NASA astronaut explains Russian cosmonauts in blue & yellow suits in ISS were 'blindsided'

Three Russian cosmonauts, who stoked controversy after boarding the International Space Station (ISS) last month in colours resembling Ukraine's national flag, were actually paying a tribute to their university and were not in support of Ukraine during Russia's military aggression, said NASA astronaut Mark Vande Hei on Tuesday.

Hei said that cosmonauts Oleg Artemyev, Denis Matveev and Sergey Korsakov, were caught 'blindsided' after several observers assumed that their yellow and blue spacesuits were in support of Ukraine, according to CNN.

However, all three Russian cosmonauts were graduates of Bauman Moscow State Technical University, which has yellow and blue in its emblem. NASA astronaut said in a press conference on April 5, "All three of them happened to be associated with the same university, and I think they were kind of blindsided by it." 

Hei even said that he did not try to avoid discussing the Russia-Ukraine war with his ISS crewmates.

The NASA astronaut added, "They weren't very long discussions, but I did ask them how they were feeling and sometimes asked pointed questions, but our focus was on our mission together."

Russia-Ukraine war tensions in ISS?

It is to note here that Russian President Vladimir Putin launched a war on Ukraine on February 24, and the geopolitical tensions of his steps have sent echoes to the International Space Station (ISS) as well. While the US, the West and several other nations united against Russia, NASA astronaut Hei landed in Kazakhstan in a Russian Soyuz MS-19 spacecraft on March 30 after a record-breaking 355 days spent in space. He arrived with cosmonauts Anton Shkaplerov and Pyotr Dubrov.

Hei's return was highly anticipated and ended up drawing unprecedented levels of attention from across the globe. Specifically, Russian space agency chief Dmitry Rogozin fueled more tensions by posting several fiery messages against the United States. Amid a flurry of videos, Rogozin also engaged in a Twitter spat with retired NASA astronaut Scott Kelly, who held the record for the longest stint in space until Hei broke it.

Additionally, the Russian space agency's chief even retweeted a partially animated video that indicated threat that Russian astronauts would abandon Hei in space. Noting these actions by Rogozin, Hei said that he heard about the tweets and added, "I never perceived those tweets as anything to take seriously."

The NASA astronaut even said that he viewed the tweets as aimed at a "different audience" than him.

Image: AP