A Russian rocket launched three astronauts toward the International Space Station late Monday night, kicking off a two-day journey to the huge orbiting lab. NASA astronaut Joe Acaba and Russian cosmonauts Gennady Padalka and Sergei Revin launched aboard a Soyuz spacecraft from Kazakhstan's Baikonur Cosmodrome Monday at 11:01 p.m. EDT (0301 GMT Tuesday).

The Soyuz is slated to dock with the space station shortly after midnight EDT (0400 GMT) on Thursday (May 17). Once aboard, the three space flyers will bring the orbiting complex back to its full complement of six residents, according to the Space.Com The three newcomers will live aboard the station for four months, eventually returning to Earth in mid-September, NASA officials said. Russia is now the sole nation capable of transporting humans to the ISS after the withdrawal of the US shuttle but this blast-off was the first manned flight from Baikonur since December 21. The launch had been delayed by one-and-a-half months after the spacecraft the three spacemen were initially to use in the mission was shown in testing not to be hermetically sealed and could not be used for safety reasons. Padalka, who is making his fourth space flight, is one of Russia's most experienced and decorated active cosmonauts who has already spent 585 days in space and made eight spacewalks. Acaba had previously made one shuttle flight while Revin is making his first trip into space.

Source: BNA