Early Saturday (April 6), a Soyuz spacecraft successfully returned Soyuz commander Oleg Novitskiy, Belarusian guest astronaut Marina Vasilevskaya, and NASA astronaut Loral O’Hara to Earth. The trio was aboard the International Space Station (ISS) on a crewed mission.
The Russian crewed Soyuz spaceflight, Soyuz MS-24, launched from Baikonur on September 15, 2023, and has since undergone many crew rotations.
Initially, the spacecraft took station commanders Oleg Kononenko, O’Hara, and Nikolai Chub to the station.
The Soyuz spacecraft is a series of spacecraft designed for human spaceflight activities, created by the Soviet Union, and now operated by Roscosmos, the Russian space agency. The spacecraft has been used for a variety of missions, including transporting astronauts and cosmonauts to and from space stations such as the International Space Station.
After landing on Earth, recovery crews responded immediately to aid the returning space travelers
Commander Oleg Novitskiy, Marina Vasilevskaya of Belarus, and NASA’s Loral O’Hara touched down in Kazakhstan at 3:17 a.m. EDT. After landing on Earth, recovery crews responded immediately to aid the returning space travelers while they adjusted to Earth’s gravity.
Notably, Novitskiy and Vasilevskaya spent two weeks at the space station. Novitskiy, Vasilevskaya, and NASA veteran Tracy Dyson were launched to the International Space Station on March 23 of this year for crew rotation.
All three that returned to Earth were in good health. Vasilevskaya, Belarus’ first citizen to fly in space since the Soviet era, expressed her overwhelming emotions, reportedly saying, “It’s something incredible. I wish all people on Earth to treasure and cherish what they have because this is precious.”
Following medical examinations and communication with loved ones, the trio was set to be transferred to Karaganda by helicopter, with O’Hara departing for Houston and Novitskiy and Vasilevskaya returning to Star City outside Moscow.