Multinational crew of 3 returns from ISS
Source: Agencies |
July 2, 2012, Monday
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Print Edition
Print Edition
A Soyuz space capsule carrying a three-man multinational crew touched down safely yesterday on the southern steppes of Kazakhstan, bringing an end to their 193-day mission to the International Space Station.
Around a dozen recovery helicopters zeroed into the vast uncultivated land mass, where NASA astronaut Donald Pettit, Russia's Oleg Kononenko and Dutchman Andre Kuipers landed in the Russian-made capsule.
Russian space officials quickly surrounded the craft, which performed a perfect upright textbook landing, and erected ladders to begin the process of pulling out the astronauts.
The voyage from the space station started 3 -1/2 hours earlier, when it undocked and began a slow, gentle drift away. It made a perfect landing in the still and summery weather.
NASA TV reporter Rob Navias called the landing a ''bullseye."
Kononenko was the first to be extracted from the descent module. He looked pale and tired, but medical staff pronounced him healthy. Pettit, second out of the module, was heard to say: "It's good to be home."
The three men were hoisted into recliners and posed for photos before being carried into a tent for further checks.
They were part of the team that handled the arrival to the space station last month of the privately-owned SpaceX Dragon capsule. That became the first private delivery to the ISS.
The retirement of the US shuttle fleet has left Russia's Soyuz spacecraft as the only means to deliver crews to the orbiting laboratory.
Around a dozen recovery helicopters zeroed into the vast uncultivated land mass, where NASA astronaut Donald Pettit, Russia's Oleg Kononenko and Dutchman Andre Kuipers landed in the Russian-made capsule.
Russian space officials quickly surrounded the craft, which performed a perfect upright textbook landing, and erected ladders to begin the process of pulling out the astronauts.
The voyage from the space station started 3 -1/2 hours earlier, when it undocked and began a slow, gentle drift away. It made a perfect landing in the still and summery weather.
NASA TV reporter Rob Navias called the landing a ''bullseye."
Kononenko was the first to be extracted from the descent module. He looked pale and tired, but medical staff pronounced him healthy. Pettit, second out of the module, was heard to say: "It's good to be home."
The three men were hoisted into recliners and posed for photos before being carried into a tent for further checks.
They were part of the team that handled the arrival to the space station last month of the privately-owned SpaceX Dragon capsule. That became the first private delivery to the ISS.
The retirement of the US shuttle fleet has left Russia's Soyuz spacecraft as the only means to deliver crews to the orbiting laboratory.
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