NASA astronaut Kate Rubins and two Russian crew members, Sergey Ryzhikov and Sergey Kud-Sverchkov, have safely returned to Earth. The crew members returned to Earth after being stationed on board the ISS for six months. They left the ISS aboard a Soyuz MS-17 spacecraft at 9:34 p.m. EDT on Friday.
The capsule landed safely southeast of the city of Dzhezkazgan in Kazakhstan at 12:55 p.m. on Saturday. Rubins will return to Houston, and the two Russian cosmonauts will return to their home and training base in Star City, Russia. A press conference will be held next week on Wednesday April 21 at 3:15 p.m. EDT where Rubins will speak about her 185-day mission. The conference will be broadcast live on NASA television, on the NASA app, and on the Johnson Space Center Agency website in Houston.
Rubins and her crewmembers had an active mission with a few key milestones including welcoming the first SpaceX Crew-1 astronauts for the crew’s first long-term commercial spaceflight. Rubins also completed two space walks alongside another NASA astronaut, Victor Glover, and a Japanese astronaut, which brought her career to four space walks.
After returning to Earth, she has now spent 300 days on two flights in space, the fourth most common day that an American astronaut has spent in space. During her time aboard the space station, Rubins worked hundreds of hours on a variety of experiments, including the Cardinal Heart Experiment, which examined how changes in gravity affect cardiovascular cells at the cell and tissue levels.
When Rubins and her crew members of Expedition 64 left the ISS, Expedition 65 officially began with NASA astronaut Shannon Walker as station commander. The ISS has been in orbit for more than 20 years after reaching its 20th birthday in November 2020. The space station was manned all the time.
Ref: https://www.slashgear.com
