WIKIARCHIVES.SPACE

Russian MI-8 helicopters sit on the steppes of south central Kazakhstan at sunrise on April 9, 2006 (Kazakhstan time) as engineers and members of the Russian Search and Recovery Forces recovered astronaut William S. McArthur Jr., Expedition 12 commander and space station science officer; Russian cosmonaut Valery I. Tokarev, Soyuz commander and space station flight engineer; and Brazilian Space Agency astronaut Marcos C. Pontes following their pre-dawn landing in the Soyuz TMA-7 spacecraft. McArthur and Tokarev completed six months in space on the station, while Pontes spent 10 days in orbit.