A Soyuz FG rocket launched itself and a manned Soyuz MS-03 spacecraft from the Baikonur Cosmodrome near Tyuratam in Kazakhstan. The launch took place at 2020 GMT on 17 November 2016. Aboard Soyuz MS-03 were three crew: the Roskosmos cosmonaut Oleg Novitskiy, the ESA astronaut Thomas Pesquet, and the NASA astronaut Peggy Whitson.
After using the old-style two day slow approach to the International Space Station (ISS), and after a short fly around the station, the capsule docked with the Rassvet module of the ISS at 2158 GMT on 19 November allowing the crew to join those already on board.
The reason the slower 38 orbit (two day) approach was used instead of the faster four orbit (six hour) one as that the Klion-R command station in Vostochny needed for the EKTS telecommand system (itself needed for fast orbital corrections) is not yet operational.
