All astronauts going to the International Space Station have to learn how to speak Russian.

All astronauts going to the International Space Station have to learn how to speak Russian.

Their spacecraft mission is commanded by a Russian citizen and a large chunk of their destination — the International Space Station — has modules and operations in Russian, too. This means that all astronauts going to the ISS, no matter how many languages they speak, also need to learn Russian.

English

The official working language aboard the station is English. However, since the end of NASA's Space Shuttle programme in 2011, Russia's Soyuz spacecraft is the only way of travelling to the ISS. And since all its controls are in Russian, every astronaut must learn the language.

NASA astronauts Robert Behnken and Douglas Hurley aboard the SpaceX Dragon Endeavour have arrived at the International Space Station to join Expedition 63 Commander and NASA astronaut Chris Cassidy and cosmonauts Anatoly Ivanishin and Ivan Vagner of the Russian space agency Roscosmos.