The astronauts, who are collectively called Crew-3, did research on the ISS into microgravity and the growing of plants without potting soil. They were aboard the space station for 175 days, which has orbited the Earth 2,832 times in that time.
The German Matthias Maurer was on the mission on behalf of the European space agency ESA. He will fly straight to Cologne on Friday, where he will be supervised by the space medicine team to readjust to Earth’s gravity. Three Americans flew on behalf of NASA.
They traveled in the Crew Dragon Endurance, a space vehicle from SpaceX. NASA likes to work with Elon Musk’s commercial company, because this allows transport to the ISS to be arranged safely and cost-effectively. This allows NASA to focus on research in the space station itself.