Russian manned spaceship successfully docks with ISS

A Russian manned spaceship has been confirmed to have successfully docked with the International Space Station (ISS) early Friday morning, two days after a docking attempt failed due to a technical hitch. "The spaceship moored at the docking assembly of the Russian module Poisk at 03:53 Moscow time, in an automatic mode," an official at the Mission Control Center told reporters. The docking, originally scheduled for Wednesday, was postponed due to an orientation problem, Russian Federal Space Agency Roscosmos said. About two hours after the Friday docking, three crew members of the ISS-39/40 mission -- Russian cosmonauts Alexander Skvortsov and Oleg Artemyev, and NASA astronaut Steven Swanson -- entered the ISS via open hatches. They were welcomed by three crew members already living on the station -- Koichi Wakata of Japan, American Rick Mastracchio and Russian Mikhail Tyurin. The newcomers are feeling well, Mission Control Center said, adding that the six crew members will be working together aboard the orbital station until May. During their planned 169 days on the station, the ISS-39/40 mission will receive several resupply spacecraft and carry out extensive scientific research, including 49 experiments under the Russian program and about 170 under the U.S. one. The Russian cosmonauts will also launch a minisatellite during a spacewalk scheduled for August.