New Crew Arrives Safely at International Space Station

By Nancy Atkinson - December 23, 2011 06:04 PM UTC | Space Exploration

Three international travelers arrived safely at the International Space Station in their Soyuz TMA-03M spacecraft, docking just in time for the holidays, at 15:19 UTC on December 23, 2011. Oleg Kononenko from Russia, NASA astronaut Don Pettit and European Space Agency astronaut Andre Kuipers from The Netherlands docked at the Rassvet module on the Russian segment of the complex, and a few hours later were greeted by three other crew members on the outpost, station Commander Dan Burbank of NASA and Russian Flight Engineers Anton Shkaplerov and Anatoly Ivanishin, who have been aboard the orbital laboratory for just over a month.

The Soyuz slowly flew around the Station and spiralled in to perfect alignment with the Earth-facing docking port. This is just the fourth long-duration mission on the ISS for an ESA astronaut. The trio that arrived today will work aboard the Station for five months and return to Earth in May.

Nancy Atkinson

Nancy Atkinson is a space journalist and author with a passion for telling the stories of people involved in space exploration and astronomy. She is currently retired from daily writing, but worked at Universe Today for 20 years as a writer and editor. She also contributed articles to The Planetary Society, Ad Astra (National Space Society), New Scientist and many other online outlets.

Her 2019 book, "Eight Years to the Moon: The History of the Apollo Missions,” shares the untold stories of engineers and scientists who worked behind the scenes to make the Apollo program so successful, despite the daunting odds against it. Her first book “Incredible Stories From Space: A Behind-the-Scenes Look at the Missions Changing Our View of the Cosmos” (2016) tells the stories of 37 scientists and engineers that work on several current NASA robotic missions to explore the solar system and beyond.

Nancy is also a NASA/JPL Solar System Ambassador, and through this program, she has the opportunity to share her passion of space and astronomy with children and adults through presentations and programs. Nancy's personal website is nancyatkinson.com