3 astronauts set to launch to space station on Monday
Washington: Three space travellers, including two astronauts on their first flight, are scheduled to launch to the International Space Station (ISS) on Monday for a six-and-a-half month mission, NASA said.
The launch comes less than two months after a booster failure forced a Soyuz spacecraft carrying Russian cosmonaut Alexey Ovchinin and US astronaut Nick Hague to make an emergency landing.
The incident became the first failure of a manned space launch in modern Russian history.
The three new space travellers -- Anne McClain of NASA, David Saint-Jacquesof the Canadian Space Agency and Oleg Kononenko of Russian space agency Roscosmos - are preparing to launch aboard the Soyuz MS-11 spacecraft at 5.31 p.m. from the Baikonur spaceport in Kazakhstan.
Following a six-hour journey making four orbits of Earth, the crew will dock the Soyuz to the station's Poisk module to begin their mission on the orbital laboratory.
It will be the first flight for both McClain and Saint-Jacques and the fourth for Kononenko.
Less than two hours after docking, hatches between the Soyuz and the station will open, and the current crew, Expedition 57 Commander Alexander Gerst of ESA (European Space Agency), NASA Flight Engineer Serena Aunon-Chancellor and Roscosmos Flight Engineer Sergey Prokopyev, who have been in orbit since June, will greet them.
Kononenko, McClain and Saint-Jacques will officially become the Expedition 58 crew when Gerst, Aunon-Chancellor and Prokopyev depart the station for home on December 20.
In 100 bail orders: 'Videos' used for arrest in 44; 32 of these failed ...
22 Feb 2021 7:11 PM GMTDelhi Police say 1,753 held but courts heard over 4,347 bail pleas
21 Feb 2021 8:26 PM GMT755 FIRs and 342 chargesheets against 1,553 people later – not a...
21 Feb 2021 7:48 PM GMTOf courts' bugbears, most common 'doubtful' police, public witness...
23 Feb 2021 7:29 PM GMTA Delhi Police-sized roadblock in victims' path to justice — clubbing...
25 Feb 2021 7:39 PM GMT
David Miller guides Gujarat to IPL final, beat RR by 7 wickets
24 May 2022 7:34 PM GMTMedvedev starts off French Open campaign with an easy win
24 May 2022 7:33 PM GMTShafali, Wolvaardt dazzle as Velocity win by 7 wickets
24 May 2022 7:32 PM GMTATK Mohun Bagan thrash Maziya 5-2 to book knockout stage berth
24 May 2022 7:32 PM GMTGanguly not worried about Rohit, Kohli's form, says 'matter of time'
24 May 2022 7:32 PM GMT