A Russian Soyuz spacecraft hasblasted offtowards the International Space Station ( ISS ) , label a historical five-hundredth launch from the Gagarin launchpad in Kazakhstan . Liftoff was at 10:37 a.m. local fourth dimension in Baikonur this break of day ( 12:37 a.m. EDT , 5:37 a.m. BST ) . Its three spaceman will come at the ISS early in the morning on Friday September 4 .
On board are Sergey Volkov of Roscosmos ( Russia ’s space bureau ) , Aidyn Aimbetov of the Kazakh Space Agency and Andreas Mogensen of the European Space Agency ( ESA ) . Mogensen is Denmark ’s first cosmonaut , and to mark the special social function the 38 - class - old will be “ greet ” by 20 LEGO figurines that weretaken to the ISSon a old cargo mission . While in space , Mogensen will select competition winners from school child to receive the toy when they are returned to Earth on a hereafter SpaceX Dragon condensation .
“ It ’s a majuscule honour for me to symbolize Denmark as an astronaut , ” Mogensen said in an ESAhangout . He was earlier going to be join on the mission by British singer Sarah Brightman , but she was replaced by Aimbetov after shepulled outin May 2015 for unknown ground .
The LEGO toys are emblazoned with the mission insignia . ESA .
The flight , key out iriss , is also famed in that it will see nine hoi polloi temporarily occupy the ISS , rather than the regular six , for the first time since 2013 . This is due to a complicated version of cosmic musical chairs read position as a event of the“Year in Space”mission . Two of the crew , NASA ’s Scott Kelly and Roscosmos ’ Mikhail Kornienko , are spend 12 calendar month on the station to ply biologic data for a future mission to Mars , which will require spaceman to spend almost three years off Earth .
The ISS only has sleeping compartment for six masses though , so Mogensen state in a previous Q&A onRedditthat his crew of three would “ have to find a nice quiet turning point where we can attach our sleeping bags and nap . ”
On September 11 , Mogensen and Aimbetov will complete their brief stay on the ISS and yield to Earth with current Expedition 44 Commander Gennady Padalka of Roscosmos . Kelly and Kornienko will regress to Earth with Volkov in March 2016 . Although their time on the ISS will be unforesightful , just eight days , Mogensen and Aimbetov will complete a legion of scientific experiment in their time on the orbital outpost .
you may watch a rematch of the launching of Soyuz TMA-18 M below .
