Washington, United States:
A SpaceX Crew Dragon capsule carrying 4 astronauts back to Earth splashed down off Panama City early Sunday, a NASA livestream showed.
Boats have been retrieving the spacecraft and crew right after their six-month mission aboard the International Space Station.
The crew reported they have been feeling properly, NASA stated.
The capsule splashed down at 2:56 am (0656 GMT) in the dark in the Gulf of Mexico off the Florida coast right after a six-and-a-half hour flight from the ISS, pictures relayed by NASA’s WB-57 higher-altitude study aircraft showed.
Astronauts Michael Hopkins, Victor Glover, Shannon Walker and Japan’s Soichi Noguchi went to space last November as the crew on the very first completely operational mission to the ISS aboard a car made by Elon Musk’s SpaceX, which has come to be NASA’s favored industrial transportation companion.
Seven astronauts remained on the ISS such as a new crew of 4 who arrived on a distinct SpaceX craft last week.
“Thanks for your hospitality,” Hopkins stated earlier as the capsule undocked from the space station for its return journey. “We’ll see you back on Earth.”
Prior to that, two American astronauts made a test mission to the ISS in May and stayed for two months.
That was the very first launch to the ISS from US soil because the finish of the Space Shuttle plan in 2011. It was also the very first crewed mission run by a private corporation, as opposed to NASA.
Until then US astronauts had caught rides to the ISS aboard Russian spacecraft.
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