A team of four astronauts from the U.S., Japan, and Russia successfully returned to Earth on Saturday after spending nearly five months aboard the International Space Station (ISS). Their SpaceX Dragon capsule splashed down off the coast of California at 8:44 AM local time, concluding NASA’s 10th Commercial Crew Program mission.
The crew included American astronauts Anne McClain and Nicole Ayers, Japanese astronaut Takuya Onishi, and Russian cosmonaut Kirill Peskov. After undocking from the ISS on Friday at 3:15 AM (PKT), the capsule took 17 hours to re-enter Earth’s atmosphere, aided by parachutes for a smooth ocean landing.
During their mission, dubbed Crew-10, the astronauts conducted key experiments, including plant growth studies and cellular responses to zero gravity. The mission also brought home two American astronauts who had been stranded on the ISS for nine months due to earlier delays.\
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