There's a new year in the sky.
Santa hats, streamers, and an Orthodox Christmas tree were part of the holiday celebrations of the seven crew members of the International Space Station.
"Just like back home, we have a tradition here to put up a New Year tree and decorate the interior of the space station to celebrate the New Year. Today, we will show you how to do it under zero-gravity conditions," Russian cosmonaut
Sergey Prokopyev said in a video message from Roscosmos (opens in new tab) on Thursday (Dec. 29), with translation provided by state media provider TASS (opens in new tab).
A colored banner with the words "New Year" in Cyrillic was festooned with ornaments and somersaults by Russian cosmonauts. The US side of the complex was filled with holiday cheer.
Is it possible that there isn't a chimney? No issue! Santa will visit astronauts on the space station.
Российские космонавты в невесомости украсили МКС под Новый год:https://t.co/iehc5iNMNBВидео: Роскосмос pic.twitter.com/0XMblQ0JClDecember 29, 2022
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In a NASA video uploaded last week, Koichi Wakata promised to take a picture of the first sunrise of the year in one of the nearby modules in the International Space Station.
NASA uploaded a few photos of the crew floating around the space station with Santa hats, stockings and holiday sweaters while they were on the space station.
There will be a lot of work for the crew of the expedition after Russia decides what to do with the spaceship. There is no immediate danger to the space station crew, but it is not certain if the Soyuz can carry Prokopyev, Petelin and Rubio back to Earth.
According to reports, Russia will make a decision in January on whether to send up a rescue Soyuz or bring the three crew members back to Russia.
If no other backup is available, NASA may be able to bring the trio home in a Crew Dragon spaceship. The space station is nominally full as it is scheduled to bring Mann, Wakata, and Kikina back to earth.
The cause of the Soyuz leak has not been determined, but follow-up scans of the spacecraft revealed a hole in the radiator that could be from a micrometeoroid, or a piece of space debris. In case of an emergency on the International Space Station, the three crew members of the Soyuz may not have a life jacket.
The co-author of Why Am I Taller is Elizabeth Howell. A book about space medicine is in the works. Follow us on social media, like us on Facebook (opens in new tab)
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