BAIKONUR, Kazakhstan (AP) -- The countdown began Friday to the launch of a Soyuz capsule carrying a Russian and American team to the International Space Station, a mission that underscores Russia's crucial role in space flight.
The launch early Saturday comes three days after China became the world's third spacefaring nation by sending its first astronaut into orbit.
In contrast to the excitement surrounding the Chinese launch, the crew at Baikonur seemed relaxed about the prospect of bolting into space at nearly 20,000 feet per second in stride.
Russia's state space commission declared all systems ready and gave the formal go-ahead for Saturday's blastoff, a decision conveyed immediately to launch-pad technicians who began preparing the Soyuz rocket for fueling.
Both NASA and the European Space Agency are counting on the launch, which is now their only means into space as a result of the Columbia space shuttle disaster.
Since the Columbia disintegrated on Feb. 1 over Texas, the Russians have made one of the Soyuz capsule's three seats available to an American astronaut. The Europeans, who lack their own means to launch astronauts, have been buying seats onboard the non-reusable Russian crafts for the past few years.
"I want to convey our thanks for your support during this period when the shuttle cannot fly," Charlie Precourt, the NASA deputy manager responsible for the space station, told Russian space officials.
Russian cosmonaut Alexander Kaleri is a veteran Soyuz pilot, and his American counterpart, Michael Foale, is returning to space for a sixth time. It's the second trip for Spaniard Pedro Duque.
"I am always looking for a new flight," Foale said in Russian, speaking from behind a thick glass wall to protect him and the other astronauts from germs.
Russia has more than four decades of experience sending people into orbit -- beginning with Yuri Gagarin's pioneering 1961 flight.
On Saturday from the same pad used by Gagarin, the crew will blast off, strapped snugly inside the compact Soyuz TM-3, for a two-day ride to the space station, aiming for a Monday docking hundreds of miles above Earth. Foale and Kaleri will become the station's next temporary inhabitants, replacing American Ed Lu and Russian Yuri Malenchenko for a six-month stay.
Duque, who plans to conduct a series of experiments, will return to Earth in 10 days with Lu and Malenchenko on another Soyuz capsule already docked at the outpost.
NASA administrator Sean O'Keefe was expected to arrive at Baikonur, an isolated Russian military outpost in the Kazakh steppe, to watch Saturday's launch. Nikolai Moiseyev, first deputy head of the Russian space agency, Rosaviakosmos, said O'Keefe's presence demonstrates the new level of cooperation between the former Cold War foes.
But while the Soyuz has easily stepped in as the "ferry" to the international space station, the shuttle's absence is starting to cause some problems. The Russians had planned to launch a Progress cargo vessel -- full of food, water and other supplies -- this fall, but that has been postponed. Russia has scrambled to prepare more Progress ships to meet the supply demands typically fulfilled by the much larger shuttle.
NASA spokesman Rob Navias insisted, however, that the delay would not leave the station's inhabitants short of supplies. "They won't be up there missing any creature comforts," he said.
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