Crew lifts off for space station
Ap, Baikonur
A Russian Soyuz rocket streaked into the skies over the Central Asian steppe yesterday, launching a US-Russian-Brazilian crew on a mission to the international space station. Russian Pavel Vinogradov and American Jeffrey Williams were to stay on board the station for about six months. Brazil's first man in space, Marcos C. Pontes, will stay at the station for nine days before returning to Earth on April 9 with the station's current crew of Russian Valery Tokarev and American Bill McArthur. Officials monitoring the launch at Russian Mission Control outside Moscow held their applause until the spacecraft reached near-Earth orbit, about 10 minutes after its 6:30 a.m. (9:30 p.m. EST Wednesday) launch.
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Cosmonauts Pavel Vinogradov (R), Jeffrey Williams (top) and Marcos Pontes wave during the farewell ceremony at the Baikonur cosmodrome in Kazakhstan yesterday. PHOTO: AFP |
