Washington, 26 August 2023 (dpa/MIA) — The eighth manned flight on multi-billionaire Elon Musk's Dragon spacecraft took off early Saturday with four astronauts from four countries on board.

The Space X vehicle launched from NASA's Cape Canaveral spaceport towards the International Space Station (ISS).

Jasmin Moghbeli from the United States, the Danish European Space Agency astronaut Andreas Mogensen, Satoshi Furukawa from Japan and the Russian Konstantin Borisov took off aboard the Dragon capsule, powered by a Falcon 9 rocket.

The launch, originally planned for Friday, was postponed by one day.

After just under 24 hours, it is expected to dock at the human outpost about 400 kilometres above the Earth and will bring four crew members back home a few days later.

This marks the seventh rotation of the ISS crew since 2020. The new crew members are to conduct research in space for six months.

The returning members of Crew 6 consist of Stephen Bowen and Warren Hoburg from the US, the Russian Andrey Fedyaev and the Emirati Sultan Al Neyadi. A total of seven people are currently on the ISS.