US astronaut Scott Kelly and his Russian crew mate ended an unprecedented 340-day stay aboard the International Space Station Tuesday and are headed toward a parachute landing in Kazakhstan. His capsule will land in Kazakhstan on Wednesday, after traveling 144 million miles through space, circling the world 5,440 times and experienced 10,880 orbital sunrises and sunsets.
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The year-long mission is created to measure the impact of space travel on Kelly’s body. The twin part was a bonus which will allow doctors to study how the body changes after a year in space and enable NASA to better prepare for longer trips in outer space.
All photos above are courtesy of NASA.
NASA will be live streaming various parts of the day’s events, including the planned landing that will end Kelly’s 340 days up in space.
The International Space Station, a joint project of the United States, Russia, Europe, Japan and Canada, followed Mir and has been permanently staffed by rotating crews since 2000.
“We’ll say something like ‘We did it, ‘ or ‘We made it, ‘ but we both recognize that this is a lot more about teamwork and all the people that it takes to put these missions together and be successful than it is about us”, he said.
While photography from the ISS’s cupola module was not Kelly’s primary mission, his prolific, inspiring work will likely have far-reaching implications, especially because of his choice of platform. “Talk about aliens. He’s been off the planet for a year”.
Once on the ground, Kelly and Kornienko split.
NASA astronaut Scott Kelly is coming home after a very long time away. Kelly heads to Houston with two flight surgeons and several other NASA reps, arriving late Wednesday night.
Amid final preparations to leave with Kornienko and Russian cosmonaut Sergey Volkov, Kelly transferred command of the station to USA astronaut Tim Kopra yesterday afternoon. Realizing this is likely his last journey, it was “a little bittersweet” saying goodbye to his orbiting home.
The space veteran said he has witnessed some of the most unbelievable scenes of Earth during his mission, like spotting the northern lights, passing over the Bahamas and watching huge storms like Hurricane Patricia.
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“What a ride he took us on!” fellow astronaut Reid Wiseman said in a tweet from Earth. Scientists are using Kelly’s twin brother Mark, a retired astronaut, as a control subject to compare him to.
