Thanks for flying SpaceX: Four Nasa astronauts splashdown in Gulf of Mexico, ending 200-day flight

Four astronauts returned to Earth after spending nearly 200 days on the International Space Station.

Four astronauts splashed down off the coast of Florida on Tuesday morning riding home with SpaceX to end a 200-day space station mission. The dragon spacecraft streaked through Earth's upper atmosphere in the wee hours leaving behind a meteor trail before parachuting into the Gulf of Mexico.

Onboard the Crew Dragon was Nasa astronauts Shane Kimbrough and Megan McArthur, Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency astronaut Akihiko Hoshide, and European Space Agency astronaut Thomas Pesquet coming home after a nearly six-month-long science mission at the International Space Station.

The four astronauts should have been back Monday morning, but high winds in the recovery zone delayed their return.

“One more night with this magical view. Who could complain? I’ll miss our spaceship!” Pesquet tweeted Sunday alongside a brief video showing the space station illuminated against the blackness of space and the twinkling city lights on the nighttime side of Earth.

Before undocking, German astronaut Matthias Maurer, who’s waiting to launch at Nasa’s Kennedy Space Center, tweeted it was a shame the two crews wouldn’t overlap at the space station but “we trust you’ll leave everything nice and tidy.” His will be SpaceX’s fourth crew flight for Nasa in just 1 and 1/2 years.

A FLY AROUND THE SPACE STATION

Before leaving, the Crew Dragon conducted a fly around the ISS to capture the exterior of the station, this was the first for SpaceX vehicles. Such fly around was earlier conducted by the Space Shuttle mission. The last Russian capsule fly-around was three years ago.

"Crew-2 Commander Shane Kimbrough and Pilot Megan McArthur monitor data as Mission Specialist Thomas Pesquet captured photos of the International Space Station during the first-ever 'fly around' of the complex from inside a commercial Crew Dragon," Nasa said in a blog post.

A SCIENCE-RICH MISSION

The four astronauts, who arrived at the Station earlier this year were part of some of the major scientific experiments in microgravity which included four spacewalks to enhance the station’s solar power, a movie-making visit by a Russian film crew and the first-ever space harvest of chilly peppers.

The astronauts worked on experiments related to the loss of muscle mass, especially in space flight. The experiment could pave way for long term flights for astronauts going to the Moon and beyond. The Ultrasonic Tweezers experiment by astronauts will help develop acoustic tweezers that use sound for remote and contactless manipulation of materials in microgravity. Meanwhile, astronaut Megan McArthur was part of the Cool flames experiment that burn at extremely low temperatures and are nearly impossible to create in Earth’s gravity. Understanding how fire spreads and behaves in space is crucial for the safety of future astronauts and for understanding and controlling fire here on Earth.

"These valuable scientific research helps to prepare humans for future space exploration missions while generating numerous innovations and benefits for humanity on Earth," Nasa said.

NOT A COMFY RIDE HOME

It wasn’t the most comfortable ride back. The toilet in their capsule was broken, and so the astronauts needed to rely on diapers for the eight-hour trip home. They shrugged it off late last week as just one more challenge in their mission.

Their stay on board the flying outpost had also been not that easygoing. The first issue arose shortly after their April liftoff; Mission Control warned a piece of space junk was threatening to collide with their capsule. It turned out to be a false alarm. Then in July, thrusters on a newly arrived Russian lab inadvertently fired and sent the station into a spin. The four astronauts took shelter in their docked SpaceX capsule, ready to make a hasty departure if necessary.

CREW-3 TO LAUNCH WEDNESDAY

With the safe arrival of Crew-2, Nasa and SpaceX is targeting the launch of four astronauts part of the Crew-3 mission to Space Station on Wednesday. The liftoff of the Falcon-9 rocket with four astronauts to the station is likely to happen at 9.03 pm EST (7.33 am IST).

The next crew will also spend six months up there, welcoming back-to-back groups of tourists. A Japanese tycoon and his personal assistant will get a lift from the Russian Space Agency in December, followed by three businessmen arriving via SpaceX in February. SpaceX’s first privately chartered flight, in September, bypassed the space station.