A Russian-American-Dutch crew blasted into space aboard a Russian spacecraft yesterday, starting a two-day journey to the international space station on the third manned mission since the halt of the US shuttle program following the Columbia disaster in February of last year.
Russian commander Gennady Padalka, American Michael Fincke and Andre Kuipers of the Netherlands, representing the European Space Agency, paused to wave farewell before boarding the Soyuz TMA-4 spacecraft.
"Until we meet again!," Padalka shouted, giving a V-for-victory sign. Fincke flashed a thumbs up, while Kuipers held up a clenched fist.
Their relatives and friends, standing with Russian and US space officials at Russia's Baikonur launch pad in the desolate steppes of Kazakhstan, craned their necks and squinted in the sunshine to follow the rocket's trajectory after blast-off.
"Sitting on a ball of a fire, going to heaven, what more can you ask for a human being?" Fincke's father Edward said. "It's more than you can wish for. It was overwhelming," Edward Finske said.
He and other relatives gathered around a monitor transmitting images from inside the capsule. The three astronauts shook hands after the spacecraft entered orbit approximately nine minutes after lift-off, then were shown taking notes on clipboards.
The spacecraft was due to reach the ISS tomorrow morning.
Padalka and Fincke, who were initially trained to fly on a US shuttle, will spend 183 days on the space station, where they are scheduled to conduct two spacewalks. Kuipers will return after nine days with the station's current crew, US astronaut Michael Foale and Russian cosmonaut Alexander Kaleri, who have been in orbit since October.
The crew will perform various experiments in space, including geographic monitoring, biotechnology and medical projects, said Joel Montalbano, NASA's flight director, who watched the launch from Russian Mission Control outside Moscow. Padalka was to cultivate the fourth generation of peas to be grown on the ISS, he said.
Yesterday's launch came amid increasingly frequent complaints from Russia that its efforts to keep the space station manned at the expense of its own space programs are underappreciated.
"We have fulfilled all our obligations," Sergei Gorbunov, the chief spokesman for Russia's space agency, said in Baikonur on Sunday.
"Russia is taking off its last pair of pants, while the US and Japan are cutting down their (space) budgets," Gorbunov said.
"This cannot last long," he said.
Facing the need to mobilize its scarce resources to keep the station afloat while the US shuttle fleet remains grounded, Russia had to freeze the construction of its own station's segment and some commercial projects, including selling space trips to rich tourists.
NASA has turned down the Russian space agency's proposal to provide financial backing for delivering more crew and cargo to the station.
Russia is now pressing NASA to agree to extend crew stints on the space station from the current six months to one year -- a move that would allow Russia to make money selling rides to handsomely paying space tourists.
Michael Baker, NASA's ISS program manager for international and crew operations, said the US space agency hoped to have the shuttle flying again by March 2005.
"We're still in difficult times with the station, with the shuttle being down," he said in Baikonur.
Under the original agreements between partners in the 16-nation space station -- the US, Russia, members of the European Space Agency, Japan and Canada -- the station was supposed to be manned by six crew members this year.
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