Fears after contact lost with Russian rocket

(CNN) - Russia's mission control has reported an abnormal situation with a space freighter that launched from the Baikonur Cosmodrome bound for the International Space Station, NASA said Wednesday.

The rocket was carrying 2.9 tonnes of food, fuel and supplies, NASA said, but has no passengers on board.

The Progress 44 cargo craft, which launched at 7 p.m. Kazakhstan time, is due to dock with the ISS on Friday.

NASA spokesman Rob Navias, at the Johnson Space Center in Houston, Texas, told CNN that contact with the space craft had been lost about three minutes before it reached orbit.

"We have no confirmation of a crash from the Russians," he said.

Navias said the Russians launch a supply vessel roughly every three months.

The six people currently living on the ISS are "well supplied - actually oversupplied" since the delivery of supplies after the last U.S. shuttle mission last month, he said.