Status: 05/05/2022 09:15 a.m
About half a year – which has literally flown by: The German astronaut Maurer is on his way back to earth together with three NASA colleagues. The space capsule is scheduled to land off the US coast on Friday morning.
After around six months on the International Space Station ISS, the German astronaut Matthias Maurer is on his way back to earth. The Saarlander and three US colleagues docked in the morning on board a “Crew Dragon” capsule from the ISS, as shown in live images from the US space agency NASA.
Maurer left for the ISS in November last year as an ESA astronaut, together with NASA astronauts Raja Chari, Thomas Marshburn and Kayla Barron.
Maurer used them to conduct research in the fields of physics, biology, medicine and artificial intelligence, testing new technologies in the process. At an altitude of 400 kilometers, he experimented with weightless water, new types of concrete mixtures for sustainable construction on earth and bio-plasters made from skin cells.
Landing on Friday morning
On Friday morning German time, the capsule with Maurer and the three NASA astronauts is scheduled to land in the sea off the coast of the US state of Florida. If everything goes according to plan, Maurer is expected back in Germany late Friday evening. He is to land at the military part of Cologne/Bonn Airport.
On his return flight, Maurer has to be prepared for an exhausting journey. “When the space capsule touches the water surface, the crew will feel very clearly that they are back on earth,” says German astronaut Thomas Reiter, describing the return. After half a year in weightlessness, you can feel every little movement. “You’re surprised at how heavy your arms and legs suddenly feel,” says Reiter.
Difficult field work on the ISS
Looking back, Maurer described an exhausting field mission that he completed with his commander and NASA colleague Chari as one of the “most outstanding experiences”. For more than six hours, the two repaired the station’s cooling system and replaced an outdoor camera.
The 52-year-old Maurer was the twelfth German in space. At the official farewell ceremony on board the ISS, he emphasized: “It has been an outstanding six months here on the space station”. And he wished all the best for future missions in space:
It’s the end of a six-month mission, but the space dream lives on.
And his US colleague Marshburn added: “It’s an interesting day for us, we flew around the space station and took our last photos, collected our last things and prepared to come home.”
Marshburn also handed over command of the space station to his Russian colleague Oleg Artemyev at the ceremony. With him, the ISS will be in good hands, Marshburn said. “The ISS’s lasting legacy will most likely be international cooperation and a place of peace.”