Getting your Trinity Audio player ready... An international crew of five astronauts began their descent back down to Earth on a SpaceX capsule Friday, after nearly five months onboard the International Space Station US astronauts Anne McClain and Nichole Ayers, Japan’s Takuya Onishi, and Russian cosmonaut Kirill Peskov are expected to spend more than 17 hours in the capsule before splashing down off California’s coast at 1533 GMT on Saturday. Their return will mark the end of the 10th crew rotation mission to the space station under NASA’s Commercial Crew Program, which was created to succeed the Space Shuttle era by partnering with private industry. The Dragon capsule of billionaire Elon Musk’s SpaceX company detached from the International Space Station at 2215 GMT on Friday. The capsule’s dizzying drop back down to Earth will be slowed when it re-enters Earth—and then again by huge parachutes to soften its landing. After the capsule splashes down, it will be recovered by a SpaceX ship and hoisted aboard. Only then will the astronauts be able to breathe Earth’s air again, for the first time in months. The astronauts, known as Crew-10, conducted numerous scientific experiments during their time on the space station, including studying plant growth and how cells react to gravity. Related News