In 2003, after months of bureaucratic confusion, two star-crossed lovers overcame all obstacles from men and nature and were triumphantly married. The bride was in Texas and the groom was on the International Space Station. Perhaps symbolic of the ultimate coordination of events, at the precise moment that 26-year-old Ekaterina “Kat” Dmitriev walked down the aisle in the main hall of the Gilruth Center at NASA’s Johnson Space Center in Houston, the ISS carrying her intended — 42-year-old cosmonaut Yuri Malenchenko — emerged from Earth’s shadow just south of New Zealand and entered the sunny side of its orbit. Contrary to expectations, Malenchenko wore a formal flight uniform, not a tuxedo. He and his best man, fellow cosmonaut Ed Lu, appeared on a video linkup between the ISS and the wedding hall. The transmission was officially categorized as a “private family conference” and was not publicly broadcast over NASA-TV. The bride marched in to the music of David Bowie’s “Absolute Beginners” and then recited the lyrics. Following Texas law, they performed a proxy marriage ceremony — with one of Yuri’s friends standing in for him in Houston — and then blew kisses to each other. About 200 people attended the 25-minute service, with the reception being held at Villa Capri in nearby Seabrook, where a life-size cutout of the groom greeted guests as they entered. The couple held a religious wedding service in Russia the following year.
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| The bride with a cut-out of her new husband |
