Space Station Expedition 36 Crew Returns to Earth Safely

The Expedition 36 crew from the International Space Station have landed safely, touching down in their Soyuz TMA-08M spacecraft in Kazakhstan at 02:38 UTC on September 11 (10:58 p.m. EDT Sept. 10). This great overhead image by NASA photographer Bill Ingalls shows the Soyuz’s thrusters firing just before it slams into the ground, ending up on its side. On board were Commander Pavel Vinogradov and Flight Engineer Alexander Misurkin of the Russian Federal Space Agency and NASA Flight Engineer Chris Cassidy. Vinigradov, age 60, is the oldest person to make the jarring landing in the venerable Soyuz craft.

You can see undocking and landing videos below:

The three completed 166 days in space since launching in late March. Remaining on the ISS are ESA astronaut Luca Parmitano, NASA astronaut Karen Nyberg and Russian cosmonaut Fyodor Yurchikhin, now comprising Expedition 37. They will be joined by the Oleg Kotov, Sergei Ryazansky and Michael Hopkins, set to launch on September 25.

Nancy Atkinson

Nancy has been with Universe Today since 2004, and has published over 6,000 articles on space exploration, astronomy, science and technology. She is the author of two books: "Eight Years to the Moon: the History of the Apollo Missions," (2019) which shares the stories of 60 engineers and scientists who worked behind the scenes to make landing on the Moon possible; and "Incredible Stories from Space: A Behind-the-Scenes Look at the Missions Changing Our View of the Cosmos" (2016) tells the stories of those who work on NASA's robotic missions to explore the Solar System and beyond. Follow Nancy on Twitter at https://twitter.com/Nancy_A and and Instagram at and https://www.instagram.com/nancyatkinson_ut/

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