Humanity has reached a new milestone in space exploration. According to cosmonaut historian Alexander Zheleznyakov, there are currently a record number of people in Earth orbit – 19 people, RIA Novosti reports.

This historic moment came after the successful launch of the Soyuz MS-26 manned transport spacecraft from the Baikonur Cosmodrome. The spacecraft, which was launched on the Soyuz-2.1a rocket at 19:23 Moscow time, entered orbit 9 minutes later. On board are Russian cosmonauts Alexei Ovchinin and Ivan Wagner, as well as American astronaut Donald Pettit.

The day before this event, the American Crew Dragon spacecraft was launched with participants in the Polaris Dawn mission. The crew consists of four people: businessman and ship captain Jared Isaacman, former military pilot Stott “Kidd” Poteet, SpaceX astronaut program manager Sarah Gillis, and SpaceX chief space operations engineer Anna Manon.

In addition, astronauts Ye Guangfu, Li Cong, and Li Guangsu continue their work on the Chinese orbital station Tiangong.

Nine people are on the International Space Station (ISS) awaiting the arrival of Soyuz MS-26: Russians Oleg Kononenko, Nikolai Chub, and Alexander Grebenkin, and Americans Matthew Dominik, Michael Barratt, Janet Epps, Tracy Dyson, Barry Wilmore, and Sunita Williams.

This new record surpasses the previous achievement, set in May 2023, when 17 people were in orbit at the same time.