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Four astronauts, including Frenchman Thomas Pesquet, returned safely after a record NASA science mission, after spending six months on the International Space Station. The historic Crew-2 mission, aboard the SpaceX Crew Dragon capsule, conducted hundreds of experiments and helped upgrade the station’s solar panels, among others.
After an eight-hour journey to Earth, one of the largest space missions in recent history was successfully completed.
Before its descent, the SpaceX Crew Dragon capsule, nicknamed Endevour, traveled around the International Space Station (ISS) for about another hour and a half to take pictures, the first mission of its kind since a Russian Soyuz spacecraft performed a similar maneuver in 2018.
Four astronauts were on board: the Americans, Shane Kimbrough and Megan McArthur, the French Thomas Pesquet, of the European Space Agency (ESA), and the Japanese Akihiko Hoshide, who completed their return to Earth off the coast of Florida, at 0333 GMT on November 8.
“Proud to have once again represented France in space! Next stop, the Moon? Pesquet posted on his Twitter account.
Since their arrival on April 24, the crew’s activities included documenting the planet’s surface to record man-made changes and natural events, growing Hatch chili peppers to study the planting of food products for long-duration space missions, and Worm experiments to better understand changes in human health in space.
Powered by the last firing of its forward rocket boosters for “out-of-orbit combustion,” the capsule reentered the atmosphere at about 27,359 kilometers per hour, for a free fall into the ocean during which the crew’s communications they were lost for several minutes.
The intense friction generated when the capsule passed through the atmosphere slowed its descent and caused the temperatures around the outside of the vehicle to rise to 1,927 degrees Celsius. However, the bottom of the capsule is covered by a shield that dissipates heat, preventing the ship from incinerating.
The mission will be relieved this week by Crew-3
The return of the SpaceX Crew Dragon came after 199 days in orbit, the longest time for a full crew launched from the United States, according to Kathy Lueders, NASA’s associate chief of space operations.
With them, the mission surpassed the previous record of 168 days set by predecessor SpaceX-NASA earlier this year, Lueders explained.
NASA’s next major launch is scheduled for Wednesday, November 10 from the Kennedy Space Center, Florida, with the Crew-3 mission, which will take over and will also remain on the space station for six months.
With AFP and Reuters
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