Two weeks ago, an American took off for the ISS on a Russian Soyuz rocket from the cosmodrome from Baikonur in Kazakhstan.
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A rocket from the American company SpaceX took off on Wednesday October 5 for the International Space Station (ISS) from Florida, in the United States, with Russian cosmonaut Anna Kikina on board, even as tensions between Washington and Moscow are at their height since the start of the war in Ukraine.
Dragon has separated from Falcon 9’s second stage pic.twitter.com/DzqsCb04Hz
—SpaceX (@SpaceX) October 5, 2022
Anna Kikina, the only female Russian cosmonaut currently on active duty, is part of the “Crew-5” crew, also made up of a Japanese and two Americans, including Nicole Mann, who becomes the first Native American to go to the space. The takeoff took place Wednesday noon from the Kennedy Space Center, in Florida (United States). This is the fifth regular mission to the ISS carried out by SpaceX on behalf of NASA, but the first to transport a Russian citizen.
Two weeks ago, an American took off for the ISS aboard a Russian Soyuz rocket. This long-planned astronaut exchange program has been maintained despite the very high tensions between the two countries since Moscow’s invasion of Ukraine in February. Ensuring the operation of the ISS has thus become one of the very few subjects of cooperation between the United States and Russia. Transporting the citizen of another nation is “a huge responsibility”had underlined during a press conference at the end of September Kathy Lueders, associate administrator at NASA.