Three astronauts set to join the International Space Station (ISS) crew successfully launched Tuesday, but will not be able to dock due to an unexpected glitch.
According to BBC News, the Soyuz rocket carrying two Russian cosmonauts and one American astronaut took off from Kazakhstan Tuesday evening but was not able to dock at the ISS early Wednesday morning. The three ISS crewmembers are not expected to dock for another two days. They are not in any danger.
Tension between the U.S. and Russia over the latter's annexation of Crimea has not affected ISS operations, as both nations rely on each other. Both countries are also among a select few who undoubtedly lead the world in the space industry.
The crewmembers are not going to take their countries' political tension into account when interacting with one another. At a press conference, the crewmembers said down time aboard the ISS will be "an opportunity to come together as friends in the kitchen and look each other in the eye."
Alexander Skvortsov is an ISS veteran and fellow cosmonaut Oleg Artemyev will be taking his first tour. Once NASA's Steve Swanson makes it to the ISS, he will be able to meet up with American ISS veteran Ralph Mastracchio.
NASA will continue to cooperate with Russia to fly its astronauts to the ISS, the Associated Press reported. NASA Administrator Charles Bolden said they hope to launch Americans into space on their own.
"But even as the 'space race' has evolved over the past 50 years from competition to collaboration with Russia, NASA is rightfully focused now more than ever on returning our astronauts to space aboard American rockets - launched from U.S. soil - as soon as possible," Bolden wrote on his blog for NASA.
NASA has contracts with two privately owned companies, SpaceX and Orbital Sciences, to restock the ISS with cargo. Both companies likely represent the future privatization of space travel, which could also be an area for growth in the U.S. economy.
