Astronaut Pettit, 2 cosmonauts undock from the International Space Station
The astronaut and cosmonauts departed the ISS at 5:57 p.m. EDT aboard the Soyuz MS-26 spacecraft and will take about 27.5 hours to travel from the space station to the landing area on the steppe of Kazakhstan at 9:20 p.m. EDT on Sunday, according to a NASA press release.
Pettit, Ovchinin and Vagner spent 220 days in space and orbited the Earth 3,520 times while traveling 93.3 million miles after their Soyuz MS-26 spacecraft docked at the ISS on Sept. 11 to begin Expedition 72.
While aboard the ISS for Expedition 72, the three crew members explored a variety of space phenomena that could benefit life on and off Earth.
The mission included studying advanced life support systems, genetic sequencing in microgravity, pharmaceutical manufacturing and other matters.
The spaceflight is Pettit's fourth, and he served as the flight engineer for Expeditions 71 and 72 at the ISS, according to NASA.
He has spent a total of 590 days in orbit aboard the ISS.
Ovchinin likewise completed four missions at the ISS and has logged 595 days in space, and Vagner has completed two missions and 416 days in space at the space station.
After re-entering the Earth's atmosphere, the capsule will complete a parachute landing in Kazakhstan on Sunday evening.
A helicopter will carry the three crew members to Karaganda, Kazakhstan, where Pettit will board a NASA aircraft for a flight to Houston.
Ovchinin and Vagner will continue their journey to a training base in Star City, Russia.
NASA will stream the MS-26 spacecraft's de-orbit burn, entry and landing starting at 8 p.m. EDT Sunday online at NASA+.
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
WIRED
6 minutes ago
- WIRED
Why the US Is Racing to Build a Nuclear Reactor on the Moon
NASA is fast-tracking a plan to build a nuclear reactor on the moon by 2030 under a new directive from the agency's interim administrator Sean Duffy. The plan revives a decades-old dream of scaling up nuclear power in space, a shift that would unlock futuristic possibilities and test legal and regulatory guidelines about the use of extraterrestrial resources and environments. Duffy, who also serves as President Donald Trump's secretary of transportation, framed being first to put a reactor on the lunar surface as a must-win contest in a new moon race. 'Since March 2024, China and Russia have announced on at least three occasions a joint effort to place a reactor on the Moon by the mid-2030s,' said Duffy in the directive, which is dated July 31. 'The first country to do so could potentially declare a keep-out zone which would significantly inhibit the United States from establishing a planned Artemis presence if not there first,' he added, referring to NASA's Artemis program, which aims to land humans on the moon in the coming years. The directive laid out a roadmap to design, launch, and deploy an operational 100-kilowatt reactor to the lunar South Pole within five years that would be built with commercial partners (for comparison, 100-kilowatts could power about 80 American households). While the specs are, well, speculative at this point, 100 kilowatts represents a dramatic power boost compared to the basic nuclear generators that fuel Mars rovers and space probes, which typically operate on just a few hundred watts, equivalent to a toaster or a light bulb. The implications would be transformative, 'not just for the moon, but for the entire solar system,' says Bhavya Lal, who previously served as NASA's associate administrator for technology, policy, and strategy and acting chief technologist. Placing a nuclear reactor on the moon would allow the space industry to 'start designing space systems around what we want to do, not what small amounts of power allow us to do. It's the same leap that occurred when Earth-based societies moved from candlelight to grid electricity.' Could NASA Build a Lunar Nuclear Reactor by 2030? Establishing a nuclear plant on the moon by 2030 won't be a lay-up, but many experts believe it is within reach. 'Four-and-a-bit years is a very racy timescale' but 'the technology is there,' says Simon Middleburgh, a professor in nuclear materials and co-director of the Nuclear Futures Institute at Bangor University in the UK. The issue up to this point hasn't necessarily been technological readiness, but a lack of mission demand for off-Earth reactors or political incentives to strongarm their completion. That calculus is now shifting. 'We've been investing over 60 years and have spent tens of billions of dollars, and the last time we launched anything was 1965,' says Lal, referring to NASA's SNAP-10A mission, which was the first nuclear reactor launched to space. 'I think the big moment of change was last year, when NASA actually, for the first time in its history ever, selected nuclear power as the primary surface power generation technology for crewed missions to Mars.
San Francisco Chronicle
35 minutes ago
- San Francisco Chronicle
Hubble Space Telescope takes best picture yet of the comet visiting from another solar system
CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. (AP) — The Hubble Space Telescope has captured the best picture yet of a high-speed comet visiting our solar system from another star. NASA and the European Space Agency released the latest photos Thursday. Discovered last month by a telescope in Chile, the comet known as 3I-Atlas is only the third known interstellar object to pass our way and poses no threat to Earth. Astronomers originally estimated the size of its icy core at several miles (tens of kilometers) across, but Hubble's observations have narrowed it down to no more than 3.5 miles (5.6 kilometers). It could even be as small as 1,000 feet (320 meters), according to scientists. The comet is hurtling our way at 130,000 mph (209,000 kph), but will veer closer to Mars than Earth, keeping a safe distance from both. It was 277 million miles (446 million kilometers) away when photographed by Hubble a couple weeks ago. The orbiting telescope revealed a teardrop-shaped plume of dust around the nucleus as well as traces of a dusty tail. ___ The Associated Press Health and Science Department receives support from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute's Department of Science Education and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. The AP is solely responsible for all content.
36 minutes ago
Hubble Space Telescope takes picture of comet visiting from another solar system
CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. -- The Hubble Space Telescope has captured the best picture yet of a high-speed comet visiting our solar system from another star. NASA and the European Space Agency released the latest photos Thursday. Discovered last month by a telescope in Chile, the comet known as 3I-Atlas is only the third known interstellar object to pass our way and poses no threat to Earth. Astronomers originally estimated the size of its icy core at several miles (tens of kilometers) across, but Hubble's observations have narrowed it down to no more than 3.5 miles (5.6 kilometers). It could even be as small as 1,000 feet (320 meters), according to scientists. The comet is hurtling our way at 130,000 mph (209,000 kph), but will veer closer to Mars than Earth, keeping a safe distance from both. It was 277 million miles (446 million kilometers) away when photographed by Hubble a couple weeks ago. The orbiting telescope revealed a teardrop-shaped plume of dust around the nucleus as well as traces of a dusty tail. ___ The Associated Press Health and Science Department receives support from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute's Department of Science Education and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. The AP is solely responsible for all content.
