On Monday, the Russian space agency posted photos of its three cosmonauts posing with the flags of the Luhansk People’s Republic and the Donetsk People’s Republic — self-proclaimed republics in breakaway areas of Ukraine which can be solely acknowledged as unbiased states by Russia and Syria — and mentioned the seize of the area was “a liberation day to celebrate both on Earth and in space.”
Ever since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, NASA has gone to nice lengths to attempt to protect the partnership on the house station, which has endured for greater than 20 years. The house company has highlighted the comity between the astronauts and cosmonauts dwelling facet by facet in orbit and pledged the partnership would proceed to endure.
Earlier this 12 months, Kathy Lueders, NASA’s affiliate administrator for house operations, mentioned that regardless of the conflict and tensions on the bottom, NASA and its Russian counterparts “are still talking together. We’re still doing training together. We’re still working together. Obviously, we understand the global situation and where it is, but as a joint team, these teams are operating together.”
She added that, “obviously we need to continue to monitor the situation. … We’ve operated in these kinds of situations before and both sides always operated very professionally and understand the importance of this fantastic mission and continuing to have peaceful relations between the two countries in space.”
Last 12 months, after Russia blew up a lifeless satellite tv for pc that scattered particles and threatened the station, Bill Nelson, the NASA administrator, strongly condemned the Russian navy, calling it “reckless and dangerous.”
Still, he had gone out of his approach to spotlight the house station as a peaceable haven and preserve that the conflict has not thrown the partnership into query.
“The cosmonauts and the astronauts are getting along as usual,” he told CNBC in March.