</s>The International Space Station (ISS), orbiting about 400 kilometers above Earth’s surface, is about to see another change of crew. Three astronauts — two from the United States and one from Russia — who make up Expedition 56 to ISS will start their journey Wednesday aboard a Soyuz spacecraft, and arrive at their destination Friday.

Flight engineers Ricky Arnold and Drew Feustel from NASA will accompany Soyuz commander Oleg Artemyev in the Soyuz MS-08 rocket, which is scheduled to launch at 1:44 p.m. EDT Wednesday from its usual launch pad at the Baikonur Cosmodrome, Kazakhstan. After 34 orbits around the planet and 50 hours later, they will arrive at the orbiting space laboratory, docking with the Poisk module at 3:41 p.m. EDT Friday.

All three astronauts have been to ISS before, and have considerable experience conducting space walks among them. They will join members of Expedition 56 on the space station, which include the commander Anton Shkaplerov from Roscosmos, and flight engineers Scott Tingle of NASA and Norishige Kanai of Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency, who have been in space since Dec. 17.

The Russian-built Soyuz MS-08 that will fly Wednesday arrived at its launch pad Monday morning, and has been undergoing servicing since. The launch itself, as well as the docking with ISS and opening of the hatch, will all be broadcast live by NASA. The launch coverage will start at 12:30 p.m. EDT Wednesday, and can be watched on the space agency’s website, using this link. The docking live stream would start at 3 p.m. EDT Friday.

The astronauts headed to ISS, where they will spend the next five months, expressed their anticipation on their Twitter accounts (Artemyev’s is in Russian).

Some of the hundreds of experiments that would be carried out by the astronauts in the microgravity environment of the space laboratory are in the fields of biology, biotechnology, physical science and Earth science. Research conducted aboard ISS is integral to the future of space exploration, because it allows us to understand how things behave in the harsh conditions of space. Knowing that is critical to any long-term space missions humans may plan, such as setting up a base on the moon or sending a crewed expedition to Mars.

China is also working on setting up its own space station, called Tiangong (Chinese for “heavenly palace”). It is expected to be complete by the middle of the next decade.</s>Three more people are set to leave Earth to live aboard the International Space Station for about five months. They are slated to launch in their Soyuz MS-08 spacecraft at 1:44 p.m. EDT (05:44 GMT) March 21, 2018, from Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan.

After a nine-minute ride into orbit, Russian cosmonaut Oleg Artemyev and NASA astronauts Ricky Arnold and Drew Feustel will spend 34 orbits—about 50 hours—catching up with the orbiting outpost inside their tiny spacecraft. Once they dock, they will join the already-aboard Expedition 55 crew members Scott Tingle of NASA, Norishige Kanai of the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency, and Anton Shkaplerov of Roscosmos (the Russian state-run space corporation).

Artemyev, 47, previously first flew to the space station in 2014 aboard Soyuz TMA-12M as part of the Expedition 39/40 increment. During his 169-day stay, he performed two spacewalks totaling 12 hours, 34 minutes.

Feustel, 52, is a veteran of two previous spaceflights. His first flight was aboard Space Shuttle Atlantis’ STS-125 mission in 2009. During that flight he served as a mission specialist and performed three spacewalks to help repair the Hubble Space Telescope. His second flight, Space Shuttle Endeavour’s final flight in 2011, saw him visit the ISS for the first time. There he performed three spacewalks to install external experiments and equipment, repair one of the outpost’s Solar Alpha Rotary Joints, and route cables. Between his two missions, his six spacewalks total 42 hours, 18 minutes.

Arnold, 54, first flew into space aboard Space Shuttle Discovery’s STS-119 mission in 2009. That mission saw the installation of the station’s S6 truss and its two solar array wings. During the 13-day flight, he performed two spacewalks totaling 12 hours, 34 minutes to help install the truss segment and move a crew equipment cart.

The Soyuz MS-08 trio is set to dock at 3:41 p.m. EDT (19:41 GMT) March 23, 2018, at the Poisk module on the space station’s Russian orbital segment. Once onboard they will be welcomed by the three already onboard ISS before moving over to the Zvezda module for a conference call with family and friends.

It will be a busy five months for the ISS crew. On March 28, Progress MS-07, which has been attached to the outpost since October 2017, will be commanded to undock and move away from the station to begin a period of free flight to perform several experiments. The uncrewed cargo craft is slated to reenter the atmosphere and burn up sometime in April.

Just a week after docking, Feustel and Arnold will go on a spacewalk to install wireless antennas on the Tranquility module, according to NASA, and replace cameras on the P1 truss segment.

Not long after that, on April 2, SpaceX is set to launch the CRS-14 Dragon cargo spacecraft. It will rendezvous and berth to ISS on April 4 to spend about a month attached to the 400-metric-ton complex.

In May, Expedition 55 is expected to see the arrival of Orbital ATK’s OA-9 Cygnus cargo ship. Additionally, the crew is expected to perform another two-person spacewalk.

In June, Shkaplerov, Tingle and Kanai will leave in their Soyuz MS-07 spacecraft and the remaining three will transition to Expedition 56. Several days later, Russian cosmonaut Sergey Prokopyev, NASA astronaut Serena Aunon-Chancellor and European Space Agency astronaut Alexander Gerst will launch to the outpost in Soyuz MS-09 to return the crew compliment to six.

Also in June, another SpaceX Dragon cargo ship is slated to arrive for a month-long mission and Orbital ATK’s OA-9 Cygnus will unberth.

Just before the Soyuz MS-08 trio leaves the ISS in late August, they could see the arrival of the seventh Japanese Kounotori cargo spacecraft and—if schedules hold—the unpiloted arrival of one of the Commercial Crew Program spacecraft, although the schedules are anticipated to slip further into the year.

All-in-all, it is expected to be a very busy period as in between all of these events the crew will be performing hundreds of experiments brought to the outpost by the various cargo spacecraft.

To prepare for launch, Roscosmos rolled Soyuz MS-08 and the 162-foot (49.5-meter) tall Soyuz FG carrier rocket to the launch pad two days in advance of its anticipated March 21 flight. The vehicle was transported via rail to Pad 1/5, also known as Gagarin Start after the first human to leave the planet in April 1961. This will be the 137th flight of a Soyuz spacecraft. Additionally, this will be the third orbital launch performed by Russia in 2018 and the first human spaceflight of the year.

Derek Richardson has a degree in mass media, with an emphasis in contemporary journalism, from Washburn University in Topeka, Kansas. While at Washburn, he was the managing editor of the student run newspaper, the Washburn Review. He also has a blog about the International Space Station, called Orbital Velocity. He met with members of the SpaceFlight Insider team during the flight of a United Launch Alliance Atlas V 551 rocket with the MUOS-4 satellite. Richardson joined our team shortly thereafter. His passion for space ignited when he watched Space Shuttle Discovery launch into space Oct. 29, 1998. Today, this fervor has accelerated toward orbit and shows no signs of slowing down. After dabbling in math and engineering courses in college, he soon realized his true calling was communicating to others about space. Since joining SpaceFlight Insider in 2015, Richardson has worked to increase the quality of our content, eventually becoming our managing editor. @TheSpaceWriter</s>A Russian Soyuz MS-08 spacecraft with three astronauts aboard was launched Wednesday from the Baikonur Cosmodrome bound for the International Space Station.</s>Two NASA astronauts and one Russian cosmonaut launched on a Russian Soyuz rocket bound for the International Space Station on Wednesday.

Soyuz commander Oleg Artemyev, flight engineer Andrew “Drew” Feustel and Richard “Ricky” Arnold launched aboard the Soyuz MS-08/54S spacecraft from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan at 1:44 p.m. EDT (GMT-4; 11:44 p.m. local time).

The capsule carrying the trio should dock with the ISS at approximately 3:41 p.m. Friday. They’ll join Expedition 55 commander Anton Shkaplerov, NASA astronaut Scott Tingle and Japanese crewmate Norishige Kanai. Three other crew members — Alexander Misurkin, Mark Vande Hei and Joe Acaba — returned to Earth on Feb. 27.

Shkaplerov, Tingle and Kanai are scheduled to return to Earth on June 3.</s>In the sparsely populated Kazakh Steppe in Kazakhstan, Russia’s state-run space corporation, Roscosmos, launched three people to the International Space Station. Soyuz MS-08 lifted off pad 1/5 at 1:44 p.m. EDT (17:44 GMT) March 21, 2018, from Baikonur Cosmodrome.

The following photos taken by NASA’s Joel Kowsky show the 162-foot (49.5-meter) long Soyuz-FG carrier rocket roll out to the launch pad two days before liftoff, the three fresh Expedition 55 crew members traveling to their Soyuz MS-08 spacecraft the day of the flight, and the launch itself.

Russian cosmonaut Oleg Artemyev and NASA astronauts Ricky Arnold and Drew Feustel are on a two-day trek to rendezvous and dock with the ISS. The spacecraft will link up with the Poisk module at 3:41 p.m. EDT (19:41 GMT) March 23 to begin a five-month stay at the outpost.

From left to right: NASA astronaut Drew Feustel, Russian cosmonaut Oleg Artemyev and NASA astronaut Ricky Arnold</s>Engineers readied a Russian Soyuz rocket for launch Wednesday to ferry a veteran cosmonaut and two NASA shuttle fliers to the International Space Station for a five-month stay.

Soyuz commander Oleg Artemyev, flight engineer Andrew "Drew" Feustel and Richard "Ricky" Arnold are scheduled for launch aboard the Soyuz MS-08/54S spacecraft from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan at 1:44 p.m. EDT (GMT-4; 11:44 p.m. local time).

As usual, the launching is timed to roughly coincide with the moment Earth's rotation carries the pad into the plane of the space station's orbit, a requirement for spacecraft attempting to rendezvous with targets moving at nearly five miles per second.

Artemyev, veteran of a 2014 stay aboard the station, is making his first flight as Soyuz commander. Feustel, a self-described "gearhead" with a doctorate in geology and a passion for car restoration, will serve as co-pilot in the Soyuz's left seat.

"It's just amazing," Feustel said of the Russian vehicle. "The spacecraft is well designed, it's got a lot of great redundant features to it ... and it has some incredible capabilities. It's beauty is in it simplicity. It's been a thrill to learn how well engineered that vehicle is."

But he added that learning to handle the Soyuz systems while training in a second language was no small challenge. He credited the Russian training team in Star City near Moscow with getting him up to speed.

"If you can take a geologist and put him in the left seat and teach him how to fly a spacecraft, I think that's a great feat!" he said. "It's been challenging, but I'm happy to say I think we've made it out on the other side of training in a very positive way, and we'll be well prepared to launch into space."

If all goes well, Artemyev, strapped into the Soyuz command module's center seat, flanked on the left by Feustel and on the right by Arnold, will monitor an automated approach to the space station, moving in for docking at the lab's upper Poisk module at 3:41 p.m. Friday.

Arnold, like Feustel a shuttle veteran, said he was excited by a chance to fly aboard a Soyuz, although the spacecraft is not known for its creature comforts.

"I'm a pretty tall guy, and the Soyuz was not designed for people over six feet tall," he said of the two-day rendezvous in the cramped ship. "However, it does a great job of getting us to and from orbit, it provides a lifeboat for us in case we need to come home in an emergency. I'm incredibly thankful to have to have the opportunity to fly both of those iconic spacecraft."

Once docked at the station, Artemyev and his crewmates will be welcomed aboard by Expedition 55 commander Anton Shkaplerov, NASA astronaut Scott Tingle and Japanese crewmate Norishige Kanai. They've had the station to themselves since three other crew members -- Alexander Misurkin, Mark Vande Hei and Joe Acaba -- returned to Earth on Feb. 27 to close out a 168-day stay in space.

All three members of the Soyuz MS-08 crew are spaceflight veterans with a combined 10 spacewalks between them, experience that will come in handy during up to four planned EVAs, three U.S. and one Russian, during their station expedition.

Artemyev completed a 169-day stay aboard the station in 2014, participating in two spacewalks totaling 12 hours and 34 minutes. Arnold, an educator with a degree in marine science who has taught at schools around the world, flew a single mission aboard the shuttle Discovery in 2009 and logged two spacewalks totaling 12 hours 34 minutes helping install one of the station's main solar array truss segments.

"Oleg Artemyev is one of the best guys you can meet but honestly, I never met a cosmonaut in the last 18 years that I didn't like and get along with," Feustel said in an interview with CBS News. "We have a great relationship with these individuals, they're very professional, they're very technically skilled, and I can't speak more highly of him and having him as a crewmate. I really look forward to spending time with him on orbit."

Arnold agreed, saying "he is a great guy."

"He comes from an EVA background, which is the job I had prior to being assigned to this mission," Arnold added. "He's been here a long time, he's very technically sharp. It's his second mission, his first time in command of the Soyuz. He's very kind, he has a great sense of humor, and I think he does a really good job of bringing people together and making them feel part of the team."

Of the three new station crew members, Feustel has the most spacewalk experience. He participated in two shuttle missions for a combined 28 days 15 hours in space, one in 2009 to service the Hubble Space Telescope and another in 2011 to help finish construction of the space station.

He logged 21 hours and 20 minutes of EVA time during three excursions at the space station and another 20 hours and 58 minutes during three spacewalks to work on the Hubble telescope.

Feustel and Arnold expect to venture outside the space station on March 29 to install wireless communications gear that will be used by an external payload and, eventually, by approaching commercial crew ferry ships being built by Boeing and SpaceX. They also plan to swap out a high-definition camera and remove aging hoses in the station's ammonia coolant system.

Two more NASA spacewalks are expected in the May-June timeframe, followed by a Russian excursion in August. But the primary goal of the mission is science, with a full agenda of experiments and research on tap, along with the usual station maintenance work.

Asked what he was looking forward to the most, Artemyev said through an interpreter "I really hope our work will be a step forward towards further solar system exploration."

"Everything that we're doing on the station is a step forward to future flights to the moon, to Mars and farther," he said. "And, of course, we need to stay friends throughout our joint endeavour. ... We cannot allow politics to rule our life on the ISS."

Arnold said he was looking forward to living on the station long term rather than visiting as a "quick house guest" like he did on his previous shuttle mission.

"You don't really get the sense of living and working in space" on a short visit, he said. "You're kind of there to do a specific job and then turn around and go home. The pace will be different, I believe, the continuity and the science, actually seeing day to day how the flight plan lays out and then when we do have some time off to be able to enjoy the view. I think it's just going to have a different feel to it."

A graduate of the U.S. Naval Academy, Arnold taught middle school science in Maryland, earned a master's degree in environmental science and later taught in Casablanca, Morocco, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, West Papua, Indonesia, and Bucharest, Romania.

Arnold said he also hopes to follow in the footsteps of the Acaba, a fellow teacher, "to really shine a light on the people who are working in our nation's and the world's classrooms, just to kind of say this is what's possible, these are amazing people, we have really talented folks working in the classroom and just to kind of say thanks to them."

For Feustel, it's the science and a chance to maintain the equipment that's most appealing about a long-term stay aboard the station. He worked as an auto mechanic while attending community college in Michigan, restoring 1950s-era Jaguars, before earning a doctorate in geology and eventually working as a geophysicist for Exxon.

"I'm looking forward to the science," he said, "but what I'm really looking forward to is the opportunity to keep the space station living for another six months and have it well prepared to receive the next crew that comes on after us.

"As you know, we're the hands, eyes and ears of the researchers, and our job is just to keep things operating and executing the science. Most of us don't make up science experiments to take to space, but we're really there to make sure everything gets done to ensure the success of the mission.

"I'm a bit of a gearhead, so putting my hands on the hardware to make sure we can keep it operating will be a fun challenge."

Shkaplerov, Tingle and Kanai are scheduled to return to Earth on June 3 to close out a 167-day voyage while Artemyev, Feustel and Arnold expect to remain in space for 159 days, returning to a landing on the steppe of Kazakhstan on Aug. 28.</s>A rocket carrying two American astronauts and a Russian cosmonaut to the International Space Station has blasted off successfully.

The Soyuz booster blasted off as scheduled on Wednesday from the Russia-leased Baikonur launchpad in Kazakhstan.

It is carrying Nasa astronauts Drew Feustel and Ricky Arnold, and Roscosmos' cosmonaut Oleg Artemyev.

The rocket put their Soyuz MS-08 spacecraft in a designated orbit en route to the station.

The crew are now ‘embarking on a two day journey to their new home in space.’

The spacecraft is set to dock at the orbiting outpost on Friday.

The trio will join Anton Shkaplerov of Roscosmos, Scott Tingle of Nasa and Norishige Kanai of the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency who are on the station.

The mission comes at a time of strained relations between Russia and the West, with the country blamed for the poisoning of a former Kremlin spy in Salisbury and meddling in the US election.

In a neutrally worded tweet prior to the launch, the American space agency said: 'Three people will leave planet Earth (on Wednesday) for a journey to humanity's orbiting laboratory – the @Space_Station.'

The trio, who were pictured putting their hands together as they prepared for their flight, are scheduled to arrive at the ISS on Friday.

While circling the Earth 240 miles up, the members of Expedition 55-56 will continue work on the hundreds of experiments aboard the ISS.

The United States recently imposed fresh sanctions on Russia after a probe into meddling in the 2016 election of Donald Trump.

Meanwhile the UK and Russia have been involved in a tit-for-tat expulsion of diplomats as part of a row over who was responsible for the attempted assassination of Sergei Skripal.</s>Drew "A.J." Feustel of Lake Orion is set to launch to the International Space Station at 1:45 p.m. today, according to WDIV-TV.

Feustel joins fellow American astronaut Rick Arnold and Russian cosmonaut Oleg Artemyev aboard the Soyuz MS-08, the station reported.

According to NASA, after launching from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan, the three will embark on a 50-hour, 34-orbit flight to the International Space Station — they are expected to arrive at the space station on Friday and dock to the Poisk module at 3:41 p.m.

"The orbiting trio continues to ensure the station is flying in tip-top shape while conducting advanced space science to benefit humans on Earth and in space," a NASA blog post on Monday said.

This trip marks NASA's Expedition 55, in which two spacewalks are planned, and "researchers will study Earth atmospherics, the effects of microgravity on bone marrow, materials’ responses to space environments, and biological samples’ responses to simulated gravity," according to the mission summary.

According to NASA, Feustel has been assigned to be the Flight Engineer for Expedition 55 and will later serve Commander for NASA's Expedition 56.

Feustel told WDIV that he's always been surrounded by space — the house he grew up in is located on Saturn Drive, and streets in the surrounding neighborhoods included: Armstrong, Gemini and Mercury.

According to his NASA profile:
• Feustel was selected by NASA in 2000 and assigned to Expedition 55/56 scheduled to launch in March 2018.
• He has a Ph.D. in Geological Sciences, specializing in Seismology
• He is a veteran of two space flights, having served on the: STS-125, which launched on Atlantis in 2009 and was the final mission to service the Hubble Space Telescope, and the STS-134 which launched on Endeavor in 2011 to deliver an Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer and an ExPress Logistics Carrier to the International Space Station
• He has logged more than 29 days in space and over 42 hours in spacewalks

Contact reporter Aleanna Siacon at ASiacon@freepress.com. Follow her on Twitter: @AleannaSiacon.</s>Soyuz MS-08 trio lights up Kazakh sky to begin 2-day trek to ISS

Lighting up the Kazakh Steppe at the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan, three fresh International Space Station crew members launched toward space to begin a two-day chase of the orbiting outpost. Soyuz MS-08 launched at 1:44 p.m. EDT (17:44 GMT) March 21, 2018.

Riding a Soyuz-FG rocket, Russian cosmonaut Oleg Artemyev and NASA astronauts Ricky Arnold and Drew Feustel achieved orbit in just under nine minutes to begin a two-day, 34-orbit rendezvous profile to catch up to the ISS. Docking with the Poisk module is expected to occur at about 3:41 p.m. EDT (19:41 GMT) March 23. There the trio will join the already-aboard Expedition 55 crew members Scott Tingle of NASA, Norishige Kanai of the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency, and Anton Shkaplerov of Roscosmos (the Russian state-run space corporation).

The run-up to the nighttime launch started with the rollout of the Soyuz-FG rocket with the Soyuz MS-08 spacecraft two days before, on March 19. Transported horizontally by rail, the vehicle made the trek to launch pad 1/5, also known as Gagarin Start—the place where the first human, Yuri Gagarin, launched into space.

Once there, the rocket was lifted into the vertical position and umbilicals connected to begin the process of readying the 162-foot (49.5-meter) tall machine for its launch.

Soyuz MS-08, call sign “Hawaii,” is part of the latest evolution of the spacecraft (Soyuz-MS) that dates back to its first launch in 1967. It consists of three modules—an orbital module, descent module (where the crew resides), and a service module—totaling 25.5 feet (7.78 meters) long and 8.9 feet (2.72 meters wide). With its solar panels deployed, it has a wingspan of 35 feet (10.7 meters).

During their two-day journey, the crew will have a tiny volume of 370 cubic feet (10.5 cubic meters) to live in between the orbital and decent modules.

The Soyuz-FG carrier rocket has three stages, which includes its four strap-on liquid-fueled boosters as the first stage. Those boosters are 64 feet (19.6 meters) tall and 8.8 feet (2.68 meters) wide. Each sport a single RD-107A engine that consumes liquid oxygen and rocket grade kerosene to produce 188,500 pounds (838.5 kilonewtons) of thrust for 118 seconds before falling away.

Stage two includes the 89-foot (27.1-meter) tall, 9.7-foot (2.95-meter) wide core stage. It is powered by a single RD-108A engine, which also consumes liquid oxygen and rocket grade kerosene. It fires at the same time as the boosters and produces 178,160 pounds (792.5 kilonewtons) of thrust for about 280 seconds.

The third stage is 22 feet (6.7 meters) long and 8.7 feet (2.66 meters) wide. It is powered by an RD-0110 engine and consumes liquid oxygen and rocket grade kerosene to produce 66,980 pounds (298 kilonewtons) of thrust. It fires for up to 230 seconds to push the Soyuz spacecraft into orbit.

About 8.5 hours before launch, the crew woke up and began their last hours on Earth before their five-month mission. This included eating breakfast, performing various traditions such as signing room door at the Cosmonaut Hotel and being blessed by Russian Orthodox priests, and saying their final goodbyes to friends and family.

At about 6 hours before liftoff, the crew left the Cosmonaut Hotel to board a bus bound for Site 254 where they were given final medical checks and helped into their Sokol launch and entry suits.

Meanwhile, five hours before launch, the rocket began receiving its rocket grade kerosene propellant and liquid oxygen. This loading was completed before the crew arrived at the launch pad, although it would continue to be topped off as the cryogenic liquid oxygen slowly boiled away.

Just over three hours before leaving Earth, the crew departed Site 254 to take the 50-minute bus ride to the launch pad. At 2.5 hours before liftoff, the ground teams began helping the crew into their Soyuz MS-08 spacecraft.

Just over two hours before engine ignition, the hatch to the Soyuz was shut and sealed, and ground teams began final system checks on the vehicle.

With one hour to go, the pad was evacuated and the crew left alone to wait for the final countdown sequence. To pass the time, music was fed into the capsule. The last song listened to was “Crazy Train” by Ozzy Osbourne.

Some 45 minutes before launch, the two service tower halves retracted. This also took away the crew’s launch pad access back to Earth. From this point, should something had gone wrong, the only way to safety would have been the spacecraft’s launch abort tower. However, everything continued nominally.

In the final 10 minutes of the countdown the crew members closed their helmets and turned on their suit air, the launch key was inserted in the launch bunker, and the auto sequence began.

Forty seconds from liftoff, the third stage umbilical tower retracted. This was followed by the core stage umbilical tower triggering the engine ignition sequence at 20 seconds before launch.

It took 15 seconds for the five multi-chamber engines at the base of the Soyuz-FG rocket to throttle to full power. Then five seconds later, the entire stack began rising toward the night sky.

One minute, 54 seconds after leaving Earth, the abort tower jettisoned as it was no longer required. Three seconds later, the four liquid-fueled boosters separated. This was followed 40 seconds later by the launch shroud jettisoning to reveal the Soyuz MS-08 spacecraft to space.

Some 4 minutes 45 seconds after liftoff, the core stage shut down. Three seconds later, the third stage ignited and then separated from the lower stage in a process called “hot staging.”

The third stage continued to burn for just under four minutes before cutting off 8 minutes, 44 seconds after launch. Soyuz MS-08 separated four seconds later and began deploying its antennas and twin solar panels. Soyuz MS-08 was in orbit.

For the rest of the crew’s day, they will work to perform two orbit-raising burns on the spacecraft’s third orbit. By their sixth orbit, the trio will go into a sleep period on the tiny spacecraft.

On Thursday, the spacecraft will perform another orbital adjustment burn and on Friday, the spacecraft is set to rendezvous and dock with the ISS.

Once onboard, the trio will spend five months there before returning to Earth in late August. During their time, they will perform hundreds of experiments and support several visiting vehicle arrivals and departures beginning with SpaceX’s CRS-14 Dragon spacecraft in early April. Their first major task, however, will be preparing for an extravehicular activity on March 29.

This EVA will be performed by spacewalking veterans Feustel and Arnold. Combined, the two have over 55 hours of time spent inside a suit in the void of space.

Their primary tasks on the spacewalk will include installing wireless antennas on the Tranquility module and replacing cameras on the P1 truss segment, according to NASA.

Today’s launch was the 137th flight of a Soyuz spacecraft and the 63rd of the Soyuz-FG rocket, which traces its heritage to the R-7 intercontinental ballistic missile first launched in the late 1950s. The R-7 family of boosters has collectively launched more than 1,800 times—more than any other large rocket family.

Additionally, this was the third orbital launch performed by Russia in 2018 and the first human spaceflight of the year.

Derek Richardson has a degree in mass media, with an emphasis in contemporary journalism, from Washburn University in Topeka, Kansas. While at Washburn, he was the managing editor of the student run newspaper, the Washburn Review. He also has a blog about the International Space Station, called Orbital Velocity. He met with members of the SpaceFlight Insider team during the flight of a United Launch Alliance Atlas V 551 rocket with the MUOS-4 satellite. Richardson joined our team shortly thereafter. His passion for space ignited when he watched Space Shuttle Discovery launch into space Oct. 29, 1998. Today, this fervor has accelerated toward orbit and shows no signs of slowing down. After dabbling in math and engineering courses in college, he soon realized his true calling was communicating to others about space. Since joining SpaceFlight Insider in 2015, Richardson has worked to increase the quality of our content, eventually becoming our managing editor. @TheSpaceWriter
Three people (two American, one Russian) launch successfully from the Baikonur Cosmodrome aboard Soyuz MS-08 to the International Space Station as part of Expedition 55.