Four astronauts return from space station aboard SpaceX capsule

Four astronauts returned safely to Earth from the International Space Station early on Sunday in a SpaceX Crew Dragon capsule, parachuting to splash-down in the Gulf of Mexico, NASA said.

Splashdown of Dragon confirmed – welcome back to Earth, @AstroVicGlover, @Astro_illini, Shannon Walker, and @Astro_Soichi! pic.twitter.com/jEVQMyOgQT

— SpaceX (@SpaceX) May 2, 2021

Their return marked the end of the first crew rotation mission to the station by the Crew Dragon spacecraft, developed in partnership between NASA and Elon Musk's rocket company SpaceX, the agency said in a statement.

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The hatch of @SpaceX’s Dragon Resilience spacecraft is open!

🌎💙 Shortly, @NASA_Astronauts @AstroVicGlover, @Astro_illini and Shannon Walker along with @Astro_Soichi of @JAXA_en will take their first breaths of fresh air back on planet Earth. pic.twitter.com/TUKWQdTLsX

— NASA (@NASA) May 2, 2021

The crew - NASA's Michael Hopkins, Victor Glover and Shannon Walker, and Japan's Soichi Noguchi - had launched from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida on November 15, propelled by a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket.

The capsule, dubbed Resilience by the crew, splashed down in darkness off the coast of Panama City, Florida.

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The mission was part of NASA’s fledgling public-private partnership with SpaceX, the rocket company founded in 2002 by Musk, who is also CEO of electric car maker Tesla.

The mission marks the second "operational" space station team to be launched by NASA aboard a Dragon Crew capsule since the United States resumed flying astronauts into space from US soil last year, following a nine-year hiatus at the end of the US space shuttle program in 2011.