The British astronaut was really busy on the International Space Station before he returned to Earth on Saturday.
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Peake and USA astronaut Tim Kopra will board a NASA plane to Norway, where the British spaceman will switch to a European Space Agency flight back to its headquarters in Cologne to be re-united with his family.
Several hours earlier, the three astronauts had closed the hatch between the station and the spacecraft at precisely 3.34am, marking the official end of ISS Expedition 47 and Major Peake’s Principia mission. The space station airlock was used to study Peake’s lungs, and his sleeping patterns were monitored in order to learn more about how humans adapt to the absence of normal daylight.
One of his first actions after leaving the space capsule was to try to phone his family – but it wasn’t clear if he managed to get through.
The first British astronaut performed a spacewalk, which he said was an obvious highlight of his time on the International Space Station (ISS).
A Royal Mail spokesperson, said: “As the first British European Space Agency astronaut to visit the Space Station, we wanted to mark Tim’s historic return to earth with a very special postmark”. His capsule entered the Earth’s orbit at 10 am United Kingdom time today and 15 minutes later he along with two other crew members landed on the planet. “I’ll look forward to seeing the family”, Peake said after his landing.
He added that spending 186 days on the space station was a “life changing experience”.
The astronaut has also made a number of educational videos in conjunction with the National Space Centre during his six months in space.
He said the highlight of his mission was the space walk he conducted with Colonel Kopra in January to fix electrical components on the outside of the space station. In April, he completed in the London Marathon in space with the help of a running machine, setting a Guinness World Record for the “fastest marathon in orbit”. The spacewalk – 200 feet long is scheduled to last for about six hours.
Peake is an expert in flying Apache helicopters and Indian delicacies form part of his diet while in space.
“It was incredible”, Peake said while being attended by the rescue and medical team in the scrubland steppe of Kazakhstan.
Peake also held a science lesson for 300,000 schoolchildren.
He excited many at home by joining the 26.2-mile (42-kilometer) London Marathon-from 250 miles (400 kilometers) above the Earth, harnessed to a treadmill aboard the ISS with a simulation of the route through London’s streets playing on an iPad.
He tweeted, “Time to put on some weight!” As part of their mission there, the astronauts tested new technologies and conducted hundreds of experiments in biology, biotechnology, physical science and Earth science.
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It was incredible, like nothing I have ever seen.
