The best view of today’s crew launch turned out to be from the spacecraft’s destination itself, the International Space Station.
NASA astronaut Jessica Meir, Russian cosmonaut Oleg Skripochka and United Arab Emirates spaceflight participant Hazza AlMansoori blasted off from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan today (Sept. 25) at 9:57 a.m. EDT (1457 GMT or 6:57 p.m. local time). They were bound to join a crew of six currently living and working on board the International Space Station, including Meir’s astronaut training classmate, Christina Koch.
“What it looks like from @Space_Station when your best friend achieves her lifelong dream to go to space,” Koch wrote in a tweet sharing the image yesterday (on Sept. 25). “Caught the second stage in progress! We can’t wait to welcome you onboard, crew of Soyuz 61!”
Meir and Skripochka will remain on board the space station until February; their travel companion AlMansoori returns to Earth in just a week, as he is a spaceflight participation. Koch will be heading home with Meir and Skripochka, completing the longest single spaceflight by a woman. She arrived in orbit on March 14.
Before becoming an astronaut, Meir trained as a biologist, and she her research has included raising a flock of geese. She has already completed a stint with NASA’s underwater research program.
