Russians launch crucial flight to space station

MOSCOW?? Three astronauts were lofted into orbit amid heavy snowfall on Monday, on a mission to bring the crew of the International Space Station back to full strength.

The liftoff at 10:14 a.m. local time (11:14 p.m. ET) from Russia's Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan came after a weeks-long delay, due to the crash of a Russian rocket that was carrying an unmanned cargo spaceship. That incident in August forced the Russians to review the safety of the similar Soyuz rocket model that is used for manned launches.

The U.S.-Russian crew is the first to enter orbit since NASA ended its 30-year shuttle program in July, heralding a period of several years when the space station's partners will have to rely solely on Russia to ferry crews.

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Any problem with the launch could have left the space station empty for the first time in more than a decade when the current three-man crew returns to Earth later this month.

The launch came amid what NASA spokesman Rob Navias said was about half a foot (15 centimeters) of snow and "almost whiteout" conditions. Russian controllers said the launch could proceed despite the snow because winds at the launch site were within limits.

This marks the first voyage on board a Soyuz spacecraft for veteran NASA astronaut Daniel Burbank, while cosmonauts Anatoly Ivanishin and Anton Shkaplerov are making their maiden spaceflights.

Russia's space agency decided Monday's launch could go ahead after determining that the Aug. 24 Soyuz rocket failure was an "isolated" glitch caused by a fuel pipe blockage. The launch of an unmanned Progress craft in October added to Russia's confidence that the problem was limited to one bad rocket.

The spacefliers shrugged off safety concerns before liftoff.

"We don't have any black thoughts. We have faith in our equipment," Russian news agencies quoted Shkaplerov as saying.

Once the Soyuz spacecraft was safely in orbit, the crew flashed a thumbs-up signal to onboard cameras, and applause broke out at Russia's Mission Control center.

After a cramped two-day journey aboard the Soyuz TMA-22 capsule, the trio will dock with the space station on Nov. 16, overlapping briefly with station commander Mike Fossum of NASA, Japan's Satoshi Furukawa and Russia's Sergei Volkov. Those three are due to return to Earth aboard a different Soyuz craft on Nov. 22, with their replacements launching from Baikonur on Dec. 21.

Moscow hopes a smooth crew transition will help restore its reputation after last week's apparent failure of what was once touted as post-Soviet Russia's interplanetary debut. The $165 million Phobos-Grunt probe was launched from Baikonur, with the objective of journeying to the Martian moon Phobos, but it became stuck in Earth orbit and may plunge back through the atmosphere within weeks.

Botched launches have also lost Russia a high-tech military orbiter, a costly telecommunication satellite and set back plans for a global navigation system to rival the U.S. Global Positioning System.

This year the United States turned over all crewed flight responsibilities to Russia, at a cost of about $350 million a year, until commercial firms can offer space-taxi rides.

NASA is seeking $850 million to help U.S.-based private companies develop human orbital transport capabilities with the goal of breaking Russia's monopoly on ferrying astronauts to the space station before the end of 2016.

This report includes information from Reuters and msnbc.com.

? 2011 msnbc.com

Source: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/45277363/ns/technology_and_science-space/

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