Incredible footage captures moment International Space Station crew undock and return to Earth

A group of astronauts who spent over six months at the International Space Station have just returned to Earth.

Russia's Soyuz spaceflight - the spacecraft specifically named Soyuz MS-24 - took off from the Baikonur Cosmodrome spaceport in Kazakhstan on 15 September, 2023.

Over half a year later and the spacecraft landed back on Earth on 6 April, with the undocking and part of the descent journey being caught on camera, alongside an incredible parachute-assisted landing.

NASA astronaut Loral O’Hara, Roscosmos cosmonaut Oleg Novitskiy, and spaceflight participant Marina Vasilevskaya from Belarus were all onboard Soyuz MS-24.

The Soyuz MS-24 landed back on Earth on 6 April. (International Space Station/ NASA)

It was O'Hara and Vasilevskaya's first space missions and Vasilevskaya's involvement in the trip marked the first woman from Belarus being in space.

Soyuz undocked from the International Space Station at around 11:55am on 6 April and the team's return to Earth was captured on camera from their un-docking to the point of the crew's 'de-orbit burn,' the official landing beginning at 2am and finally, the touchdown.

The International Space Station shared footage to X on 6 April of the Soyuz crew undocking from the station and returning to earth, in which the astronauts can be seen waving as the spacecraft 'break[s] free' from its mooring at the space station.

Soyuz then uses a parachute to help float to the ground, an overhead narration announcing touchdown occurred 'at 2:17am central time (3:17am eastern time and 12:17pm at the landing site)'.

And the video has left people in awe.

One X user said: "Great to see continued cooperation between countries on International Space Station. Welcome back home."

"Awesome!" Another added.

As a third commented: "Wow, an hard landing on land vs ocean."

And a fourth resolved: "It is fantastic we can still do this with all the crap going on between our nations now."

The trio arrived back on Earth on 6 April. (International Space Station/ NASA)

Upon landing back on Earth, Vasilevskaya said, as quoted by Space.com: "I'm overwhelmed with emotions. It's something incredible. I wish all people on Earth to treasure and cherish what they have because it is precious.

"We wanted to stay longer [on the ISS], but it is great to be back."

The three astronauts left the rest of the team - NASA astronauts Michael Barratt, Matthew Dominick, Tracy Dyson, and Jeannette Epps as well as Roscosmos cosmonauts Nikolai Chub, Alexander Grebenkin and Oleg Kononenko - behind onboard the International Space Station.

The rest of the expedition are set to stay there until fall later this year.

Topics: International Space Station, Russia, Space, World News, Travel, NASA, Science

Poppy Bilderbeck

Poppy Bilderbeck is a Senior Journalist at LADbible Group. She graduated from The University of Manchester in 2021 with a First in English Literature and Drama, where alongside her studies she was Editor-in-Chief of The Tab Manchester. Poppy is most comfortable when chatting about all things mental health, is proving a drama degree is far from useless by watching and reviewing as many TV shows and films as possible and is such a crisp fanatic the office has been forced to release them in batches.