Why Scott Kelly Will Be Taking Russian Spacecraft for a Spin

— -- American astronaut Scott Kelly is spending one year in space but he'll get to briefly leave the International Space Station this week when he takes a short ride in the Russian Soyuz spacecraft, which is being moved to make room for the arrival of additional crew members.

The ride will take about 25 minutes, beginning when the Soyuz TMA-16M spacecraft undocks from the Poisjk module on Friday at 3:12 a.m. and moves to the station's Zvezda port, freeing up room for three new crew members to park their spacecraft when they're set to arrive at the station on Sept. 2, NASA officials said.

Kelly's new neighbors in space will be Expedition 45 crew member Sergei Volkov of Roscosmos, and visiting crew members Andreas Mogensen from the European Space Agency and Aidyn Aimbetov of the Kazakh Space Agency.