American And 2 Russians Safely Return To Earth From Space Station

After 6 months on the International Space Station, the astronaut and cosmonauts are reacclimating to gravity.

MOSCOW (AP) — An American astronaut and two Russians have returned to Earth after six months aboard the International Space Station.

BILL INGALLS VIA AP

Expedition 64 NASA astronaut Kate Rubins is helped out of the Soyuz MS-17 spacecraft.

A Soyuz space capsule carrying NASA’s Kate Rubins and Russians Sergey Ryzhikov and Sergey Kud-Sverchkov landed at 0455 GMT (12:55 a.m. EDT) Saturday in the steppes of Kazakhstan.

BILL INGALLS VIA AP

In this photo provided by NASA, Roscosmos cosmonaut Sergey Kud-Sverchkov is helped out of the Soyuz MS-17 spacecraft.

Dmitry Rogozin, head of the Russian space agency Roskosmos, said all three were feeling well after they were extracted from the capsule and began reacclimating to the pull of gravity.

BILL INGALLS VIA AP

The Soyuz MS-17 spacecraft lands in a remote area near the town of Zhezkazgan, Kazakhstan, Saturday, April 17, 2021.

The three had arrived at the orbiting laboratory complex on Oct. 14.

There now are seven people aboard the ISS: NASA astronaut Mark Vande Hei and Russians Oleg Novitskiy and Pyotr Dubrov arrived on April 9; Americans Michael Hopkins, Victor Glover and Shannon Walker, and Japan’s Soichi Noguchi, came aboard in November on the SpaceX Crew Dragon Resilience, the first ISS docking under NASA’s Commercial Crew Program.