14 DAY TRIAL // After spending a little less than six months on the International Space Station (ISS), three astronauts returned to Earth today, March 16, landing in the snowy steppes of Kazakhstan, central Asia.
The spacecraft carrying the three landed at 2 pm local time (3:54 am EDT / 0754 GMT), about 80 kilometers (50 miles) away from the town of Arkalyk. The crew inside was in good condition, and unharmed, responders on the scene said.
The Russian built Soyuz TMA-01M space capsule delivered former ISS Expedition 26 commander Scott Kelly (NASA) and flight engineers Oleg Skripochka and Alexander Kaleri, both with the Russian Federal Space Agency (RosCosmos).
“The Soyuz landed on its side, but in good shape,” reported from the scene Rob Navias, a spokesman for NASA. Winds were blowing at speed of up to 30 knots at the landing site, and snow was piling up to the ankle. Regardless, the crew suffered no injuries as a result of the harsh landing.
Navias added that the strong winds dragged the spacecraft on the ground for more than 23 meters (75 feet), before its parachute came off. “You would think that it was a scene out of the North Pole,” the spokesman explained.
“It was a bull's-eye landing under very harsh conditions,” he added. The three astronauts that just returned today concluded a 159-day stay aboard the orbital facility. They were immediately put into helicopters following their arrival, and taken to safer, warmer accommodations.
“It is extremely cold and they don't want the crew to be exposed to these conditions for a long amount of time,” Navias explained. The crew left Earth in October, aboard the first revamped model of the tremendously successful and reliable Soyuz capsule.
Kelly, Skripochka and Kaleri left the ISS yesterday, March 15, at 12:24 am EDT (0424 GMT). They carried out a couple of flight tests on the spacecraft, which awaited for them docked on the station for nearly 6 months.
The successful conclusion of Expedition 26 marks Kaleri's entrance into the record books. During five spaceflights, he accumulated more than 770 days in orbit, a little more than two years. He is therefor the second most-flown human in history, after cosmonaut Sergei Krikalev (803 days / 6 spaceflights).
In an official ceremony held on Monday, March 14, Kelly handed over command of the ISS to flight engineer Dmitry Kondratyev (RosCosmos), who became the commander of Expedition 27.
The current crew of the ISS is made up of Kondratyev, European Space Agency (ESA) astronaut Paolo Nespoli and NASA astronaut Catherine Coleman. They were originally scheduled to be joined by three other flight engineers at the end of March.
However, a glitch with the Soyuz capsule that was supposed to ferry the astronauts to the ISS delayed that launch to April 7-10. It's only then that Expedition 27 will be reunited in orbit, Space reports.