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Credit: NASA/Bill Ingalls
SpaceX’s crew-10 astronauts returned to the earth on Saturday (August 9) after having lived at the international space station for almost five months.
The crew of the Dragon Capsule mission, called Endurance, splashed at 11:33 am Edt (1533 GMT; 8:33 am local California Time).
“From the entire crew-10, thanks,” Anne McClain, Nasa Astronaut and Dragon Commander, shortly after Splashdown. “It was really the ride of your life.”
SpaceX’s Crew-10 Astronaut Mission returns to the earth off the coast of San Diego, California on August 9, 2025. | Credit: NASA/Bill Ingalls
As the name suggests, Crew-10 was the 10th operational astronaut mission that has flown to and from the International Space Station (ISS) for NASA via the Commercial Crew Program (CCP) of the Agency.
The crew members were McClain and Nichole Ayers from NASA, Takuya Onishi from Jaxa (the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency) and Kirill Peskov of Roscosmos, Russian space agency. McClain ordered Crew-10, Ayers was the pilot and Onishi and Peskov were mission specialists.
The flight launched a SpaceX Falcon 9 -rocket on 14 March and arrived at the Orbiting Lab two days later. The four astronauts of the crew-10 are soon set to perform science work, which consumed much of their time in the following months.
“During their stay in space, the crew studied space-made mental and physical changes in astronauts, blood flow from the brain to the heart, future lunar navigation techniques and more,” wrote NASA officers in a blog post on Monday (August 4).
The wheels before the departure of the crew-10 started to run last Saturday (August 2), when the Mission-11 mission of SpaceX Crew-11 from SpaceX arrived at the ISS. The crew-10 astronauts spent a few days advising their replacements and then appointed themselves to be committed to the return to the earth and to think about their orbital experience.
“We have to achieve a lot of really great operational things,” said Ayers during a farewell ceremony on Tuesday (August 5).
“We have seen some great views, and we have had some really big laughs and had a great time together,” she added. “I think that [we’re] leave with a heart full of gratitude, and [we’re] Excited to see where the international space station goes after we get home. “
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-Spacex’s crew-11 astronauts arrive at the International Space Station (Video)
The shutters between endurance and the ISS closed on Friday (August 8) at 4.20 pm EDT (2020 GMT), and the capsule separated about two hours later at 6:15 pm EDT (2205 GMT). Challenge then started to maneuver his way back to Earth and today to set up his splashdown.
It was the first return of the Pacific for a SpaceX CCP mission; All earlier such flights have come off the coast of Florida. SpaceX recently moved to the West coast of Reentries for all his dragon missions, both crew and not written, to minimize the chance that falling space waste can damage or injure people.
However, crew-10 was not the first SpaceX Astronaut mission of each type to land in the Pacific; The private Fram2 and Axiom 4 flights did this earlier this year.
Crew-10 was the first space travel for Ayers and Peskov and the second for McClain and Oneishi. Onishi served as commander of the ISS ‘current Expedition 73 from April to last Tuesday, when he handed the reins to Cosmonaut Sergey Ryzhikov.
Note of the editors: This story was updated on August 9 at 12:00 with News about successful Splashdown.
