NASA's Crew-5 astronauts join ISS residents to begin six-month-long mission

Astronauts of NASA’s Crew-5 mission have joined the rest of the residents aboard the International Space Station (ISS). The SpaceX Dragon spacecraft Endurance docked with the orbital outpost at 2:31 am IST on October 7 following a 29-hour long journey after its launch on October 5. The spacecraft carried four astronauts– Nicole Mann and Josh Cassada from NASA and one each from Russia (Anna Kikina) and Japan (Koichi Wakata)– who joined seven astronauts from previous missions. 

According to NASA, the new batch of visitors entered the ISS after the hatch opening ceremony at 4:19 am IST and was welcomed by Commander Samantha Christoforetti and ten others. “It’s a very special crew because for the first time we have a Russian cosmonaut (Anna Kikina) flying on a Crew Dragon. So a very special welcome to Anna for breaking the ice on this crew swap”, Christoforetti said. 

Kikina etched history on her maiden spaceflight as she became the first Russian to fly on a commercial US spacecraft under the crew-swap agreement between NASA and Roscosmos. In return, Russian space agency Roscosmos launched NASA astronaut Frank Rubio with cosmonauts Sergey Prokopyev and Dmitri Petelin to the ISS on September 21. Another reason why this mission is significant is that it saw the first Native American woman (Nicole Mann) launch into space. 

(All eleven astronauts currently aboard the ISS; Image: NASA)

With the arrival of Crew-5 astronauts, the number of residents aboard the ISS has risen to 11. Notably, four of them-- Bob Hines, Kjell Lindgren, Jessica Watkins and Christoforetti are from the Crew-4 mission which launched in April this year. 

Members of the Crew-4 mission will make their return home in the next few days making room for the rest. Over the next few months, the new members will conduct several microgravity experiments which include studying heart cells, human health and developing technologies for bioprinting.