Article Posted on : - Jun 18, 2010

The International Space Station.

MOSCOW (AFP): The Russian space ship carrying a Russian cosmonaut and two US astronauts docked successfully with the International Space Station on Friday, mission control officials said.

The Soyuz-FG rocket, which blasted off Wednesday for the ISS, carried Russian cosmonaut Fyodor Yurchikhin and US astronauts Shannon Walker and Douglas Wheelock.

The team is expected to conduct several scientific tests, unload three Progress shuttles, and assemble an experimental satellite, space officials said earlier.

The astronauts would also maintain an Internet blog and an email mailbox to supply information on the station and space as a whole.

The mission is the last launch by a Soyuz rocket to the ISS before the US space shuttle programme is mothballed later this year, leaving the burden of travel to the ISS entirely on Russian spacecraft.

Despite losing the shuttles Columbia and Challenger in a pair of disasters the programme was considered a resounding success and soon took on the lion’s share of responsibility for transporting US astronauts.

A successor to the space shuttle is scheduled to take off no earlier than 2015.