The descent capsule of the Soyuz TMA-18 spacecraft with the Russian Alexandr Skvortsov and Mikhail Kornienko and Tracy Caldwell-Dyson American aboard, landed smoothly today on the steppes of Kazakhstan, informed the Flight Control Center (CCVE) of Russia.
"The landing was carried out according to schedule. According to preliminary data, the crew (the Soyuz) are fine," said a spokesman for CCVE, quoted by Interfax news agency.
The capsule landed as planned, at 05.23 GMT in an area southeast of the Kazakh city of Arkalyk, where rescuers hoped.
Its three crew members remained in space a total of 176 days, one more than expected due to a glitch that forced twenty-four hours delay their return to Earth.
The day before, a false alarm aborted maneuver the Soyuz undocking from the ISS, the first such incident is recorded in the history of exploitation of the orbital platform.
The Russian space agency, Roscosmos, said that an alarm indicated a lack of secrecy of the Soyuz spacecraft, which was discarded after rigorous review.