Watch as Progress docks with Space Station bringing a holiday delivery

An unpiloted Russian Soyuz spacecraft, carrying a humanoid robot instead of cosmonauts, parachuted to a rare nighttime landing on the steppe of Kazakhstan Friday (U.S. time) to wrap up a test flight to the International Space Station that paved the way for crewed launches using upgraded Soyuz boosters next year.

Russian cosmonaut Alexey Ovchinin and NASA astronaut Nick Hague landed safely downrange in Kazakhstan on Thursday after a Soyuz booster failure cut short their ascent into orbit from the Baikonur Cosmodrome toward the International Space Station. The emergency landing was the first Soyuz in-flight abort since 1975.

NASA’s independent review team that investigated the destruction of a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket and Dragon supply ship shortly after liftoff in June 2015 concluded a design error led to the loss of more than two tons of provisions and equipment heading for the International Space Station.