Tim Peake, the first British astronaut to travel to the International Space Station, blasted off on Tuesday from the Baikonur cosmodrome with two other spacemen, to cheers and excitement back home. eake, 43, joins Russian space veteran Yury Malenchenko and Tim Kopra of NASA for a six-month mission on the ISS. Fire from the boosters of the Soyuz rocket cut a bright light through the overcast sky at the Moscow-operated cosmodrome in Kazakhstan as the spacecraft launched on schedule at 1103 GMT.
"It was great to watch Tim Peake blast off on his mission to join the International Space Station," British Prime Minister David Cameron said on Twitter. A meeting of Cameron's cabinet "agreed that Tim Peake's mission is an inspiration for people up and down the country, particularly young people and children looking to study science," his spokeswoman said.
Queen Elizabeth II's official Twitter account @BritishMonarchy retweeted the UK Space Agency saying "We have lift-off! @astro_timpeake is on his way to space! GoodLuckTim, the UK is with you!" Russian space officials said the launch had gone according to plan and that the spacecraft was due to dock at the ISS at about 1724 GMT. "Don't Stop Me Now" by the rock group Queen was blaring in the Soyuz roughly half an hour before blastoff as the astronauts listened to their favourite music in preparation for the mission.
Former army major Peake - a European Space Agency flight engineer - begins a 173-day mission at the orbiting research outpost along with Malenchenko, 53, and 52-year-old Kopra. Malenchenko, who will celebrate his 54th birthday aboard the ISS next week, has already logged 641 days in space, while Kopra has chalked up 58. Peake's mission has generated excitement in Britain. Crowds gathered in the Science Museum in London to witness the lift-off, with thousands of people including around 2,000 schoolchildren breaking into screams and waving British flags as giant screens set up in the exhibition hall showed the rocket blasting off.