On March 14, 2019, at 22:14 MSK, Soyuz-FG launch vehicle with Soyuz MS-12 manned transport vehicle took off from launch pad №1 (Gagarin’s Start) of the Baikonur Cosmodrome.

At 22:23 MSK Soyuz MS-12 spacecraft detached from the third launch vehicle stage under normal conditions at the planned near-Earth orbit and continued its autonomous flight to the International Space Station under the guidance of the specialists from the Russian Mission Control Center.

The approach of Soyuz MS-12 to the station and its docking to the Rassvet small research module will be done automatically using the four-orbit maneuver. The spacecraft’s docking to the ISS is planned for March 15, 2019, at 04:07 MSK.

Soyuz MS-12 is carrying the crew of the ISS Expedition 59/60: Roscosmos cosmonaut Aleksey Ovchinin, and NASA astronauts Nick Hague and Christina Koch.