Williams returned with fellow Expedition 48 crew members, Russian cosmonauts Alexey Ovchinin, and Oleg Skripochka, are back on Earth after a successful trip home from the International Space Station. They returned on the Soyuz TMA-20M space craft. Williams and his two Russian colleagues, Alexey Ovchinin and Oleg Skripochka logged 117.2 million kilometers in space, circling the Earth 2,752 times before landing on target in the south central steppes of Kazakhstan.
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Daily written updates about experiments and operations aboard the space station are available in the International Space Station Blog, which also provides comprehensive coverage during dynamic events.
Williams has beaten the previous record being set by Scott Kelly during his year spent in space.
“No other US astronaut has Jeff’s time and experience aboard the International Space Station”, Kirk Shireman, ISS program manager at NASA’s Johnson Space Center, said in an update. After the landing, all three of them were pulled out of the capsule that landed on its side.
They were then carried to a medical tent for routine tests to see how they adjust to gravity, including checking to see how they could stand.
The Russians remain champions of long-duration spaceflight, with cosmonaut Gennady Padalka now the world record-holder with 878 days in space over five missions. Thirteen Russians have more time in space than Williams. Williams wrote in Twitter, “I will certainly miss this view!”
“Vast gratitude toward my crewmates, ground teams, supporting friends, and family”, Williams added.
Before coming back to earth, Williams handed over the responsibility of the outpost to cosmonaut Anatoly Ivanishin, who is present at the ISS along with NASA astronaut Kate Rubins and Japan’s Takuya Onishi.
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The returning crew members will be replaced by U.S. astronaut Shane Kimbrough and Russian cosmonauts Sergey Ryzhikov and Andrey Borisenko, who are scheduled to blast off for the ISS on September 23.
