Share

Two astronauts, cosmonaut return from five-month ISS mission

Dzhezkazgan - Two astronauts, from the US and Italy, and a Russian cosmonaut on Thursday landed in Kazakhstan after almost five months on the International Space Station, footage from the Russian space agency showed.

American Randy Bresnik, Paolo Nespoli of Italy and Sergey Ryazanskiy of Russia landed on the Kazakh steppe at 14:37 local time (08:37 GMT) in a Soyuz MS-05 spacecraft.

Over 139 days in space the three men "have supported hundreds of experiments in biology, biotechnology, physical science and Earth science aboard humanity's only microgravity laboratory", NASA said in an earlier statement.

Bresnik took part in several spacewalks to fix a robotic arm that latches onto incoming spaceships packed with supplies, while all three men were involved in a live video chat with Pope Francis from the space station.

On Sunday Scott Tingle of NASA, Anton Shkaplerov of Roscosmos and Norishige Kanai of the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency will blast off from Kazakhstan's Baikonur cosmodrome to replace the returning astronauts and cosmonaut.

The space travellers will join three other crew members currently on the ISS.

In October Russia's space agency said a manned Soyuz rocket had suffered a partial loss of pressure as it returned to Earth from the ISS in April this year.

The incident did not put the lives of the crew in danger, Roscosmos said, but it was the latest in the string of glitches to hit the country's space programme, which this month extended to a failed satellite launch.

NASA stopped its own manned launches to the ISS in 2011 but recently moved to increase its crew complement aboard the ISS as the Russians cut theirs in a cost-saving measure announced last year.

The ISS laboratory, a rare example of American and Russian international cooperation, has been orbiting Earth at about 28 000km/h since 1998.

We live in a world where facts and fiction get blurred
Who we choose to trust can have a profound impact on our lives. Join thousands of devoted South Africans who look to News24 to bring them news they can trust every day. As we celebrate 25 years, become a News24 subscriber as we strive to keep you informed, inspired and empowered.
Join News24 today
heading
description
username
Show Comments ()
Voting Booth
Do you think corruption-accused National Assembly Speaker Nosiviwe Mapisa-Nqakula will survive a motion of no confidence against her?
Please select an option Oops! Something went wrong, please try again later.
Results
No, her days are numbered
40% - 194 votes
Yes, the ANC caucus will protect her
60% - 289 votes
Vote
Rand - Dollar
19.02
-0.6%
Rand - Pound
24.01
-0.5%
Rand - Euro
20.53
-0.3%
Rand - Aus dollar
12.35
+0.0%
Rand - Yen
0.13
-0.6%
Platinum
899.20
+0.3%
Palladium
999.25
-0.3%
Gold
2,213.81
+0.9%
Silver
24.60
-0.2%
Brent Crude
86.09
-0.2%
Top 40
68,080
+0.6%
All Share
74,278
+0.5%
Resource 10
56,967
+2.4%
Industrial 25
103,572
+0.3%
Financial 15
16,456
-0.4%
All JSE data delayed by at least 15 minutes Iress logo
Editorial feedback and complaints

Contact the public editor with feedback for our journalists, complaints, queries or suggestions about articles on News24.

LEARN MORE