The Soyuz TMA-09M spacecraft blasts off. Photo: Reuters

A Russian spaceship has taken a shortcut to the International Space Station, delivering a veteran cosmonaut, a rookie Italian astronaut and an American mother on her second flight to the outpost in fewer than six hours.

The capsule slipped into its berthing port at 3.10am CET yesterday about 250 miles (400 km) above the south Pacific Ocean.

“Everything went very well,” Nasa mission commentator Kelly Humphries said during a televised broadcast of the docking.

Typically, the journey takes two days, but Russian engineers have developed new flight procedures that tweak the steering manoeuvres and expedite the trip.

One other crew capsule and several cargo ships previously have taken the fast route to the station.

The express ride to the station began at 9.31pm CET on Tuesday when a Russian Soyuz rocket soared off its launch pad at the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan and deposited the crew’s capsule into orbit.

The spaceship circled around the planet less than four times before catching up to the station

The spaceship circled around the planet fewer than four times before catching up to the station, a $100 billion project of 15 nations.

Overseeing operations from aboard the capsule was veteran cosmonaut Fyodor Yurchikhin, 54, who will be living aboard the station for the third time. The former commander also flew on Nasa’s now-retired space shuttle.

Expedition 36/37 Soyuz Commander Fyodor Yurchikhin, top, flight engineers Luca Parmitano of the European Space Agency, centre and Karen Nyberg of Nasa wave as they board the Soyuz rocket in Baikonur, Kazakhstan. Photo: AP/Nasa

He was joined on the Soyuz by first-time astronaut Luca Parmitano, 36, a major in the Italian Air Force. Parmitano, who initially studied political science and international law at the University of Naples, is the first Italian to be assigned to a long-duration mission aboard the station, which is a laboratory for biomedical, materials science and other research.

“This is very momentous,” Parmitano said in a preflight NASA interview.

Nasa gave the crew slot to the Italian Space Agency as part of a barter agreement for Italian-made cargo haulers used during the shuttle programme.

Rounding out the crew is US astronaut Karen Nyberg, a 43-year-old mechanical engineer who has one previous spaceflight on her resume.

Back on earth, her astro-naut husband, Doug Hurley, is looking after their three-year-old son, Jack.

Nyberg, an avid quilter, said she was bringing along sewing supplies, a sketch book and pencils.