Soyuz manned spaceship undocks from International Space Station
KOROLYOV. Oct 4 (Interfax) - The Soyuz MS-08 spaceship manned by Russian cosmonaut Oleg Artemyev and NASA astronauts Andrew Feustel and Richard Arnold has undocked from the International Space Station (ISS).
The spaceship has physically separated from the station, an Interfax correspondent reported from the Mission Control Center.
A source in the rocket-and-space industry told Interfax earlier that the spaceship will fly around the ISS and the Russian cosmonaut will photograph the station from various angles after the undocking.
The spaceship will depart from the ISS within minutes and move to a safe distance with two burns of its engines. After that the landing capsule will begin the descent.
Three hours later engines will slow down the ship, and Soyuz will enter dense layers of the atmosphere at 2:22 p.m. Moscow time.
The landing capsule will touch down at 2:45 p.m. Moscow time southeast of Kazakhstan's Jezkazgan.
Artemyev wrote on Twitter he would miss the ISS crew.
"Several weeks later I will be missing space, the flight, zero gravity, and my international space family, with whom I spent the past six months," Artemyev said.
The returning crew has spent 197 days in orbit.