Crew Dragon Launches Safely, Carrying First Russian From US Soil In 20 Years

Ars Technica's Eric Berger writes: Four days before Thanksgiving in 2002, space shuttle Endeavour lifted off from Kennedy Space Center in Florida. Among the seven crew members to the International Space Station was one Russian cosmonaut, Nikolai M. Budarin, making his third spaceflight. By then, as part of warming relations between Russia and the United States, cosmonauts had been flying on board the space shuttle for nearly a decade. The exchange program would have continued, but tragedy struck on the shuttle's next mission, which launched in January 2003. Space Shuttle Columbia was lost upon reentry into Earth's atmosphere, killing all seven astronauts on board. Following this disaster, no more Russians would fly on the space shuttle after it returned to service. Instead, NASA focused on flying the minimum number of missions needed to complete the construction of the International Space Station. After the shuttle's retirement in 2011, NASA would come to rely on Russia's Soyuz vehicle as its only ride to space. NASA regained the capacity to launch its own astronauts into space in 2020, after working with SpaceX to complete the development of the Crew Dragon vehicle. Following a successful demonstration flight in May 2020 with two astronauts on board, Crew Dragon safely launched six additional times, carrying an additional two dozen people into space. On Wednesday, Crew Dragon carried astronauts into space for an eighth time, with the fifth operational mission for NASA. This Crew-5 flight was commanded by Nicole Mann, a NASA astronaut making her first flight into space. "Whooo, that was a smooth ride uphill!" she exclaimed upon reaching orbit. Among the four Dragon riders was a cosmonaut, Anna Kikina, also making her debut flight into space. She is just the sixth Russian or Soviet female cosmonaut in the history of the program since Valentina Tereshkova flew into orbit on June 16, 1963. Kikina is also the first Russian to launch into space from the United States since Budarin, two decades ago. In addition to Mann and Kikina, Crew-5 is rounded out by NASA astronaut Josh Cassada and Japanese astronaut Koichi Wakata. While the other three are rookies, this is Wakata's fifth spaceflight. During their stay aboard the International Space Station, the astronauts will conduct more than 200 science experiments and technology demonstrations, including studies on printing human organs in space.

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