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NASA astronaut Chris Williams and Russian crewmates Sergei
Kud-Sverchkov and Sergei Mikaev touched down in their Soyuz
MS-28 that landed smoothly by parachute in a designated area
southeast of Dzhezkazgan.
Their 241-day stint on the orbiting outpost was the first space
mission for Williams and Mikaev and the second for Kud‑Sverchkov.
The crew will be flown by helicopter to Karaganda, where
Williams will board a plane to return to NASA’s Johnson Space
Center in Houston, while Kud‑Sverchkov and Mikaev will take a
flight to their training base in Star City, just outside Moscow.
Once bitter rivals in the space race during the Cold War, Russia
and the U.S. cooperate on the space station and other projects.
That relationship was marred by tensions after Moscow sent
troops into Ukraine in 2022, but Washington and Moscow have
continued to work together, with U.S. and Russian crews flying
to the orbiting outpost on each country’s spacecraft.
On July 14, the crew of NASA astronaut Anil Menon and Roscosmos
cosmonauts Pyotr Dubrov and Anna Kikina arrived at the
International Space Station for an eight-month mission after
launching from the Russia-leased Baikonur cosmodrome in
Kazakhstan on July 14.
NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman attended the launch, the first
visit to Baikonur by a NASA chief in eight years.
The newly arrived trio have joined NASA astronauts Jessica Meir
and Jack Hathaway, European Space Agency astronaut Sophie Adenot
and Roscosmos cosmonaut Andrei Fedyaev as part of Expedition 75.
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