Russian Soyuz commander Alexander Misurkin and two U.S. astronauts — flight engineers Mark Vande Hei and Joe Acaba — lifted off Tuesday from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan. The trio began their six-hour journey to the International Space Station with a launch aboard a Soyuz rocket at 2117 GMT (5:17 p.m. EDT), and docking occurred at 0255 GMT (10:55 p.m. EDT).
Three fresh crew members lifted off at 1541 GMT (11:41 a.m. EDT) Friday on a six-hour trip to the International Space Station, riding a Soyuz spaceship from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan. The trio hails from Russia, the United States and Italy and boosted the station’s crew back to a full complement of six. Docking occurred at 2154 GMT (5:54 p.m. EDT).
Launch of a Russian Soyuz spacecraft Friday carrying three fresh crew members to the International Space Station will boost the lab’s crew back to six and, most important from NASA’s perspective, dramatically boost research with four crew members — three NASA astronauts and a veteran European flier — available to operate experiments in the American segment of the laboratory.
© 1999-2017 Spaceflight Now Inc.