NASA astronaut Chris Williams and Russian cosmonauts Aleksandr Misurkin and Andrey Fedyaev will land in Kazakhstan on July 26 after completing their stay aboard the International Space Station. Their Soyuz MS-23 spacecraft will undock from the orbital outpost and descend through Earth's atmosphere in a carefully choreographed sequence that Space.com will broadcast live.
Williams, a mission specialist from the Johnson Space Center, flew to the ISS in September 2023 as part of Expedition 69 and 70. Misurkin and Fedyaev launched alongside him aboard the same Soyuz vehicle. The three crew members have spent months conducting experiments, maintaining station systems, and supporting ongoing research in microgravity.
The return follows standard Soyuz procedures. The spacecraft will separate into three modules during reentry, with only the descent capsule carrying the crew protected by its heat shield as it plunges through the atmosphere at roughly 17,500 miles per hour. Parachutes will deploy to slow the vehicle before it touches down on the steppes of southern Kazakhstan, where recovery teams will be positioned to extract the crew.
This mission marks routine operations for the ISS partnership between NASA, Roscosmos, and international partners. Despite geopolitical tensions, the U.S. and Russian space agencies continue launching astronauts and cosmonauts together. Williams' return will leave two American astronauts aboard the station: Tracy C. Dyson and Matthew Dominick, who arrived in March 2024.
The ISS typically rotates crews every six months, though some missions extend longer. After Williams, Misurkin, and Fedyaev depart, replacement crew members will arrive to maintain continuous human presence on the orbiting laboratory 250 miles above Earth.
Live coverage begins early