SpaceX launches joint NASA crew and Japanese astronaut to ISS

NASA’s SpaceX Crew-11 members, from left: mission specialist Oleg Platonov of Roscosmos, pilot Mike Fincke of the U.S., commander Zena Cardman of the U.S. and mission specialist Kimiya Yui of Japan’s JAXA, seen at Cape Canaveral on Aug. 1. © Reuters

WASHINGTON (Reuters) — An international crew of four astronauts launched toward the International Space Station from Florida on Friday aboard a SpaceX rocket, beating gloomy weather to embark on a routine NASA mission that could be the first of many to last a couple months longer than usual.

The four-person astronaut crew — two NASA astronauts, a Russian cosmonaut and Japanese astronaut — boarded SpaceX’s Dragon capsule sitting atop its Falcon 9 rocket at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center and blasted off at 11:43 a.m. ET. They will arrive at the ISS on Saturday.