NASA astronaut Jonny Kim, together with Roscosmos cosmonauts Sergey Ryzhikov and Alexey Zubritsky, is preparing to depart the International Space Station aboard the Soyuz MS-27 spacecraft and return to Earth.
The crew will undock from the station’s Prichal module at 12:41 p.m. AEDT on Tuesday, 9 December, beginning their journey back to Earth. They are scheduled for a parachute-assisted landing at 4:04 p.m. AEDT on Tuesday, 9 December (10:04 a.m. local time in Kazakhstan), touching down on the Kazakh steppe southeast of Dzhezkazgan.
The space station change of command ceremony will take place at 2:30 a.m. AEDT on Monday, 8 December, with Ryzhikov handing station leadership to NASA astronaut Mike Fincke for Expedition 74, which officially begins at the moment of Soyuz MS-27 undocking.
Kim and his crewmates are wrapping up a 245-day mission aboard the station. By the end of their flight, they will have completed 3,920 orbits of Earth and travelled nearly 104 million miles. This mission marks the first spaceflight for Kim and Zubritsky, while Ryzhikov concludes his third long-duration stay on the ISS.
After landing, the crew will be transported by helicopter to Karaganda, Kazakhstan. Kim will then board a NASA aircraft to return to Houston, while Ryzhikov and Zubritsky will head back to their training base in Star City, Russia.
Image: The Soyuz MS-26 spacecraft is seen as it lands on April 20, 2025 (April 19 Eastern time) in a remote area near the town of Zhezkazgan, Kazakhstan, with the Expedition 71/72 crew aboard.
Credit: NASA/Bill Ingalls
