Astronaut Koichi Wakata, the first Japanese captain of the International Space Station, returned to Earth on Wednesday after completing a six-month mission.
Mr. Wakata (50), landed in Kazakhstan aboard the Russian Soyuz spacecraft after handing his duties as ISS commander to U.S. astronaut Steven Swanson. Russian cosmonaut Mikhail Tyurin and U.S. astronaut Rick Mastracchio also returned with him the capsule.
Mr. Wakata served as the station’s skipper for 66 days. He is the first Asian to head the station, where he worked with five other astronauts from the United States and Russia.
In a ceremony marking the transfer of commandership, Mr. Wakata gathered at the Japanese science laboratory module Kibo with the five other crew members.
Praise for crew mates “I had the honour of serving you as commander, which was an incredible opportunity for me to expand my knowledge and experience in managing this complex outpost of humans in space and I couldn’t have done this job without the superb performance of my fellow crew mates and (our) great teamwork,” Wakata said at the ceremony.
Fourth space journey It was Mr. Wakata’s fourth trip to space, where he spent 188 days. It was the longest stay by a Japanese astronaut in a single voyage, surpassing the 167 days spent by Satoshi Furukawa. While aboard the ISS, Mr. Wakata filmed Comet ISON with a 4K high-resolution camera, according to the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency.
Mr. Wakata stayed on the ISS from November and became the 39th ISS commander on March 9 with the duty of securing the safety of crew members in the event of incidents such as a fire or meteorite strike.
The ISS was launched in 1998 as an international effort and has been a symbol of cooperation, particularly between the US and Russia. When the time comes to retire it, the station will be de-orbited and sunk in the ocean.
