Video: Soyuz MS-01 leaves the space station for landing

Cape Canaveral was the departure point for more space launches in 2015 than in any year since 2003, with 17 takeoffs by Atlas, Falcon and Delta rockets hoisting U.S. military satellites, commercial payloads and cargo for the International Space Station.

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.

Three space station fliers floated into their Soyuz ferry craft, undocked from the lab complex and plunged back to Earth Friday, making a rare nighttime landing in snowy Kazakhstan to close out a 141-day stay in orbit.