The SpaceX Crew Dragon spacecraft on Saturday shoved off from the International Space Station (ISS) with two US astronauts on board, beginning their journey back to Earth, despite a storm threatening Florida.
NASA footage showed the capsule drifting slowly away from the ISS in the darkness of space, ending a two-month stay for the first US astronauts to reach the orbiting lab on a US spacecraft in nearly a decade.
“And they are off!” NASA tweeted, with astronauts Doug Hurley and Bob Behnken set to splash down yesterday.
“[They] will spend one more night in space prior to returning to their homeland, Earth,” NASA tweeted.
Their proposed splash-down sites were off the coast of western Florida’s panhandle, while Tropical Storm Isaias was headed toward the state’s east coast.
NASA opted to go ahead with bringing the pair home, despite the threat of Isaias, which was downgraded to a tropical storm from a hurricane on Saturday.
The agency later added that the capsule was confirmed to be “on a safe trajectory.”
FAREWELL
“Now is the entry, descent and splashdown phase after we undock, hopefully a little bit later today,” Hurley said in a farewell ceremony aboard the ISS that was broadcast on NASA TV.
“The teams are working really hard, especially with the dynamics of the weather over the next few days around Florida,” he said.
Earlier, during the ISS ceremony, Behnken said that “the hardest part was getting us launched, but the most important part is bringing us home.”
The mission, which blasted off on May 30, marked the first time a crewed spaceship had launched into orbit from US soil since 2011, when the space shuttle program ended.
It was also the first time a private company has flown to the ISS carrying astronauts.
The Burmese junta has said that detained former leader Aung San Suu Kyi is “in good health,” a day after her son said he has received little information about the 80-year-old’s condition and fears she could die without him knowing. In an interview in Tokyo earlier this week, Kim Aris said he had not heard from his mother in years and believes she is being held incommunicado in the capital, Naypyidaw. Aung San Suu Kyi, a Nobel Peace Prize laureate, was detained after a 2021 military coup that ousted her elected civilian government and sparked a civil war. She is serving a
‘NO AMNESTY’: Tens of thousands of people joined the rally against a bill that would slash the former president’s prison term; President Lula has said he would veto the bill Tens of thousands of Brazilians on Sunday demonstrated against a bill that advanced in Congress this week that would reduce the time former president Jair Bolsonaro spends behind bars following his sentence of more than 27 years for attempting a coup. Protests took place in the capital, Brasilia, and in other major cities across the nation, including Sao Paulo, Florianopolis, Salvador and Recife. On Copacabana’s boardwalk in Rio de Janeiro, crowds composed of left-wing voters chanted “No amnesty” and “Out with Hugo Motta,” a reference to the speaker of the lower house, which approved the bill on Wednesday last week. It is
‘EAST SHIELD’: State-run Belma said it would produce up to 6 million mines to lay along Poland’s 800km eastern border, and sell excess to nations bordering Russia and Belarus Poland has decided to start producing anti-personnel mines for the first time since the Cold War, and plans to deploy them along its eastern border and might export them to Ukraine, the deputy defense minister said. Joining a broader regional shift that has seen almost all European countries bordering Russia, with the exception of Norway, announce plans to quit the global treaty banning such weapons, Poland wants to use anti-personnel mines to beef up its borders with Belarus and Russia. “We are interested in large quantities as soon as possible,” Deputy Minister of National Defense Pawel Zalewski said. The mines would be part
Cozy knits, sparkly bobbles and Santa hats were all the canine rage on Sunday, as hundreds of sausage dogs and their owners converged on central London for an annual parade and get-together. The dachshunds’ gathering in London’s Hyde Park came after a previous “Sausage Walk” planned for Halloween had to be postponed, because it had become so popular organizers needed to apply for an events licence. “It was going to be too much fun so they canceled it,” laughed Nicky Bailey, the owner of three sausage dogs: Una and her two 19-week-old puppies Ember and Finnegan, wearing matching red coats and silver
RSS