Sep 25, 2010

John Yembrick Headquarters, Washington
202-358-1100 john yembrick-1@nasa gov

Kelly Humphries Johnson Space Center, Houston 281-483-5111 kelly o humphries@nasa gov

RELEASE: 10-231

INTERNATIONAL SPACE STATION EXPEDITION 24 CREW LANDS SAFELY

WASHINGTON -- Expedition 24 Commander Alexander Skvortsov and Flight Engineers Tracy Caldwell Dyson and Mikhail Kornienko landed their Soyuz TMA-18 spacecraft in Kazakhstan on Saturday, Sept 25, wrapping up a six-month stay aboard the International Space Station

Skvortsov, the Soyuz commander, was at the controls of the spacecraft as it undocked at 10:02 p m EDT Friday from the Poisk module's docking port on the station's Zvezda module The undocking and landing occurred a day later than planned because of a hatch sensor problem Thursday night That problem prevented hooks on the Poisk side of the docking mechanism from opening Station crew members installed a series of jumper cables, bypassing the sensor, and the Poisk module hooks retracted

Following undocking and a normal descent, the crew landed at 1:23 a m near Arkalyk, Kazakhstan

Russian recovery teams were on hand to help the crew exit the Soyuz vehicle and adjust to gravity after 176 days in space Skvortsov and Kornienko will return Saturday to the Gagarin Cosmonaut Training Center in Star City, outside of Moscow

The trio launched aboard the Soyuz TMA-18 spacecraft from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan in April As members of the Expedition 23 and 24 crews, they spent 174 days on the station Caldwell Dyson and Expedition 25 Commander Doug Wheelock conducted three spacewalks to replace a faulty cooling pump module on the station's backbone, known as the truss Kornienko conducted one spacewalk to prepare the recently delivered Russian Rassvet Module for future automated dockings by Russian spacecraft

The station is occupied by Wheelock, who assumed command of the station Wednesday, NASA Flight Engineer Shannon Walker, and Russian Flight Engineer Fyodor Yurchikhin, who arrived in mid-June

A new trio of Expedition 25 crew members - NASA astronaut Scott Kelly and Russian cosmonauts Alexander Kaleri and Oleg Skripochka - will launch from the Baikonur Cosmodrome on Oct 7 (Oct 8 in Kazakhstan) and arrive on the station about 48 hours later

For more information about the space station, visit:

http://www nasa gov/station

To follow Twitter updates from Expedition 24/25 crew member Wheelock and Exp 26 Commander Kelly, visit:

http://twitter com/Astro_Wheels

http://twitter com/StationCDRkelly

-end-

To subscribe to the list, send a message to: hqnews-subscribe@mediaservices nasa gov To remove your address from the list, send a message to: hqnews-unsubscribe@mediaservices nasa gov

The following information is a reminder of your current mailing list subscription:

You are subscribed to the following list: [list_name]

using the following email: example@example.com

You may automatically unsubscribe from this list at any time by visiting the following URL:

https://aus-city com/cgi-bin/dada/mail cgi/u/NASA_REPORTS/example/example com/

If the above URL is inoperable, make sure that you have copied the entire address Some mail readers will wrap a long URL and thus break this automatic unsubscribe mechanism

You may also change your subscription by visiting this list's main screen:

<[program_url]/list/[list]>

If you're still having trouble, please contact the list owner at:

<mailto:[list_owner_email]>

The following physical address is associated with this mailing list:

[physical_address]