A Soyuz rocket rolled out to its launch pad at the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan today to begin counting down to a Thanksgiving Day liftoff of three new crew members to the International Space Station. NASA astronaut Chris Williams and Roscosmos cosmonauts Sergey Kud-Sverchkov and Sergei Mikaev are scheduled to lift off aboard the Soyuz MS-28 spacecraft at 4:27 a.m. EDT (3:27 p.m. Baikonur time) on Thursday, Nov. 27. They will orbit Earth twice before docking to the Rassvet module at 7:38 a.m. the same day beginning an eight-month space research mission.

The Cygnus XL spacecraft, supporting the Northrop Grumman-23 commercial resupply services mission for NASA, was uninstalled today from the International Space Station. It will remain attached to the station’s Canadarm2 robotic arm until Monday, Dec. 1, clearing the way for the arrival of the crewed Roscosmos Soyuz MS-28 spacecraft on Thursday. 

NASA, Northrop Grumman, and Roscosmos coordinated the spacecraft’s movement to prevent any unnecessary structural loads from being imparted on Cygnus XL and its solar arrays when the Soyuz MS-28 spacecraft docks to the Rassvet module, which is the adjacent docking port. The on-duty robotics officer in the Mission Control Center at NASA’s Johnson Space Center in Houston completed the maneuver, while agency astronauts Jonny Kim and Zena Cardman monitored from inside the space station. 

Cygnus XL will be reattached to the space station on Dec. 1 and remain there until no earlier than March 2026, when it is scheduled to depart and dispose of several thousand pounds of trash during its destructive re-entry into Earth’s atmosphere. 

Kim earlier worked out on the advanced resistive exercise device for one part of the CIPHER investigation that is studying cardiorespiratory fitness, muscle strength, and endurance in microgravity. Cardman injected gas into a specialized tank for a fluid physics experiment that is testing ways to protect super-cooled fluids, or cryogenic fluids, in space.

Flight Engineers Mike Fincke of NASA and Kimiya Yui of JAXA (Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency) joined each other on Monday and continued offloading some of the several thousand pounds of new science and supplies delivered aboard the HTV-X1 cargo spacecraft on Oct. 29. Yui also familiarized himself with the operations of the Astrobee robotic helpers before replacing components inside the Tranquility module’s bathroom, or waste and hygiene compartment. Fincke also trained to use the Astrobees then set up the fluorescence microscope to observe how particles behave inside fluids.

Roscosmos cosmonauts Sergey Ryzhikov and Alexey Zubritsky, station Commander and Flight Engineer respectively, both tested the lower body negative pressure suit for its ability to reverse the space-caused flow of body fluids toward a crew member’s head. Results may prevent microgravity-induced head and eye pressure and help crews adjust quicker to the return to Earth’s gravity. Roscosmos Flight Engineer Oleg Platonov wore virtual reality googles and sensors while responding to visual signals to observe how his vision and sense of balance is adjusting to microgravity.

Learn more about station activities by following the space station blog, @space_station on X, as well as the ISS Facebook and ISS Instagram accounts.

Get the latest from NASA delivered every week. Subscribe here.

November 24, 2025

More from International Space Station