spacetoday.net: Soyuz launched to ISS

Posted: Wed, Oct 10, 2007, 7:08 PM ET (2308 GMT)
Soyuz TMA-11 launch (NASA)

A Soyuz spacecraft carrying a three-person crew, including the first female space station commander and first Malaysian cosmonaut, launched on a journey to the ISS on Wednesday. A Soyuz rocket carrying the Soyuz TMA-11 spacecraft lifted off from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan at 9:22 am EDT (1322 GMT); the spacecraft reached orbit nine minutes later. The Soyuz is carrying the Expedition 16 crew of Peggy Whitson and Yuri Malenchenko, as well as Malaysian guest cosmonaut Sheikh Muszaphar Shukor, the first Malaysian to fly in space. The Soyuz is scheduled to dock with the ISS at 10:52 am EDT (1452 GMT) Friday. Shukor will return to Earth on October 21 along with Expedition 15 cosmonauts Fyodor Yurchikhin and Oleg Kotov, while Whitson, the first woman to command the ISS, and Malenchenko will remain on the station for the next six months.