The return to Earth of Thomas Pesquet and his teammates postponed

Published on : 07/11/2021 – 15:09

Due to “strong winds near the landing zone”, the return to Earth of the French astronaut Thomas Pesquet and his three teammates was delayed by several hours and will finally take place on Tuesday, November 9 at dawn, NASA announced on Sunday.

The Crew 2 (Space X) mission will leave the International Space Station (ISS) on Monday and land off Florida on Tuesday. The water landing is scheduled for 3:33 GMT on November 9, NASA said on its Twitter account.

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The crew of Crew 2, composed of Thomas Pesquet, the Japanese Akihiko Hoshide and the Americans Shane Kimbrough and Megan McArthur, will return to Earth before the arrival on board the ISS of the four astronauts of Crew 3, whose take-off has been several times delayed especially because of the weather.

The 43-year-old French astronaut is completing the second mission of his career in orbit, “Alpha”. He arrived aboard the ISS with his teammates on April 24, 2021.

During his previous “Proxima” mission, in 2016-2017, he landed in the Kazakh steppes. The landing will therefore be a first for him.

With AFP