A trio of US and Japanese astronauts and a Russian cosmonaut blasted off from Kazakhstan on December 17 for a two-day trip to the International Space Station, a NASA TV broadcast showed.
Commander Anton Shkaplerov of Roscosmos and flight engineers Norishige Kanai of Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency and Scott Tingle of NASA lifted off from the Baikonur Cosmodrome at 1:21 pm local time (0721 GMT/0221 EST).
The crew will gradually approach the station, which orbits about 250 miles (400 km) above Earth, for two days before docking.
Shkaplerov, Kanai and Tingle will join Alexander Misurkin of Roscosmos and Mark Vande Hei and Joe Acaba of NASA, who have been aboard the orbital outpost since September.
Onboard cameras showed crew members making thumbs-up gestures after the blast-off. Also visible was a stuffed dog toy chosen by Shkaplerov’s daughter to be the spacecraft’s zero-gravity indicator. NASA broadcasted the launch on Twitter and 10 minutes after blasting off, Soyuz was in orbit.
And LIFTOFF! @Anton_Astrey, @Astro_Maker and @Astro_Kanai are headed to the @Space_Station. Watch live: https://t.co/mzKW5uDsTi pic.twitter.com/1mbL9oQjU9
— NASA (@NASA) December 17, 2017
Soyuz was safely in orbit about 10 minutes after the launch.
