Cosmonauts will join the veteran spacefarer's return after 220 days in space.
In a remarkable coincidence, NASA astronaut Don Pettit will mark his 70th birthday with a fiery reentry through Earth’s atmosphere on Saturday, capping off his fourth mission to space, the agency said in a release.
Pettit, along with Russian cosmonauts Alexey Ovchinin and Ivan Vagner, will bid farewell to their orbital home of more than seven months when they undock from the International Space Station (ISS) aboard the Soyuz MS-26 spacecraft at 5:57 p.m. ET Saturday.
During their 220-day mission, the crew circled the Earth an astounding 3,520 times, traveling approximately 93.3 million miles.
