Live coverage of the countdown and flight of a Delta 4-Heavy rocket carrying NASA’s Orion space capsule on its first test flight in Earth orbit. Text updates will appear automatically below; there is no need to reload the page. Follow us on Twitter.
Mission Reports
Live coverage: Three-man crew closes out 173-day space mission
Outgoing space station commander Shane Kimbrough and two Russian crewmates returned to Earth on Monday, riding a Soyuz capsule in a bubble of hot plasma to a parachute-assisted landing in Kazakhstan. The trio undocked from the space station at 0757 GMT (3:57 a.m. EDT) and landed on the Kazakh steppe at 1120 GMT (7:20 a.m. EDT) Monday.
