After 340 days in space, Scott Kelly is back on Earth.
Kelly, who spent the time about 249 miles above the planet aboard the International Space Station, and Russian cosmonaut Mikhail Kornienko landed Tuesday at 11:26 p.m. Eastern in Kazakhstan after their spacecraft touched down successfully.
Kelly, in a bulky, white spacesuit, pumped his fist and smiled as he was helped out of the craft.
The spacecraft departed from the space station Tuesday at 8:02 p.m. Eastern, a part of the journey that was captured on a livestream.
From Kazakhstan, Kelly will travel to Houston. He is scheduled to arrive at 11:45 p.m. Wednesday, and will be greeted by NASA officials; Jill Biden, the wife of Vice President Joe Biden; and his identical twin brother, Mark Kelly, also an astronaut.
Scientists will study Kelly for the health effects of extended space travel, expecting it to be a steppingstone for a potential trip to Mars. They will have an unusual partner in the research: His twin will also be analyzed.
If you’re waiting to hear Scott Kelly’s perspective on the experience, you’ll have to be patient a little while longer. He won’t address the news media until 2 p.m. Friday. NASA scientists will answer questions on Reddit at 11 a.m. that day, and the agency will also hold a news conference to discuss research accomplishments at 1 p.m.
Kelly has documented much of his trip on his Instagram and Twitter accounts, which became popular largely because of his distant views of Earth and its otherworldly sunrises and sunsets (he witnessed 10,944 of them). On Day 141, he posted a spectacular video of the aurora borealis.
Combined with his other three trips to space, Kelly has now spent 540 days of his life in orbit. The 340-day stay far surpassed the previous American record — 215 days — set by Michael López-Alegría in 2006 and 2007. The international record is nearly 438 days, set by Russian cosmonaut Valeri Polyakov on the Mir space station in 1994 and 1995.
“I could go another year if I had to,” Kelly said last week in a wide-ranging news conference. He was looking forward to jumping in his pool, he said, adding that the hardest part was being away from friends and family.
But Kelly managed to maintain a sense of levity, including dressing up in a gorilla suit. Highlights of the trip included a spacewalk and enjoying the first lettuce grown and harvested in space.
“Kind of like arugula,” Kelly said.
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