SpaceX splashdown: ISS astronauts return after 5 months; Nasa's first Pacific landing in 50 years
International space station
(ISS).
Their SpaceX capsule splashed down in the Pacific Ocean off the coast of Southern California on Saturday, a day after leaving the orbiting laboratory.
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Nasa's Anne McClain and Nichole Ayers, Japan's Takuya Onishi, and Russia's Kirill Peskov launched in March to replace the two Nasa astronauts stranded on Boeing's Starliner following its failed test mission.
'Welcome home,' Mission Control at SpaceX radioed as the capsule parachuted into the water.
Starliner's malfunctions forced Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams to remain in orbit for more than nine months instead of a planned week.
Nasa eventually ordered the capsule to return empty, transferring the pair to a SpaceX flight. Wilmore has since retired from Nasa.
Before departure on Friday, McClain said, 'We want this mission, our mission, to be a reminder of what people can do when we work together, when we explore together.' She said she was looking forward to 'doing nothing for a couple of days' in Houston, while her crewmates hoped for hot showers and burgers.
This was SpaceX's first
Nasa crew splashdown
in the Pacific in 50 years, with Elon Musk's company shifting returns from Florida to California earlier this year to reduce debris risks.
The last Nasa astronauts to land in the Pacific were part of the 1975
Apollo-Soyuz mission
, a historic joint effort between the US and the Soviet Union.
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