Three Russian cosmonauts arrived at the International Space Station dressed in blue and yellow

Last night , three Russian cosmonauts arrived at the International Space Station (ISS) wearing yellow and blue spacesuits, colors that refer to the Ukrainian flag, on the first arrival of astronauts to the orbital laboratory since the invasion of Russia began.

These are the cosmonauts of the Russian space agency Roscosmos, Oleg Artemyev, Denis Matveyev and Sergey Korsakov, who successfully took off from the Baikonur launch facilities in Kazakhstan, rented by Russia, on their Soyuz MS-21 spacecraft.

The particular color of the spacesuits caught the attention of many, as the cosmonauts had boarded the spaceship in white and blue suits, so they changed their clothes in the three hours that passed from docking until they opened the hatch to join their new companions. Today the ISS has 5 Russian cosmonauts, 4 American astronauts and 1 German astronauts.

When the cosmonauts were able to talk to their relatives on Earth, Artemyev was asked about why he changed costumes with that particular color. The cosmonaut said that each crew chooses the color they are going to use. “It became our turn to choose a color. But in fact, we had accumulated a lot of yellow material, so we needed to use it. That's why we had to wear yellow,” he said.

Since the war began, many people have used the flag of Ukraine and its colors to show solidarity with the country. That is why many speculated that it was a support for Ukraine in Russia's invasion, while others took the fact as a Russian provocation that uses the colors of the country it is invading.

Some people with knowledge of spaceflight procedures think it could be a sign of support for Ukraine. Former NASA astronaut Scott Kelly, who went on a one-year mission to the space station with cosmonaut Mikhail Kornienko from March 2015 to March 2016, tweeted today, in both Russian and English: “Three Russian cosmonauts who docked the Space Station International came dressed in yellow from Ukraine!”

“Wow. Just wow. Well done. Ekipaz!” tweeted Terry Virts, another former NASA astronaut. He spent six months aboard the station from November 2014 to June 2015 and traveled to and from the orbiting laboratory in a Soyuz. (“Ekipaz” in Russian means “crew”).

There are also other possible explanations for flight suits. For example, several people on Twitter have pointed out that the colors are similar to those of the Bauman Moscow State Technical University, which was attended by Artemyev, Matveev and Korsakov. This is all just speculation; all we have to follow right now is Artemyev's cryptic response during the opening ceremony of the hatch. Hopefully, one of the cosmonauts will offer more details in the not too distant future.

None of the three newly arrived cosmonauts come from Ukraine, by the way. Artemyev was born in present-day Latvia, Matveev is from St. Petersburg and Korsakov was born in what is now Kyrgyzstan.

Threats and cancellations

The war has led to the cancellation of spacecraft launches and broken contracts. Roscosmos chief Dmitry Rogozin warned days ago that the US would have to use “broomsticks” to fly into space after Russia said it would stop supplying rocket engines to US companies. However, many worry that Rogozin is putting decades of peaceful partnership on the space station at risk.

NASA Administrator Bill Nelson played down Rogozin's comments and told him: “That's just Dmitry Rogozin. He talks from time to time. But at the end of the day, he ends up working with us.”

“The other people working in the Russian civil space program are professionals. They don't miss a beat with us, the American astronauts and control of the American mission. Despite all that, in space, we can cooperate with our Russian friends, our colleagues,” Nelson added.

NASA astronaut Mark Vande Hei, who broke the record for a single US space flight of 340 days on Tuesday, must leave the space station with two Russians aboard a Soyuz capsule to land in Kazakhstan on March 30. In April, three other NASA astronauts and one Italian astronauts will take off for the space station.

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