Sergey Prokopyev and Dmitry Petelin, two Russian cosmonauts who set a new record for time spent on the International Space Station, and their colleague, NASA astronaut Francisco Rubio, safely landed in Kazakhstan on Wednesday, according to Roscosmos.
According to Russia’s space agency, the Soyuz MS-23 spacecraft carrying the three men touched down at 2:17pm Moscow time, after a smooth voyage.
According to the statement, Prokopyev and Petelin spent more than 370 days in space, making theirs the longest ISS mission to date. Only two pairs of their colleagues who crewed the now-defunct Soviet/Russian Mir space station in 1994-1995 and 1998-1999 outdid them, according to Roscosmos.
Prokopyev, who has two voyages under his belt, has chalked up 567 days, 15 hours, and 12 minutes spent in orbit, while this was Petelin’s maiden flight.
They ventured outside the station six times during their stay aboard the ISS. On top of that, the Russian cosmonauts conducted a series of scientific experiments and received four cargo spacecraft.
Roscosmos stated in February that one of these vehicles had depressurized after docking for unclear causes. The mishap, however, did not imperil any of the ISS crew members because the malfunctioning component was swiftly separated.
The current space station crew includes Russian cosmonauts Oleg Kononenko, Nikolay Chub, and Konstantin Borisov, NASA astronauts Jasmin Moghbeli and Loral O’Hara, the European Space Agency’s Andreas Mogensen, and Japan’s Satoshi Furukawa.
Roscosmos and NASA reached an agreement in July to integrate flights to the International Space Station. This allows Russian cosmonauts to travel to and from the space station on American Crew Dragon spacecraft, while US astronauts board Russian Soyuz MS spacecraft.
