An American astronaut and two Russian cosmonauts are due to take off on Wednesday for the International Space Station (ISS), a trip that represents a rare sign of cooperation amid tensions linked to the offensive in Ukraine.
Nasa's Frank Rubio and Sergei Prokopiev and Dmitri Peteline of the Russian space agency Roscosmos are to blast off on a Soyuz rocket from Russia's Baikonur cosmodrome in Kazakhstan at 1:54 p.m. GMT.
Franck Rubio is the first American astronaut to travel to the ISS aboard a Russian rocket since the start of the entry of troops from Moscow into Ukraine on February 24.
Dmitry LOVETSKY / POOL / AFP
The space industry has also been targeted by Western sanctions, but space has remained, somehow, an area of cooperation between Moscow and Washington.
After Wednesday's flight, Anna Kikina, Russia's only female cosmonaut in active service, is due to travel to the orbital laboratory for the first time in early October aboard a Crew Dragon rocket from the American company SpaceX.
She will be the fifth Russian female professional cosmonaut to go into space, and the first woman to fly aboard a ship from billionaire Elon Musk's firm.
With these two planned flights, the astronauts and cosmonauts of each country, in particular those having to go into orbit, wanted to stay away from the tensions caused by the conflict which rages on Earth.
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