Russian space agency, Roscosmos, successfully launched the fastest ever trip of a manned spacecraft to the International Space Station (ISS). It took little over 3 hours for the 3-member crew comprising of Sergey Ryzhikov and Sergey Kud-Sverchkov of Roscosmos and NASA’s Kathleen Rubins, to dock their spacecraft, Soyuz MS-17. The launching of the craft was done from the Russian-operated Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan (world’s first spaceport for orbital and human launches and the largest (in area) operational space launch facility).
This crewed mission marks the use of an ‘ultrafast’ flight plan which made it possible to cover the distance in 3 hours and 3 minutes. Earlier such trips from the launching station to ISS, took 6 hours or more. Also, Soyuz MS-17 could chase down the ISS by completing only 2 orbits (to follow a curved path around a planet or a star) around the earth compared to minimum of 4 orbits required in the past.