Capsule with Russian, American and Japanese astronauts links smoothly with International Space Station
Soyuz Commander Oleg Kononenko of the Russian Federal Space Agency, centre, Flight Engineer Kjell Lindgren of NASA, left, and Flight Engineer Kimiya Yui of the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA), wave farewell to family and friends as they depart the Cosmonaut Hotel to suit-up for their Soyuz launch to the International Space Station on Wednesday in Baikonur, Kazakhstan. Photo: NASA/Getty Image
BAIKONUR: A Soyuz space capsule carrying a Russian, an American and a Japanese docked smoothly Thursday with the International Space Station.
The capsule connected to the orbiting laboratory about 400 kilometres above Earth at 10.45 pm EST Wednedsay.
The rocket had lifted off from Kazakhstan about 5 hours and 45 minutes earlier.
The rocket reached orbit about 15 minutes after launch and circled the Earth four times before heading for the space station.
The capsule carried Oleg Kononenko of Russia, NASA’s Kjell Lindgren and Kimiya Yui of Japan. Lindgren and Yui are on their first trips into space. Yui told a news conference that he was taking some sushi with him as a treat for the others.
They join Gennady Padalka, Mikhail Kornienko and Scott Kelly. The latter two are more than four months into a nearly year-long mission on the space station.
The launch was postponed by about two months after the April failure of an unmanned Russian cargo ship, which raised concerns about Russian rocketry. Another Russian cargo ship was successfully launched in early July.
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