ROSCOSMOS - Soyuz TMA-13M Mission patch.
November 10, 2014
Image above: The Soyuz TMA-13M carrying the Expedition 41 trio fires its soft-landing engines right on time at 03:58 GMT (04:58 CET). Image Credit: NASA TV.
Expedition 41 Flight Engineers Reid Wiseman of NASA, Alexander Gerst of the European Space Agency and Commander Maxim Suraev of the Russian Federal Space Agency (Roscosmos) landed their Soyuz TMA-13M spacecraft in Kazakhstan at 03:58 GMT (04:58 CET). The trio arrived at the International Space Station on May 29, and spent more than five months conducting research and maintenance activites.
Video above: International Space Station Expedition 41 Astronaut Crew Lands Safely in Kazakhstan. Video Credit: NASA TV.
Russian recovery teams will help the crew exit the Soyuz vehicle and adjust to gravity after their stay in space. Wiseman, Gerst and Suraev spent 165 days aboard the space station and clocked more than 70 million miles during their time in space.
This was the first mission for both Wiseman and Gerst. Suraev now has spent 334 days in space during two missions, including Expeditions 21 and 22.
Image above: Screens at the Mission Control Center in Russia signify a safe landing for the Expedition 41 trio inside the Soyuz TMA-13M spacecraft. Image Credit: NASA TV.
The station now is occupied by Expedition 42 Commander Barry “Butch” Wilmore of NASA and Flight Engineers Alexander Samokutyaev and Elena Serova of Roscosmos. They will remain aboard the station to continue research and maintenance until the remainder of the Expedition 42 crew arrives later this month. NASA astronaut Terry Virts, Russian cosmonaut Anton Shkaplerov and ESA astronaut Samantha Cristoforetti are scheduled to launch from Baikonur, Kazakhstan, Nov. 23, (U.S. time).
Image above: ESA astronaut Alexander Gerst, Russian commander Maxim Suraev and NASA astronaut Reid Wiseman returned to Earth today, landing in the Kazakh steppe. Image Credit: ESA/S. Corvaja.
Alexander performed over 50 experiments during his flight on the weightless research centre as it circled our planet 400 km up. In just two weeks, ESA astronaut Samantha Cristoforetti will continue many of the experiments and begin new ones when she is launched on her ‘Futura’ mission.
Highlights of Alexander’s ‘Blue Dot’ mission included installing ESA’s furnace that can suspend and cool molten metal in mid-air, a spacewalk to maintain and improve the Space Station, and the docking of Europe’s last Automated Transfer Vehicle – the largest spacecraft to supply the research centre.
A large selection of photographs from Blue Dot, most taken by Alexander himself, is available on the Flickr page: http://www.flickr.com/photos/astro_alex
For more information about the International Space Station (ISS), visit: http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/station/main/index.html
Images (mentioned), Video (mentioned), Text, Credit: NASA/ ESA.
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