Space Station Crew Members Returns to Earth !!!

November 26, 2010 by Nataly in Technology

A Russian cosmonaut and two American astronauts returned safely to Earth Friday at 10:46am after spending 5 months aboard the International Space Station.

Russian cosmonaut Fyodor Yurchikhin and American astronauts Doug Wheelock and Shannon Walker returned in a Russian Soyuz spacecraft as part of a mission called Expedition 25 and landed in Kazakhstan.

Walker has spent 163 days in space, Wheelock has 178 total days in space on his two missions and Yurchikhin has now spent 371 days in space over the course of three missions. They left Earth on June 15 from the Baikonur Cosmodrome and arrived at the ISS on June 17.

“What will that first breath be like when the hatch opens on Earth?” Doug Wheelock said in a Twitter message before departing the station. “I can only imagine.”

Yurchikhin was the first who exit the capsule into sub-freezing temperatures on a grassy field 50 miles northeast of Arkalyk. The next one was Walker and she was followed by Wheelock.

When Wheelock was asked how the space station looked after undocking, his answer was: “Beautiful.”

Three crew members remain on the space station: astronaut Scott Kelly and cosmonauts Alexander Kaleri and Oleg Skripochka.