First ever astronaut twins set to orbit planet together

NEW DELHI - The world is set to have its first astronaut twins orbiting the planet together, making them the first blood relatives to meet up in space.

US astronaut Scott Kelly, a crew member of the mission to the International Space Station, is circling the planet fresh into a five-month space station mission, and his identical twin Mark is set to join him next year, the China Daily reported.

“It’s something we hoped would happen. It wasn’t done by design. But we’re fortunate. I think it will be fun for us,” Mark said.

Scott, who is the International Space Station’s next commander, had taken off aboard a Russian Soyuz rocket early on October and arrived at the orbiting complex on October 9 night.

Mark, who is space shuttle Endeavour’s next commander, is due to take off at the end of February next year and knock on the space station door on March 1.

The two 46-year-old brothers, Navy captains and former fighter pilots, are excited about uniting more than 320 km up, and have said that they will greet one another with embraces and even arm-wrestling.

“We’re going to arm-wrestle,” Mark said.

While Scott added: “I was going to say the same exact thing.”

The twins, who grew up in West Orange, New Jersey, went to different colleges but ended up together in the Navy’s 1993 test pilot school class and, on occasion, shared jet cockpits.

Unable to choose between them, NASA accepted both as astronauts in 1996.

“It will be certainly unique, won’t it?” Mark stated. (ANI)