NEW YORK, United States (AP) — Three Russian cosmonauts arrived at the International Space Station on Friday wearing yellow flight suits with blue accents. The men were the first new arrivals on the space station since the start of the Russian war in Ukraine last month.

Russian space corporation Roscosmos cosmonauts Oleg Artemyev, Denis Matveyev and Sergey Korsakov blasted off successfully from the Russia-leased Baikonur launch facility in Kazakhstan in their Soyuz MS-21 spacecraft at 8:55 p.m. Friday (11:55 a.m. EDT). They smoothly docked at the station just over three hours later, joining two Russians, four Americans and a German on the orbiting outpost.

Video of Artemyev taken as the spacecraft prepared to dock with the space station showed him wearing a blue flight suit. It was unclear what, if any, message the yellow uniforms they changed into were intended to send.

When the cosmonauts were able to talk to family back on Earth, Artemyev was asked about the suits. He said every crew chooses their own.

“It became our turn to pick a color. But in fact, we had accumulated a lot of yellow material so we needed to use it. So that’s why we had to wear yellow,” he said.

Since the war started, many people have used the Ukrainian flag and its colors to show solidarity with the country.

The war has resulted in canceled spacecraft launches and broken contracts. Roscosmos chief Dmitry Rogozin has warned that the U.S. would have to use “broomsticks” to fly into space after Russia said it would stop supplying rocket engines to U.S. companies. Many worry, however, that Rogozin is putting decades of a peaceful off-planet partnership at risk, most notably at the space station.

NASA Administrator Bill Nelson played down Rogozin’s comments, telling The Associated Press: “That’s just Dmitry Rogozin. He spouts off every now and then. But at the end of the day, he’s worked with us.”

“The other people that work in the Russian civilian space program, they’re professional,” Nelson told the AP on Friday. “They don’t miss a beat with us, American astronauts and American mission control. Despite all of that, up in space, we can have a cooperation with our Russian friends, our colleagues.”

NASA astronaut Mark Vande Hei — who on Tuesday broke the U.S. single spaceflight record of 340 days — is due to leave the space station with two Russians aboard a Soyuz capsule for a touchdown in Kazakhstan on March 30.

In April, another three NASA and one Italian astronaut are set to blast off for the space station.

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Russian cosmonauts: suits are not inspired by Ukrainian flag

WASHINGTON (AP) — When three Russian cosmonauts arrived at the International Space Station wearing yellow flight suits with blue accents, some saw a message in them wearing the colors of the Ukrainian flag. They shot that down on Saturday.

Cosmonaut Oleg Artemyev said each crew picks the color of the flight suits about six months before launch because they need to be individually sewn. And since all three of them were graduates of Bauman Moscow State Technical University, they chose the colors of their prestigious alma mater.

“There is no need to look for any hidden signs or symbols in our uniform,” Artemyev said in a statement on the Russian space agency’s Telegram channel. “A color is simply a color. It is not in any way connected to Ukraine. Otherwise, we would have to recognize its rights to the yellow sun in the blue sky.

“These days, even though we are in space, we are together with our president and our people!”

Since Russia invaded Ukraine a little over three weeks ago, many people have used the Ukrainian flag and its colors to show solidarity with the country.

Dmitry Rogozin, the head of the space agency Roscosmos, reiterated Artemyev’s point in a tweet, posting a picture of the university’s blue and gold coat of arms.

Shortly after their arrival at the orbiting station on Friday, Artemyev was asked about the flight suits. He said there was a lot of the yellow material in storage and “that’s why we had to wear yellow.”

Newsroom | theworldmail.co.uk
Source/Contribution/Photo Credit by Associated Press