SpaceX Crew-12 begins journey home from the International Space Station

Four astronauts aboard NASA’s SpaceX Crew-12 mission began operations to return from the International Space Station today. The SpaceX Dragon spacecraft is scheduled to autonomously undock at 8:05 a.m. for a roughly 27-hour journey back to Earth.NASA and SpaceX are targeting splashdown at approximately 11:34 a.m. tomorrow, Oct. 8, off the coast of California. The return crew consists of NASA astronauts Jessica Meir and Jack Hathaway, European Space Agency astronaut Sophie Adenot and Roscosmos cosmonaut Andrey Fedyaev.Crew-12 launched on Feb. 13 from Space Launch Complex 40 at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida. This flight marks the second space mission for Meir and Fedyaev and the first for Hathaway and Adenot.NASA scheduled live undocking coverage to begin streaming at 7:45 a.m. Following the conclusion of undocking coverage, NASA will distribute audio-only communications between Crew-12, the space station and flight controllers during Dragon’s transit away from the orbita