Soyuz crew returns to Earth

Two Nasa astronauts and a Russian cosmonaut made a safe return from the International Space Station to a planet roiled by the coronavirus pandemic yesterday. Andrew Morgan, Jessica Meir and Oleg Skripochka touched down in central Kazakhstan at 0516 GMT in the first returning mission since the World Health Organisation declared Covid-19 a global pandemic in March. "TOUCHDOWN! Welcome home, Oleg Skripochka, Andrew Morgan and Jessica Meir!" Russia's Roscosmos space agency said in a tweet yesterday. While the trio's landing site southeast of the Kazakh town of Dzhezkazgan is the same as for previous crews, the pandemic has forced a number of changes to mission-end protocol. Roscosmos said Tuesday that the crews meeting the trio at the landing site were tested for Covid-19 and will don full-body protective wear.

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