Expedition 72 Soyuz MS-26 Crewed Spacecraft Landing in Kazakhstan

Expedition 72 Soyuz MS-26 Crewed Spacecraft Landing in Kazakhstan

The Soyuz MS-26 spacecraft is seen as it lands in a remote area near the town of Zhezkazgan, Kazakhstan with Expedition 72 NASA astronaut Don Pettit, and Roscosmos cosmonauts Alexey Ovchinin and Ivan Vagner of Russia aboard, Sunday, April 20, 2025, (April 19 Eastern Time). The trio are returning to Earth after logging 220 days in space as members of Expeditions 71 and 72 aboard the International Space Station. 

Spanning 220 days in space, NASA astronaut Don Pettit and his crewmates, Roscosmos cosmonauts Alexey Ovchinin and Ivan Vagner of Russia, orbited the Earth 3,520 times and completed a journey of 93.3 million miles over the course of their mission. The Soyuz MS-26 spacecraft launched and docked to the station on Sept. 11, 2024.

This was Pettit’s fourth spaceflight, where he served as flight engineer for Expedition 71 and 72. He has a career total of 590 days in orbit. Ovchinin completed his fourth flight in space, totaling 595 days, and Vagner has earned an overall total of 416 days in space during two trips to the orbiting laboratory.

The three crew members will fly on a helicopter from the landing site to the recovery staging city of Karaganda, Kazakhstan. Pettit will board a NASA plane and return to Houston, while Ovchinin and Vagner will depart for a training base in Star City, Russia.

Image Credit: NASA/Bill Ingalls

Capture Date: April 19, 2024

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