Space station trio to return after 167 days in orbit

The Soyuz TMA-14M crew (left to right): Barry "Butch" Wilmore, commander Alexander Samokutyaev and flight engineer Elena Serova. The trio plans to undock from the International Space Station Wednesday evening for a fiery return to Earth, landing in Kazakhstan around 10:08 p.m. EDT to close out a 167-day mission. NASA

Three space station fliers -- the outgoing NASA commander and two Russian cosmonauts -- are returning to Earth Wednesday after more than five months in orbit, reducing the lab's crew to three in a brief lull before launch of three fresh crew members at the end of the month, including two who plan to spend nearly a full year aboard the outpost.

Soyuz TMA-14M commander Alexander Samokutyaev, flanked on the left by flight engineer Elena Serova and on the right by shuttle veteran Barry "Butch" Wilmore, plan to detach their ferry craft from the space station's upper Poisk module Wednesday, at 6:44 p.m. EDT (GMT-4), to set the stage for re-entry and landing in Kazakhstan.

After moving a safe distance away from the lab complex, Samokutyaev and Serova plan to monitor a four-minute 41-second deorbit rocket firing, starting at 9:16 p.m., slowing the ship by about 286 mph to drop the far side of its orbit deep into Earth's atmosphere.

If all goes well, the capsule will settle to a jarring parachute and rocket-assisted touchdown near the town of Dzhezkazgan around 10:07:53 p.m. to close out a 167-day five-hour voyage that began with blastoff last Sept. 25 from the Baikonur Cosmodrome.

Forecasters are predicting temperatures in the mid 20s with fresh snow in the wake of a passing frontal system.

"It's not many jobs that you have the opportunity to return from work in a 17,000-mile-an-hour fireball," Wilmore, a fighter pilot with a shuttle mission to his credit, joked from orbit. "This is one of those opportunities! To be honest, I'm not a thrill seeker by any means, but a unique experience like that, I do look forward to it, literally coming back in a fireball."

He said said he was particularly looking forward to landing when "the Soyuz capsule does a lot of rocking and rolling."

"Eventually, the main chutes come out and, of course, you've got the separation of the (heat shield) on the bottom of the capsule and so many different events," he said. "And finally, the soft landing jets fire -- they're not so soft, I'm told -- and then, of course, the touchdown.

"It's going to be wintertime in Kazakhstan, a lot of snow, so maybe we'll hit a nice fluffy snow bank. And as the hatch opens, that fresh air coming in, it'll be chilly, I look forward to that as well."

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Space station trio to return after 167 days in orbit