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Celebrating a Milestone: Astronaut Dan Pettit Returns to Earth
America’s longest-serving astronaut, Dan Pettit, has marked a unique milestone by returning to Earth on the occasion of his 70th birthday. His journey concluded with a parachute-assisted landing of the Soyuz MS-26 spacecraft in the expansive steppes of Kazakhstan at 06:20 local time (01:20 GMT) on Sunday.
During his 220-day mission aboard the International Space Station (ISS), Pettit and his fellow crew members, Russian cosmonauts Alexey Ovchinin and Ivan Vagner, completed an impressive 3,520 orbits around the Earth, according to NASA. This mission added significantly to Pettit’s already remarkable career, bringing his cumulative time spent in space to 590 days over four missions.
Despite this achievement, Pettit is not the oldest individual to travel to space, a record held by John Glenn. Glenn completed his historic flight at the age of 77 during a NASA mission in 1998 and passed away in 2016.
Upon their return, Pettit and his Russian colleagues will undergo a period of adjustment as they reacclimate to Earth’s gravity. Following this phase, Pettit will travel to Houston, Texas, while Ovchinin and Vagner will head to Russia’s primary space training base located in Zvyozdniy Gorodok, or Star City, near Moscow.
Before departing from the ISS, the crew officially transferred command of the spacecraft to Japanese astronaut Takuya Onishi, ensuring a smooth handover of responsibilities aboard the station.
Source
www.bbc.com