The Crew Dragon capsule carrying four astronauts, including the first ones from India, Poland and Hungary to stay at the International Space Station (ISS), splashed down off the coast of California on Tuesday.
Its return, after a journey to Earth that lasted about 22 hours, concluded the Axiom-4, or Ax-4, mission.
“Thanks for the great ride and safe trip. You are incredible,” Mission Commander Peggy Whitson radioed to flight controllers in Houston, Texas after splashdown.
Whitson is a former NASA astronaut who now works for Axiom Space, a US company that offers private space flights, among other services.
Indian astronaut Shubhanshu Shukla also took part in the mission alongside Slawosz Uznanski-Wisniewski from Poland and Tibor Kapu from Hungary.
For this trio of non-Americans, the mission marked their countries' return to manned spaceflight after decades of absence.
They took off on 25 June from the Kennedy Space Centre in Florida for a two-and-a-half-week mission during which they conducted some 60 scientific experiments.
For India, a rising space power, this flight was a key step towards its first independent manned mission, scheduled for 2027 as part of the Gaganyaan (‘Celestial Vessel’) programme.
