Manned Soyuz MS-19 spacecraft lands in Kazakhstan
Moscow, Mar 30 (EFE).- The Soyuz MS-19 spacecraft landed safely in Kazakhstan on Wednesday, according to a live stream by the Russian space agency, Roscosmos.
Russian cosmonauts Anton Shkaplerov and Pyotr Dubrov, along with NASA astronaut Mark Vande Hei, returned to Earth from the International Space Station (ISS) aboard the descent capsule.
The Soyuz touched down at 11:28 GMT, 147 kilometers from the Kazakh city of Zheskazgan, as planned.
Vande Hei is the last American astronaut to fly to the ISS aboard a Russian spacecraft, as over the past year the US has sent its astronauts aboard Crew Dragon spacecraft, developed by US-based SpaceX.
The American and Dubrov concluded a 355-day mission that saw the ISS carry out 5,680 orbits around the Earth, covering over 300 million km.
Vande Hei thus broke the record for the longest single space flight by a US astronaut set at 340 days.
After completing his second flight to the ISS, Vande Hei has accumulated a total of 523 days in space.
Shkaplerov, meanwhile, concluded his fourth mission, totaling 708 days in space, while this was Dubrov first trip to space.EFE
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