Their journey kicked off Monday just after 2 pm ET when the astronauts strapped into the Crew Dragon capsule, which had remained attached to the International Space Station since it arrived with the crew in April. The spacecraft spent nearly nine hours slowly maneuvering through orbit, approaching the thick inner layer of Earth’s atmosphere before the Crew Dragon lit up its thrusters to safely slice into the air, deploy parachutes and splash down in the Gulf of Mexico around 10:30 pm Monday.
During a press conference conducted remotely from the ISS on Friday, McArthur said using undergarments rather than the toilet is “suboptimal.”
“But we are prepared to manage,” she said. “Spaceflight is full of lots of little challenges. This is just one more that we’ll encounter and take care of in our mission, so we’re not too worried about it.”
Kimbrough, McArthur, Pesquet and Hoshide made their return to Earth before the next crew of astronauts was able to get to the ISS to replace them.
The next SpaceX astronaut launch, called Crew-3, was delayed — first by weather issues and then by a “minor medical issue” with one of the astronauts. NASA said last week that it’s expecting that medical issue to clear before takeoff, which could happen as soon as Wednesday.
SpaceX splashdown: Astronauts return home from six-month ISS mission