SpaceX launches astronauts to the ISS, including a Russian – IT Pro – News

SpaceX launched four astronauts on the International Space Station with a Crew Dragon. It is surprising that one of the astronauts is a Russian. Anna Kikina is the first Russian passenger to go to the space station on an American flight.

The astronauts took off from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida late Wednesday afternoon. NASA astronauts Nicole Mann and Josh Cassada and the Japanese Koichi Wakata are joined on the Crew-5 mission by Anna Kikina, the only active Russian cosmonaut. The four flew aboard a Crew Dragon sitting atop SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket. They will soon join the seven astronauts currently on the ISS. This will soon make it crowded into the space station; it is not often that there are 11 astronauts on board.

Especially the fact that Kikina flies together on the mission is an important milestone. It is the first time that a Russian cosmonaut has embarked on an American commercial space flight. The Russians have been aboard the Space Shuttle in the past. The last time this happened was in 2002 during STS-113.

The first space shuttle cosmonaut was Sergei Krikalev, who is now head of the Roscosmos program for human spaceflight. He he told American reporters Wednesday night that he hopes that Kikina’s flight “will repair the damage that Rogozin has inflicted on international space collaborations”. Dmitri Rogozin was the former head of Roscosmos and a fierce supporter of President Putin. For months he has been making vehement statements, including that he would crash the ISS if Western sanctions against Russia were not lifted.

Kikina’s flight was planned long before the Ukrainian invasion. She was part of the crew exchange. America would stop paying Russia for some Soyuz flights, but instead launch a cosmonaut with an American spaceship. After the Russian invasion of Ukraine, it was not clear for a long time whether that agreement would continue. The fact that Kikina is indeed flying ahead is a sign that the relationship between America and Russia is still relatively intact, at least in the space sector.

For America, flight is also important because Nicole Mann is the first astronaut with a native– American background. The four astronauts are expected to arrive at the ISS on Thursday evening, Dutch time.