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Expedition 10 Crew And Italian Hitchhiker Back On Earth
Russian cosmonaut Salizhan Sharipov, US astronaut Leroy Chiao, and Italy's Roberto Vittori came back to Earth aboard a Soyuz spacecraft Monday after completing a mission on the orbiting International Space Station (ISS). The Soyuz capsule made a soft landing in darkness near the town of Arkalyk in Kazakhstan at 02:08 am Moscow time (2208 GMT Sunday), mission control officials told Russian news agencies. "Everything went according to plan," an official told the ITAR-TASS news agency. The head of the welcoming team, General Vladimir Popov, told the agency that the astronauts were all in good health, although the landing had been difficult due to bad weather and darkness. However, with six Mi-6 helicopters, two An-12 aircraft and evacuation vehicles in the area, "the landing capsule was spotted despite the darkness as soon as it opened its parachute and three helicopters accompanied it until it landed". Sharipov was the first to emerge from the Soyuz spacecraft after its landing, followed by Chiao and Vittori. The astronauts were then taken by helicopter to the Kazakh city of Arkalyk for a first medical examination, before being flown to Moscow, accompanied by doctors. Television shots showed them being greeted with bunches of red carnations on their arrival at Star City, the cosmonaut training centre near the capital, as they emerged surefooted and smiling from a bus. Galina Ozerova, of the Star Cit press office, told AFP that they were resting and were being monitored by doctors as they underwent a recovery programme. "The cosmonauts Salizhan Sharipov and Leroy Chiao, who worked in orbit for nearly 193 days, as well as the astronaut of the European Space Agency, Roberto Vittori, are feeling fine," Popov said earlier. The Soyuz had left the ISS to return to Earth late Sunday, just before 10:45 pm (1845 GMT). Its departure from the ISS had been delayed by four minutes because of a temporary problem with the oxygen supply in Vittori's flight suit, Russian space officials said. Sharipov and Chiao had been in space since October, where they spent 193 days, performing two spacewalks. Theirs was the tenth mission on the ISS. Vittori completed a 10-day scientific mission on the ISS. The European Space Agency (ESA) called his mission "a complete success," in a release published shortly after the Soyuz touched down. Vittori performed 22 experiments on board the ISS, including tests on astronaut fatigue, the durability of components of microsatellites, research into electromagnetic waves emanating from earth that may be linked to earthquakes, and the growing of shoots as a potential source of food for those in orbit. Together with the three men, some 50 live snails also returned to Earth. Their mission was to spend more than a month on the ISS as part of a series of experiments on weightlessness. A Russian and an American, Sergei Krikalev and John Phillips, have replaced Sharipov, Chiao and Vittori on the ISS. The two will spend six months in space. During their stay, they are expected to meet up with the crew of the US space shuttle Discovery, returning to space missions more than two years after the Columbia shuttle disaster in February 2003. Columbia's seven-member crew all died when the shuttle disintegrated upon re-entry into the Earth's atmosphere. All rights reserved. � 2005 Agence France-Presse. Sections of the information displayed on this page (dispatches, photographs, logos) are protected by intellectual property rights owned by Agence France-Presse. As a consequence, you may not copy, reproduce, modify, transmit, publish, display or in any way commercially exploit any of the content of this section without the prior written consent of Agence France-Presse. Related Links SpaceDaily Search SpaceDaily Subscribe To SpaceDaily Express 
Kazakh Cosmonauts May Fly To ISS In 2006
Astana, Kazakhstan (UPI) Apr 20, 2005Two Kazakhstan cosmonauts might fly to the International Space Station next year, local media reported Wednesday.
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