19:55, 21 December 2009 | GMT +5
Astronauts blast off for Christmas space mission
BAIKONUR. December 21. KAZINFORM. A Russian rocket blasted off from a cosmodrome in Kazakhstan lighting up the frigid Central Asian steppe on Monday, shuttling an American, a Russian and a Japanese to the International Space Station; Kazinform refers to China Daily.

Standing in the early morning cold, the astronauts' family and friends watched as the Soyuz craft soared atop a tower of bright orange flames.
The Soyuz TMA-17's three astronauts will take the orbiting laboratory's permanent crew to five following the early-hours launch, the first-ever blastoff of a Soyuz rocket on a winter night.
Timothy J. Creamer, Soichi Noguchi and Oleg Kotov are to join current inhabitants, American Jeff Williams and Russian Maxim Surayev, who have been alone on the space station for three weeks.
The Soyuz will travel for about two days before docking with the space station 220 miles (350 kilometers) above Earth; Kazinform cites China Daily. See www.chinadaily.com.cn for full version.