The British astronaut Tim Peake has said “it feels wonderful” to be back on Earth after six months in space, having landed in Kazakhstan at the end of a seven-hour return journey from the International Space Station (ISS).

The Soyuz capsule, which also carried the Nasa astronaut Col Tim Kopra and the Russian cosmonaut Yuri Malenchenko, completed its de-orbit to enter the Earth’s atmosphere at about 10am on Saturday UK time. It landed by parachute in a remote spot in the vast scrubland steppe of Kazakhstan 15 minutes later.

Upon touchdown, Nasa’s mission control in Houston said the Soyuz had landed on its side after being caught by the wind, but this was a fairly routine occurrence. “The search and recovery forces are now making their way around the aircraft so they can secure the aircraft and make sure all its systems are safe before they can extract the crew,” it said.

The three men were soon extracted one by one and attended to by flight surgeons and nurses. Peake had his eyes closed and looked tired, but then smiled and gave a thumbs up to waiting reporters. The astronaut told the press he was “good thanks, very good” and the journey “was incredible, a real ride. Best ride I’ve been on ever.”

He added: “It’s just been fantastic, from start to finish … I’m just truly elated, just the smells of Earth are so strong, it’s wonderful to be back … to feel the fresh air. I look forward to seeing the family now.”

Peake said spending 186 days on the ISS had been a “life-changing experience”. “I’m going to miss the view, definitely. I’d love some cool rain right now, it was very hot in the capsule and the suit’s very hot … I might be having some pizza later, maybe a cold beer as well,” he said.

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The Nasa public affairs officer Dan Hewitt said: “I don’t think I’ve ever seen better weather than the one we have now … all the teams out here actually got to see the capsule touch down, that’s something I’m never going to forget, it was phenomenal to see. All the crew members are out of the capsule, they’re going to now enjoy the weather, their first fresh air in over six months.”

Since December, Peake, a 44-year-old former helicopter test pilot, has taken part in more than 250 experiments, performed a spacewalk, run the London Marathon on a treadmill and inspired more than 1 million schoolchildren, earning him an honour from the Queen for “extraordinary service beyond our planet”.

On Saturday, his Soyuz made a scorching and at times rough descent through the atmosphere, with temperatures outside reaching more than 1,600C (2,910F).

The British astronaut Helen Sharman said before the landing that Peake’s body would need to be prepared. “To multiply your weight by five, it’s very heavy, so just breathing will be more laboured and difficult for him, but he’ll have done this in a centrifuge, we know that he’s strong and fit, as they all are in this crew; he knows what to expect,” she told the BBC Radio 4 Today programme.

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Sharman said she didn’t think Peake would be scared. “You know this even before you launch into space, but I think once you’ve made the decision to go, you know that you want to come back, and there is no way around it. This is the only way back and so it’s not a thought of: ‘Shall I do it or not?’”

Soon after 3am UK time, the three men climbed from the ISS into the Soyuz TMA-19M spacecraft that took them into orbit on 15 December. Closing the hatch between the station and the spacecraft 34 minutes later marked the official end of ISS expedition 47 and Peake’s Principia mission.

Docking latches were undone several hours before the Soyuz was pushed away by springs. The capsule then fired two rocket bursts to put it at a safe distance from the space station before beginning the main part of its descent.



Only the middle section of a Soyuz, the descent module, completes the trip to Earth intact, with passengers sitting side by side in shock-absorbing seats. The rest is discarded and burns up in the atmosphere.

Friction on the spacecraft’s heat shield slows its speed from 17,398 mph to 514 mph and raises the outside temperature to 1,600C. The rapid deceleration pushes the crew back into their seats with a force of around 5g – five times the force of Earth’s gravity.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest How the Soyuz undocks, re-enters the atmosphere and lands.

The Nasa astronaut Doug Wheelock has described the experience of a Soyuz descent as “like going over Niagara falls in a barrel, but the barrel is on fire”.

Peake was the first British astronaut to be sent to the ISS by the European Space Agency. His mission was named Principia after Sir Isaac Newton’s landmark work describing the laws of motion and gravity, and its main purpose was to contribute to scientific knowledge by conducting experiments in zero gravity.

But Peake did much more than that as he constantly kept in touch with the world on Twitter, took part in video-linked Q&A sessions, and engaged in educational activities with schoolchildren.

In preparation for Saturday’s undocking, the crew donned their Sokol space suits, took their positions in the module and carried out final air leak and communication tests.After separation, video footage from the space station showed the distant Soyuz appearing to be heading for the moon.

If all went according to plan, the return to Earth will have been controlled automatically by the craft’s computer. In an emergency, the crew, led by Malenchenko, had the ability to alter their trajectory with a hand controller.

A critical moment came at about 9.20am UK time, when the rocket motor had to fire for 4 minutes and 45 seconds to put the Soyuz on a trajectory that took it out of orbit. If the “de-orbit burn” had been too short the astronauts could have skipped across the atmosphere like a stone skimming a lake and flown back out into space. If it was too long, they could have come in at too steep an angle, too fast, and risked being incinerated.

Then, half an hour before landing and at an altitude of 87 miles, explosive bolts would havefired, splitting the Soyuz into three parts.

The descent module containing the crew would have turned so its heat shield was pointing in the direction of re-entry. The other two sections, the service module containing propellant and control systems, and the spherical orbital module that housed the crew during their launch, would have plunged into the atmosphere and burned up.

Fifteen minutes before landing, four parachutes would have deployed in succession. One second before touchdown, retro rockets would have fired and the spacecraft would hit the ground at 3mph.

The crew were due be helicoptered to Karaganda airport where, according to tradition, they will be offered bread and salt and a traditional Kazakh hat. Peake will then be flown to the European Astronaut Centre in Cologne, Germany, while his US and Russian colleagues go to Houston and Star City, near Moscow.

Sharman said events would unfold continually for Peake once he landed. “It will be a medical debriefing immediately, and then possibly some quick technical debriefings in case there’s anything really urgent they need to pass on, but then all of this business of getting back to Cologne this evening to meet his family again, it’s this gradual adjustment, but for him it will be a continued debriefing … more medical studies on his body and press conferences galore, and then he will be back in the UK telling us his stories and passing on information about what he’s been doing out there.”

During his time in space Peake worked up to 14 hours a day, participating in more than 250 experiments devised by scientists from around the world.

He was the first person to be honoured while in space, being made a Companion of the Order of St Michael and St George for “extraordinary service beyond our planet”. Speaking from the ISS in January, he said he was looking forward to private time with his family, fresh air and the feeling of rain on his face.