The head of Russia’s space agency is now threatening to abandon a US astronaut as the conflict continues to escalate in Eastern Europe, tension is reaching new heights in space.

The U.S and Russia have worked together for the past 24 years to construct and maintain the International Space Station, where research has led to some of the most important discoveries of the 21st century.

Now, 227 miles below the unrivaled laboratory, Russia has waged a war in Ukraine that’s pitted the country against the U.S. and its allies — leaving the future of the ISS in question.

NASA astronaut Mark Vande Hei was scheduled to land in Kazakhstan with two Russian cosmonauts aboard a Russian Soyuz spacecraft on March 30, 2022.

Watch it here: ABC News/Youtube

But a February 26 video from Russian space agency director Dmitry Rogozin first called that into question, when he threatened to leave Vande Hei in space and even separate Russian and American parts of the orbiting lab.

According to the Daily Mail report:

Russia’s space program has apparently threatened to leave an American astronaut aboard the International Space Station as it comes crashing down to Earth in a video shared by Russian state media outlet RIA Novosti.

Mark Vande Hei, a married 55-year-old father of two from Texas, is scheduled to return to Kazakhstan from the International Space Station (ISS) with two Russian cosmonauts aboard a Russian Soyuz spacecraft on March 30 after spending nearly a year onboard.

But amid United States sanctions against Russia for the human rights violations it is committing in its siege of Ukraine, Dmitry Rogozin, head of the Russian space agency Roscosmos, has threatened to leave him in space.

He even took the time to produce the chilling video, which was posted to Twitter by NASA Watch.

It features upbeat music with the lyric ‘Farewell’ as the two cosmonauts on board the ISS with Vande Hei wave him goodbye and detach Russia’s segment of the station – which would send it spiraling to Earth.  

RIA Novosti captioned it: ‘The Roscosmos television studio jokingly demonstrated the possibility of Russia withdrawing from the ISS project — the undocking of the Russian segment of the station, without which the American part of the project cannot exist,’ according to a translation from Newsweek. 

Vande Hei’s mother Mary, 77, told The Mail on Sunday: ‘It’s a terrible threat. When I first heard it I did a lot of crying. It’s very troubling. We are just doing a lot of praying.’

Mary, a retired teacher from Minneapolis, Minnesota, pleaded for peace, adding: ‘It is really a shame that it’s been politicized like this. It’s quite a shock. His wife, Julie, is very worried in Texas. It’s very hard for her right now.’

Sources: 100 Percent Fed Up, ABC 7, KHOU, 9News, Daily Mail