The fifth Russian female professional cosmonaut to go into space and the first cosmonaut from her country to fly with Space-X, Kikina returned to Earth on March 12 with Japan's Koichi Wakata and Americans Nicole Mann and Josh Cassada, after five months aboard the ISS.
"I really liked this flight (...) Everything was comfortable," the 38-year-old engineer told an online news conference.
"I didn't experience any difficulty (...). We felt support for each other all the time, a good sense of humor reigned on the Station, like in the ship," Kikina said.
"It was a beautiful atmosphere!" she exclaimed.
According to her, each crew member "had an interest in mutual understanding being found" and expressed "his willingness and desire to establish the best possible communication".
After returning to Earth, Anna Kikina spent the first phase of her rehabilitation at a NASA facility in Houston and then underwent extensive medical examinations in Russia.
The ISS has become one of the last areas where Washington and Moscow continue to work together since the launch of the Russian offensive in Ukraine in February 2022.
The Soviet Union sent the first woman into space in history, Valentina Tereshkova, on June 16, 1963.
Russian cosmonaut Anna Kikina recounts her stay aboard the International Space Station (ISS) during the Crew-5 mission of the American company SpaceX, during a press conference at the Gagarin Center in Star City, near Moscow, March 23, 2023 © Andrey SHELEPIN / GAGARIN COSMONAUT TRAINING CENTER / AFP
She was followed by Svetlana Savitskaya, the first woman to perform a spacewalk, in July 1984.
In October 2021, Russia also sent an actress, Yulia Peressild, to shoot the first feature film in orbit, before a competing Tom Cruise project.
© 2023 AFP