International team completes orbital mission
Four astronauts concluded a nearly five-month mission aboard the International Space Station (ISS), landing safely in the Pacific Ocean off the coast of California in the same SpaceX capsule that launched them in March.
The journey home
The spacecraft took about 17 hours to return, enduring re-entry temperatures of roughly 3,000 °F as it passed through the atmosphere after undocking from the ISS on Friday.
The crew included NASA astronauts Anne McClain and Nichole Ayers, Japan’s Takuya Onishi, and Russia’s Kirill Peskov. During their time in orbit, they conducted over 200 scientific experiments aimed at advancing human exploration beyond low-Earth orbit, including material studies and research on physiological and psychological changes in the human body.
Experiences and crew rotation
For Ayers and Peskov, this was their first spaceflight, while McClain and Onishi were on their second mission to the ISS. Their replacements, Crew-11, arrived a week earlier and will spend approximately six months conducting experiments and maintenance work on the orbital laboratory.
ISS operations and future plans
This marked the 12th time SpaceX has carried NASA astronauts to the ISS as part of the agency’s Commercial Crew Program, which began in 2020. The initiative ended reliance on Russian launches following the retirement of the Space Shuttle in 2011.
The ISS has maintained continuous human presence since October 2000, but it is expected to be retired toward the end of the decade. NASA and its international partners are working with private companies to develop new space stations for future missions.
