NASA not worried about Soyuz space capsule's bumpy ride home

April 23rd, 2008 in Space & Earth / Space Exploration
NASA not worried about Soyuz space capsule's bumpy ride home (AP)

Russian flight engineer Yuri Malenchenko, left, American astronaut Peggy Whitson, centre and South Korea's first astronaut Yi So-yeon pose after news conference in Star City, outside Moscow, Monday, April 21, 2008. A Russian space capsule touched down in Kazakhstan on Saturday after hurtling through Earth's atmosphere in a steeper-than-normal descent, subjecting the three-nation-crew to severe G-forces and landing hundreds of kilometers (miles) off target. Saturday's mission saw the return to Earth of South Korea's first astronaut, Yi So-yeon. She spent 10 days in space before joining U.S. astronaut Peggy Whitson and Russian flight engineer Yuri Malenchenko in the 3 1/2-hour, bone-jarring descent from the international space station. (AP Photo/Misha Japaridze)

(AP) -- An American astronaut described her descent to Earth in a wayward Soyuz space capsule over the weekend as "pretty dramatic," in an audio recording released Tuesday by NASA. On the recording, American Peggy Whitson described parts of the return as "a little more dramatic than I was expecting."

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