ISS Crews Face Upcoming Shakeups amid Curtailed Seat Exchanges

Throughout the history of the International Space Station program, multiple vehicles from different nations have been used to ferry crew to the orbital outpost, providing redundant transportation during the Station’s operational life. This has proved to be a useful system, with the Soyuz and Space Shuttle providing continued, multilateral access to the station throughout various periods in the program’s history. For most of this time, geopolitical relationships between the two major players of the ISS program, Russia and the United States, remained relatively stable, and the two partners have worked together with few interruptions. Now, in an age marked by aggression and deterioration of relationships, it appears that the end of a long standing practice, seat exchange on partner vehicles, is coming to an end – thrusting the station into a period of uncertainty as it faces the twilight years of its operation.

The ISS relies on a rule that goes back to the foundation of the program, which ensures that one US-segment and one Russian-segment crew member are constantly on station. This ensures that essential maintenance, management and operations of each segment are carried out by at least one crew member, as the ISS is not designed to operate independently of human beings. To ensure access even if one vehicle is rendered inoperable, the ISS partners have relied on a practice known as seat swapping, where a Russian crew member flies on an American vehicle and vice versa. While the practice was not in effect during the early days of the Commercial Crew program, Crew-5 saw the first Russian crew member fly aboard an American spacecraft since the Space Shuttle program, with Anna Kikina joining her US-segment counterparts.

Under the current plan, veteran NASA astronaut Don Pettit will join cosmonauts Aleksey Ovchinin and Ivan Vagner aboard Soyuz MS-26, launching to the ISS to become part of the Expedition 71/72 crew in September 2024. There, they will rendezvous with the upcoming SpaceX Crew-9 mission, consisting of two fliers on the uphill leg: NASA’s Nick Hague and Roscosmos’ Aleksandr Gorbunov. Following their stay aboard the ISS, they will return with the CFT crew of Butch Wilmore and Sunita Williams following their transfer to the Expedition 71/72 crew. This change represents one of the broadest shake ups in Station planning as of late, with NASA leadership convening on August 24 to discuss their findings. It is unclear as of the time of writing when Zena Cardman and Stephanie Wilson, both previously assigned to the Crew-9 mission, will get the opportunity to fly.

Following the completion of the 71/72 expedition segment, SpaceX Crew-10 will launch with its international crew, consisting of NASA astronauts Anne McClain, Nichole Ayers, JAXA astronaut Takuya Onishi and Roscosmos cosmonaut Kirill Peskov. They will be joined by the crew of Soyuz MS-27, consisting of Roscosmos cosmonauts Sergey Rhizikov, Alexey Zubritsky and NASA astronaut Jonny Kim. Notably, the crew of Soyuz MS-27 will remain on station for longer than a typical expedition, remaining on the orbiting laboratory for approximately 8 months. As of now, this represents the final seat exchange between the two space agencies, with crew assignments for the following block of Soyuz flights consisting of only Russian crew members for the foreseeable future. 

With the seemingly imminent end of the seat swapping arrangement, the responsibility of maintaining the necessary crew members on station falls on both Soyuz and US crew vehicles independently, rather than distributing the responsibility between the two agencies. Rather than having mixed crews on one spacecraft that can single-handedly meet the requirements of station crewing, the new arrangement will rely on the US and Russian contingents to be delivered separately. With continued delays to the Starliner program, it is also unclear whether or not Roscosmos will opt to fly their cosmonauts on the spacecraft for future missions, given schedule constraints and requirements of the orbital outpost. NASA’s Dana Weigel made note at the August 24th press conference that conversations between partner agencies had not taken place yet, casting doubt over this seat sharing agreement. This further stresses the already strained system of exchange between the two nations. While the agencies have stressed their continued cooperation, it is clear that these good graces are running into geopolitical hurdles wider than just the space program.

It is not difficult to connect the dots between the curtailing of seat assignments and the breakdown of political relationships between the Russian Federation and the United States. In the wake of aggression in Ukraine, much of the world has distanced themselves from reliance on the Russian aerospace industry, with a significant push through economic sanctions to cripple the space industry as a whole. This, in turn, has curtailed not only Russian space capability, but the vision of the country’s future in space. For several years, Russia has envisioned a post ISS station, made up of both old and new components from ISS heritage modules known as ROSS, or the Russian Orbital Space Station. However, in the wake of the invasion of Ukraine and subsequent economic sanctions and workforce decline, it is unlikely that Russia will maintain the political or economic motivation to continue a LEO station program. Countries such as China, India and other rising space powers have quickly surpassed Russian capabilities in recent years, with the once great space player now falling to a distant last place.   

The ISS is a product of many things, but at its core one of the tenets that drives the station program is the spirit of cooperation. Throughout its history, the ISS has represented the continued commitment of its partner agencies to overcoming geopolitical obstacles and working through difficult moments to keep humanity’s premier outpost in space operational. Now, in the face of a rapidly changing world, the agreements at play seem to be faltering. Operational paradigms for space, seen as previously secure, can change in the blink of an eye – and the presumptive end of seat swaps aboard Russian and American spacecraft seems to have been this upcoming end. For now, it seems as though this facet of cooperation will continue, and its slow end will be celebrated by no one across this historic alliance. Perhaps as times change alliances can be rebuilt, and the dream of unified spaceflight can be achieved once more.

Edited by Beverly Casillas