At 2:20 a.m. EST on Saturday, Nicole Mann and Josh Cassada from NASA, Koichi Wakata from Japan, and Anna Kikina from Russia departed from the International Space Station. They had spent almost six months in space and then went through the atmosphere, with their heat shield being exposed to temperatures as high as 3,500 degrees.
Where was the SpaceX capsule Landed ?
At 9:02 p.m. ET, the Dragon “Endurance” capsule completed its return trip, which lasted almost 19 hours, by splashing down off the coast of Tampa with the help of parachutes.
After the Coast Guard had cordoned off the area, a 17,000-pound capsule was seen bobbing on the water. Following this, a SpaceX recovery team approached the capsule to check for any hazardous propellants. Once they confirmed that the capsule was safe, it was rigged up and lifted onto SpaceX’s custom-built recovery vessel, called “Shannon.”
Mission ‘successful’
After completing medical checkouts aboard the vessel, the crew will board a helicopter that will take them to the Kennedy Space Center in Florida before traveling back home. Nicole Mann, Josh Cassada, and Koichi Wakata will return to NASA’s Johnson Space Center in Houston, Texas, while Anna Kikina will go back to Russia.
With the successful splashdown, the mission has officially come to an end after countless hours dedicated to conducting scientific experiments and maintaining the station.
After departing, Nicole Mann, the commander of the Crew-5 mission and the first indigenous woman to travel to space, expressed her gratitude to the teams at NASA and SpaceX. She acknowledged their remarkable efforts and meticulous attention to detail that had greatly contributed to the mission’s success.
As a Marine Corps colonel, Mann concluded her remarks by reciting the military branch’s motto, “Semper Fidelis,” expressing her pride in contributing to its legacy.
