MOSCOW, March 25 (UPI) -- A Russian cargo spacecraft lifted the International Space Station 1.8 miles Friday to facilitate docking with a manned spacecraft, local media reported.
The spokesman of the Russian Mission Control Center Valeriy Lyndin told the ITAR-TASS news agency the engines of the spacecraft Progress M-52 docked on the ISS were started at 5:00 a.m. ET and worked for almost 7 minutes to raise the station to an altitude of 214.7 miles.
The station had dropped by 2.6 miles after an orbital adjustment Feb. 16, the agency said.
The manned transportation spacecraft Soyuz TMA-6 with NASA astronaut John Phillips, Russian Cosmonaut Sergei Krikalev and the European Space Agency's Roberto Vittori on board is planned for liftoff from the Baykonur cosmodrome in Kazakhstan April 15 and dock with the space station April 17, ITAR-TASS said.
Krikalev and Phillips will spend six months on the station, replacing NASA astronaut Leroy Chiao and Russian cosmonaut Salizhan Sharipov. Vittori is to return a week later.
