(CNN) Astronaut Frank Rubio traveled to the International Space Station on September 21, 2022, for what he thought would be a six-month mission. But he will end up staying in space for more than a year — breaking the record for the longest mission by a US astronaut.
Rubio will return to Earth aboard a Russian Soyuz spacecraft no sooner than Sept. 27, NASA officials said Wednesday, meaning he will log a total of at least 371 days in orbit. That tour of duty will beat the previous record of 355 days set by US astronaut Mark Vande Hei in 2022.
Rubio’s return trip is slated for this spring. But the spacecraft that carried Rubio and two colleagues to Russia – cosmonauts Sergey Prokopiev and Dmitry Petelin – a coolant leak sprung up in December. Officials at Roscosmos, Russia’s space agency, eventually deemed the spacecraft not safe enough to carry the astronauts home.
Instead, the Soyuz MS-22 capsule returned to Earth without a crew on March 28. Roscosmos launched a replacement spacecraft, MS-23, which docked with the space station on February 23.
Notes on space
If all goes to plan and Rubio leaves on September 27, his 371-day stay will not be a world record. The late Russian cosmonaut Valeri Polyakov, who logged 437 continuous days in orbit aboard Russia’s Mir space station between 1994 and 1995, still holds that title.
NASA astronaut Frank Rubio is shown inside the cupola of the International Space Station as it flies 263 miles above southeast England.
Vande Hei set the current US record last year after NASA and Roscosmos decided to extend his stay as Russia opted to send a two-person film crew to the space station to film a movie. Vande Hei’s return was delayed to allow additional traffic to the orbiting laboratory, although he said at the time he knew that his mission could be extended before he arrived.
Before Vande Hei, US astronaut Scott Kelly held the title for the longest space flight by an American during his 340-day mission. That tour of duty was a planned extended mission, designed by NASA to study the long-term effects of space flight in the human body.
Rubio’s extended stay, however, was unexpected before the Soyuz MS-22 capsule developed a coolant leak in December.
Going to space
Rubio traveled to the space station aboard a Russian spacecraft as part of the crew replacement agreement between NASA and Roscosmos hashed out in the summer of 2022.
NASA officials assigned Rubio aboard Soyuz MS-22, while Roscosmos placed cosmonaut Anna Kikina on a SpaceX Crew Dragon mission which took off in October 2022 and return home March 11th.
Despite geopolitical tensions between the United States and Russia as the war in Ukraine escalates, NASA has repeatedly said its partnership with Roscosmos is essential to continuing space station operations and the important scientific research conducted in board.
At the time the ride-sharing deal was announced, NASA said in a statement that signing such a deal with Russia was critical to ensuring the “continued safe operation” of the space station. If the Russian Soyuz spacecraft or the SpaceX Crew Dragon capsule develop issues and are taken out of service, a seat swap agreement would ensure that US astronauts and Russian cosmonauts would still have access to the space station. space.
Roscosmos did not have to rely on a SpaceX capsule to replace the Soyuz MS-22 crew ship, however, as the MS-23 spacecraft was prepared to fly and the coolant leak in the MS-22 vehicle did not necessarily point to potential issues. to other Soyuz vehicles.