Expedition 28 crew lands safely in Kazakhstan at midnight (ET)
Thursday, September 15, 2011 at 11:33PM By Tariq Malik, SPACE.com Managing Editor--
This still from a camera on the Internaitonal Space Station shows the Russian Soyuz TMA-21 spacecraft with three astronauts onboard shortly after undocking from the orbiting lab on Sept. 15, 2011 for a landing on Sept. 16. Credit: NASA TV
A Russian-built Soyuz space capsule landed safely back on Earth late Thursday (Sept. 15), returning an American astronaut and two cosmonauts home after more than five months in space.
The Soyuz TMA-21 spacecraft touched down at about 11:59 a.m. EDT (0359 GMT), though it was 9:59 a.m. Friday local time at their landing site on the steppes of Kazakhstan in central Asia.
Russia's Mission Control center in Moscow lost direct communications with the Soyuz during its descent through Earth’s atmosphere, but the glitch apparently did not affect the spacecraft's normal landing operations.
"A bull's eye landing for the Soyuz TMA-21 spacecraft," said NASA spokeman Rob Navias during the agency's landing commentary. Earlier, Navias said a recovery team aircraft was able to contact the Soyuz crew and confirmed that its crew was doing well.
The spacecraft returned NASA astronaut Ron Garan and cosmonauts Andrey Borisenko and Alexander Samokutyaev back to Earth after 164 days in space. Three other space station residents stayed behind on the orbiting lab to complete their own months-long space trek.
"It's been great sharing space with you," space station commander Mike Fossum of NASA told the departing crew just after the Soyuz undocked. "Safe journey and soft landing, my friends. Godspeed from the International Space Station."
Months-long space mission
Garan and his Russian crewmates launched on April 4 just ahead of the 50th anniversary of the first human spaceflight by famed cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin on April 12, 1961.
The spaceflyers were aboard the station during NASA's final two space shuttle missions — one in May and another in July — which delivered a major astrophysics experiment and vital supplies to the orbiting lab.
Throughout the mission, Garan posted stunning photos of Earth from space on Twitter under the name @Astro_Ron in order to share his experience with the public. Even on his last day in space, he managed to send his 86,000 followers a message.
Reader Comments