The SpaceX rocket took off this Wednesday from Florida to the International Space Station together with astronauts from Russia, Japan, NASA (from the United States), despite the tensions between the latter countries due to the war in Ukraine.
The Space X launch, made up of a Falcon 9 rocket with a Crew Dragon capsule, called Endurance, occurred at noon ET from NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral.
This mission is special because it
is the first time in 20 years that a Russian cosmonaut has taken off from the United States
.
This is Anna Kikina, 38, the only active female cosmonaut of Roscosmos, the Russian space agency.
SpaceX's Falcon 9 rocket carrying the company's Crew Dragon spacecraft is launched from NASA's SpaceX Crew-5 mission to the International Space Station on October 5.
NASA via Getty Images
"We are very happy to do it together," said Kikina, referring to her other crewmates who were part of, for the first time, such a crew.
Nicole Mann, Navy Colonel, former fighter pilot, is
the first Native American woman to orbit the world.
Joining her were Captain John Cassada, also of the Navy, and veteran Koichi Wakata, of the Japanese Space Agency, who has already served five space flights.
The crew is scheduled to arrive at the space station this Thursday, 29 hours after leaving NASA's Kennedy Space Center, and return to Earth in March.
[SpaceX launches rocket that puts dozens of satellites into orbit in a single day]
The mission, designated Crew-5, is the fifth full crew aboard a SpaceX ship since the private rocket company, founded by Tesla CEO
Elon Musk
, began sending American astronauts into space in May 2020.
This SpaceX flight was delayed by Hurricane Ian, which devastated parts of the state last week.
With information from The Associated Press and Reuters.