Spaceship carrying three-man crew docks with ISS, NASA TV reports

[October 27, 2016]    (Reuters) - A Russian Soyuz spacecraft carrying an American astronaut and two Russian cosmonauts docked with the International Space Station on Friday, NASA TV reported, two days after blasting off from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan.

The Soyuz MS-02 spacecraft carrying the crew of Shane Kimbrough of the U.S., Sergey Ryzhikov and Andrey Borisenko of Russia blasts off to the International Space Station (ISS) from the launchpad at the Baikonur cosmodrome, Kazakhstan, October 19, 2016. REUTERS/Shamil Zhumatov

The spaceship with NASA's Shane Kimbrough and Russians Sergey Ryzhikov and Andrey Borisenko on board completed the docking maneuver at 0952 GMT.

The trio has joined three other ISS crew members - Kate Rubins of NASA, Anatoly Ivanishin of Roscosmos and Takuya Onishi of the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency - who have manned the station since July and are due to return to Earth on Oct. 29.

Kimbrough, Ryzhikov and Borisenko's Expedition 49-50 mission will last until February.

The next Soyuz mission is set to blast off to the station, which orbits about 250 miles (400 km) above Earth, on Nov. 16.

NASA hopes to resume flying station crewmembers from the United States in 2018 aboard capsules under development by Boeing Co <BA.N> and privately owned Space Exploration Technologies, or SpaceX.

(Reporting by Olzhas Auyezov in Almaty; Editing by Katya Golubkova and Alison Williams)

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