[ad_1]
Under the strictest hygiene regulations due to the corona pandemic, three space travelers set off on a record flight to the International Space Station ISS. The Soyuz rocket with American Kathleen Rubins and Russian cosmonauts Sergej Ryschikow and Sergej Kud-Swertschkow took off from the Baikonur spaceport on the Kazakh steppe at 7.45am Central European Time. The weather conditions were ideal.
After just three hours, the crew should dock with the ISS at an altitude of more than 400 kilometers. It would be a manned space flight in record time. Previously, space travelers took at least twice as long to reach the ISS. The short haul had previously been tested in unmanned space capsule transports.
“The International Space Station is probably the safest place right now”
The new short route requires precise planning. Instead of gradually approaching the ISS, the space capsule is heading straight for the space station. Therefore, the rocket must be launched to the second so that the space capsule does not lose the ISS in its orbit. Also, the space capsule must have exactly the correct speed, for which its engines must be fired over and over again. It used to take much longer for the capsule and the ISS to get close.
All three space travelers are expected to remain in space until spring 2021. Already strict safety regulations for space travelers have been tightened again due to the pandemic. The crew spent more than a month in quarantine and was tested multiple times for the virus, the American Rubins said before departure. “The International Space Station is probably the safest place right now,” said his Russian colleague Ryschikow, referring to the threat of the virus on Earth.
There are currently three space travelers working on the ISS: the two Russians Anatoli Iwanischin and Iwan Wagner, and the American Christopher Cassidy. They also started under strict Corona conditions in the spring. They are supposed to return to earth in October.
