The Soyuz TMA-20M spacecraft with three crew members aboard has landed in Kazakhstan, the Russian news agency TASS reported Wednesday.
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It took about three hours for the crew members, U.S. astronaut Jeff Williams and Russian cosmonauts Oleg Skripochka and Alexey Ovchinin, to return to earth on Wednesday.
The trio wrapped up a 172-day mission aboard the International Space Station with a parachute descent and landing at dawn on the steppes, a Nasa TV broadcast showed. The first to be evacuated was Russian Alexei Ochinin, then the US Jeffri Williams and the latter the Russian Oleg Skripoch also highlights the capital’s television.
“No other USA astronaut has Jeff’s time and experience aboard the International Space Station”.
“No other USA 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. The astronaut from the United States commander Jeff Williams reported that he and his crewmates are healthy and in good spirits.
Williams was instrumental in preparing the station for the future arrival of US commercial crew spacecraft. Outfitted with a host of sensors and systems, the adapter’s main goal is to connect spacecraft bringing astronauts to the station in the future.
Expedition 49 continues operating the station with Anatoly Ivanishin of Roscosmos in command until the arrival of three new crew members. Other Soyuz crew members – Ivanishin, Onishi and Rubins – are scheduled to return to Earth October 30.
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The returning crew members will be replaced by USA astronaut Shane Kimbrough and Russian cosmonauts Sergey Ryzhikov and Andrey Borisenko, who are scheduled to blast off for the space station on September 23.
