Leaving six crewmates behind in orbit, a Russian commander, his NASA co-pilot and a first-time flier from the United Arab Emirates undocked from the International Space Station early Thursday, executed a fiery plunge back to Earth and landed safely on the steppe of Kazakhstan.

The ISS Deorbit Vehicle, or DV, will be a custom-built, one-of-a-kind spacecraft needed to make sure the space station re-enters the atmosphere at the precise place and in the proper orientation to insure any wreckage that survives the 3,000-degree heat of re-entry will crash harmlessly into the sea.

A United Launch Alliance Atlas 5 rocket fitted with five powerful solid-fueled boosters has lifted off from a seaside launch complex at Cape Canaveral with the U.S. Navy’s third Mobile User Objective System communications satellite.