Space Veteran Astronaut Returns to Earth to Celebrate his Birthday on April 20

The oldest veteran astronaut from NASA landed from the International Space Station on his seventieth birthday. Donald Pettit, the U.S astronaut, reached Earth after seven months together with his crew members Aleksey Ovchinin and Ivan Vagner, two Russian cosmonauts. The spacecraft Soyuz MS-26 launched on September 11, 2024 and got here again to Earth on Saturday, April 20, 2025, at 6:20 AM native time within the steppes of Kazakhstan. He has made a exceptional historical past by touchdown on his birthday. He’s a famend identify within the area world and has accomplished 13 spacewalk hours.

Legacy of Pettit

In accordance with reported by area.com , This was the fourth flight of Pettit and Ovchinin, however the second for Vagner. Pettit labored for 590 days, Ovchinin for 595 days, and Vagner for 416 days in area till now, counted after this touchdown. This trio orbited Earth 3,520 instances and completed this 93.3 million-mile journey all through their mission. NASA astronaut and Expedition 73 flight engineer Nichole Ayers wrote on X on Saturday, saying goodbye at the moment to Donald Pettit. It is a bittersweet second as Pettit had an incredible mission by inspiring many people whereas being right here.

Again to Earth

The trio started their arrival at 5:57 PM EDT on Saturday, because the Soyuz spacecraft undocked from the station. The automobile had deorbited burn for round two and a half hours, shedding its orbit, leaving the gumdrop-shaped capsule to carry all of them dwelling. Anne McCain, Ayers, and Jonny Kim, along with JAXA astronaut and Commander of expedition 73, Takuya Onishi, Sergey Ryzhikov and Alexey Zubritsky, are those who’re nonetheless in area.

Soyuz Spacecraft MS-26

It marked a big spaceflight to the ISS (Worldwide Area Station), from its launch to touchdown, because it transported three well-experienced crew members, together with Donald Pettit, Ivan Vagner, and Aleksey Ovchinin, to area for long-term microgravity analysis within the subject of biology, physics, and materials science. The spacecraft additionally docked as an emergency area automobile for as much as 220 days.

Pettit’s Achievements

Many individuals who comply with the science of alternative demonstrations and images of Earth by him know that he’s a person of nice contributions. Pettit has additionally helped to supervise the departure of Spacex’s Crew-9 mission on Dragon Freedom, together with Crew-10 on Dragon Endurance and the Cygnus departure of a cargo ship. He has additionally been a flight engineer for Expedition 30/31 in 2012. Pettit has made main contributions by discovering g-cups to drink espresso in area and polarised images from area.