NASA astronaut Anne McClain and two of her 59 crewmates returned Monday from the International Space Station to Earth, landing safely at 10:47 p.m. in Kazakhstan. After months of science and four spacewalks aboard the microgravity laboratory, EDT (8:47 a.m. Tuesday, June 25, local time).
McClain, the Russian space agency Roscosmos ‘ Expedition 59/Soyuz Commander Oleg Kononenko and the Canadian Space Agency’s David Saint-Jacques initiated Dec. 3, 2018. Just six hours later, they arrived at the space station to start their 204-day mission, during which they orbited Earth 3,264 times traveling 86,430,555 miles.
McClain and Saint-Jacques will return to Star City, Russia after post-landing medical checks to Houston and Kononenko.
The Expedition 59 crew contributed to hundreds of studies in biology, biotechnology, physical science, and earth science, including research into tiny machines that replicate the structure and function of human organs, first-time editing of DNA in space, and 3D-printed material recycling.
A U.S. lieutenant colonel, McClain. Army and Spokane, Washington native, performed two13-hourand8-minute spacewalks on her space mission.
Saint-Jacques also joined McClain on her second trip, which amounted to 6 hours and 29 minutes, on her first space mission and only the sixth Canadian astronaut to conduct a spacewalk. Kononenko performed two13-hourand46-minute spacewalks on his fourth mission, taking his career to 32 hours and spread over five spacewalks for 13 minutes.
When their SoyuzMS-11 spacecraft undocked at 7:25 p.m., Expedition 60 started formally on board the station, with NASA’s Nick Hague and Christina Koch as flight engineers, and Roscosmos ‘ Alexey Ovchinin as commander of the station.
Source : NASA
