Anna Kekinathe only Russian cosmonaut currently in active service, is going down in history: It’s the first time in 20 years, in fact, that a Russian cosmonaut has traveled aboard an American spacecraft.

The 38-year-old left for International Space Station Aboard SpaceX’s Crew Dragon Endurance shuttle, along with three other colleagues, including Nicole ManAnd the The first Native American woman in orbitAmerican Josh Casada Japanese Koichi Wakata. From space, Kekina thanked all participants for the opportunity: “Thank you to all the agencies, Roscosmos, Nasa, Jaxa and of course SpaceX for giving us this opportunity. Each of us on the crew is thrilled to do what we’re doing,” he said.

Docking with the International Space Station is scheduled for Thursday at 22.57 (Italian time), 29 hours after departure, which occurred at noon from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center. The mission will take about five months, during which more than 200 scientific experiments will be conducted.

The launch of the Crew-5, launched from the 39A platform with a Falcon 9 missile, was initially scheduled for September 29, but was subsequently held back several times, also due to the arrival of Hurricane Ian on the Florida coast. With the arrival of the crew, the number of astronauts aboard the space station he leads will rise to 11 Samantha Cristoforetti.