Posted: Wed, Dec 21, 2011, 11:06 AM ET (1606 GMT)
A Soyuz spacecraft carrying ISS crewmembers from Europe, Russia, and the United States lifted off Wednesday from Baikonur. The Soyuz rocket carrying the Soyuz TMA-03M spacecraft lifted off at 8:21 am EST (1321 GMT, 7:21 pm local time) Wednesday from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan and placed the spacecraft into orbit nine minutes later. The spacecraft is carrying three new ISS crew members, Don Pettit of NASA, Oleg Kononenko of Roscosmos, and Andre Kuipers of ESA. The spacecraft is scheduled to arrive at the ISS at 10:22 am EST (1522 GMT) Friday.

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•  Reuters article
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