Oldest serving US astronaut returns to Earth on 70th birthday

Dan Pettit, America’s oldest active astronaut, has returned to Earth on his 70th birthday after completing his fourth mission aboard the International Space Station (ISS).

Veteran U.S. astronaut Dan Pettit safely landed in Kazakhstan early Sunday morning, marking the end of a 220-day mission aboard the ISS. Pettit, accompanied by Russian crewmates Alexey Ovchinin and Ivan Vagner, touched down in the Soyuz MS-26 capsule at 06:20 local time (01:20 GMT), assisted by parachutes in the open Kazakh steppe.

According to NASA, the trio orbited Earth 3,520 times during their mission. For Pettit, this latest journey brings his cumulative time in space to an impressive 590 days, reinforcing his status as one of NASA’s most seasoned astronauts. Born in Oregon on April 20, 1955, Pettit reached this milestone on his 70th birthday.

Despite his achievement, Pettit is not the oldest person to have flown in space. That distinction remains with John Glenn, who returned to orbit in 1998 at the age of 77. Glenn, a legendary figure in American spaceflight history, passed away in 2016.

Following their return, Pettit and his crewmates will undergo a period of physical readjustment as they reacclimate to Earth’s gravity. Pettit will then travel to NASA’s Johnson Space Center in Houston, Texas, while Ovchinin and Vagner will return to Russia’s Star City space training center near Moscow.

Before their departure, the crew officially handed over command of the ISS to Japanese astronaut Takuya Onishi.

This return follows another recent extended stay aboard the space station. Last month, NASA astronauts Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams finally came back to Earth after spending more than nine months in space—far beyond their initially planned eight-day mission. The delay stemmed from technical problems with the spacecraft that brought them to the ISS in June 2024, forcing them to wait until March 18 of this year to return.

Copied