Russian, North American Astronauts to Return to Earth
The first crew to blast off to the International Space Station following a launch accident that deepened doubts over Russia's space programme is set to return to earth Tuesday.
Almaty (Kazakhstan), Jun 25 (AFP) The first crew to blast off to the International Space Station following a launch accident that deepened doubts over Russia's space programme is set to return to earth Tuesday.
NASA astronaut Anne McClain, veteran cosmonaut Oleg Kononenko of Roscosmos, and Canadian Space Agency record-holder David Saint-Jacques are expected to touch down on the steppes of Kazakhstan at around 0248 GMT.
The trio's launch on December 3 was the first after a Soyuz rocket carrying Russia's Aleksey Ovchinin and US astronaut Nick Hague failed in October just minutes after blast-off, forcing the pair to make an emergency landing.
They escaped unharmed but the failed launch was the first such incident in Russia's post-Soviet history and a new setback for the country's once proud space industry. (AFP)
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