NASA's Crew-8 spacecraft recently docked with the International Space Station on its mission to deposit three US astronauts for a sixth-month stay, and their arrival was recorded with a video of a pile-on group hug in microgravity.

Yet there was another passenger on board—Roscosmos cosmonaut Alexander Grebenkin.

It isn't editorializing to say that US-Russia relations are the worst they've been since the worst days of the Cold War. Yet despite their differences, there's one long and grand tradition they have always shared: peaceful cooperation and coexistence in space.

In the video, thrilled that their colleagues made it to the ISS safely, and thrilled, one would imagine, with the mere presence of new faces, Crew-8 mission commander Matthew Dominic is mobbed by NASA Crew-7 mission commander Jasmin Moghbeli and Soyuz-24 mission flight engineer Marina Vasilevskaya.

The three-astronaut group hug begins to float up toward the ceiling when Dominic realizes just in time that they would all get a nasty bump on their heads if he didn't stop them.

Dominic then moves to greet Soyuz-24 mission commander Oleg Kononenko, while the rest of his crew follow behind hugging those wearing the red white and blue and the white blue and red.

NASA astronauts Dominick, Michael Barratt, and Jeanette Epps arrived in the Crew capsule Endeavor with Grebenkin for a six-month stay to relieve the Crew-7 mission team that arrived in the Crew Dragon spacecraft Endurance. 

The mission was the fifth flight for the Endurance, and is the first SpaceX Crew Dragon to reach that milestone. Currently, the craft is rated for a maximum of five flights, but Space News reports that the company has sat down with NASA to study extending that certification to as many as 15 flights based on performance.

Astronauts have a unique way of seeing the world, figuratively and literally. Looking down on our home from low-Earth orbit day after day, they realize (and they all say they do) that space is an incredibly harsh environment, and everything we humans have and need is concentrated on this single planet with no alternative.

As regards US-Russia relations, you can see in the video what they think of the current tensions, and perhaps we should all take a leaf out of their books.

WATCH the micrograv group hug below… 

SHARE This Awesome Reminder That Peaceful Coexistence Is Always Possible…