Russian craft docks safely at space station
Source: Agencies |
April 5, 2010, Monday
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Print Edition
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A UNITED States-Russian space team sent their Easter greetings down to Earth yesterday after their Soyuz spacecraft docked flawlessly at the International Space Station.
"Happy Easter to you all," Souyz captain Russian Alexander Skvortsov broadcast from the station shortly after the ship docked at the orbiting station.
His crewmates, Californian Tracy Caldwell Dyson and Russian Mikhail Kornienko, joined him in greeting the world's Catholics, Protestants and Orthodox Christians who celebrate their belief in Jesus' resurrection on the same day this year because of a coincidence in the Julian and Gregorian calendars.
The Soyuz was launched on Friday from the Baikonur cosmodrome in Kazakhstan, and the three joined the station's current inhabitants, American astronaut Timothy J. Creamer, Soichi Noguchi of Japan, and Russia's Oleg Kotov.
Within three days, a seven-person crew aboard the shuttle Discovery will dock at the station for a 13-day mission. During this period, four women will be in space at the same time - a first in history.
The expedition led by Skvortsov, a seasoned military pilot who is making his maiden flight to space, will end in September, just as the last US shuttle flight launches from the Kennedy Space Center.
With the winding down of the shuttle, the Soyuz - which launched the world's first satellite into space in 1957 - is set to take on the burden of carrying astronauts to and from the space station.
Dependence on the Russian-made spacecraft will increase over the next few years with only four launches left for the space shuttle before it is retired. That will leave NASA without its own means to send astronauts into space for the first time in half a century. Five manned Soyuz launches are planned for next year.
The space station is the biggest orbiting outpost built and can sometimes be seen from the Earth with the naked eye. It consists of 13 modules built by the US, Russia, Canada, Japan and the European Space Agency.
"Happy Easter to you all," Souyz captain Russian Alexander Skvortsov broadcast from the station shortly after the ship docked at the orbiting station.
His crewmates, Californian Tracy Caldwell Dyson and Russian Mikhail Kornienko, joined him in greeting the world's Catholics, Protestants and Orthodox Christians who celebrate their belief in Jesus' resurrection on the same day this year because of a coincidence in the Julian and Gregorian calendars.
The Soyuz was launched on Friday from the Baikonur cosmodrome in Kazakhstan, and the three joined the station's current inhabitants, American astronaut Timothy J. Creamer, Soichi Noguchi of Japan, and Russia's Oleg Kotov.
Within three days, a seven-person crew aboard the shuttle Discovery will dock at the station for a 13-day mission. During this period, four women will be in space at the same time - a first in history.
The expedition led by Skvortsov, a seasoned military pilot who is making his maiden flight to space, will end in September, just as the last US shuttle flight launches from the Kennedy Space Center.
With the winding down of the shuttle, the Soyuz - which launched the world's first satellite into space in 1957 - is set to take on the burden of carrying astronauts to and from the space station.
Dependence on the Russian-made spacecraft will increase over the next few years with only four launches left for the space shuttle before it is retired. That will leave NASA without its own means to send astronauts into space for the first time in half a century. Five manned Soyuz launches are planned for next year.
The space station is the biggest orbiting outpost built and can sometimes be seen from the Earth with the naked eye. It consists of 13 modules built by the US, Russia, Canada, Japan and the European Space Agency.
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