SpaceX Crew Dragon astronauts heading home to pre-dawn Sunday splashdown
CBSN
Four astronauts wrapping up a 167-day stay aboard the International Space Station plan a pre-dawn return to Earth Sunday in a SpaceX Crew Dragon capsule, splashing down in the Gulf of Mexico south of Panama City, Florida. Their return was delayed several days due to windy weather.
It will be the second water landing for a piloted Crew Dragon spacecraft and only the third nighttime splashdown in space history, the first in nearly 45 years. Bidding their seven station crewmates farewell, Crew Dragon commander Michael Hopkins, Victor Glover, Shannon Walker and Japanese astronaut Soichi Noguchi plan to undock from the Harmony module's upper port at 8:35 p.m. EDT Saturday, kicking off a six-and-a-half hour re-entry sequence.Ashley White received her earliest combat action badge from the United States Army soon after the first lieutenant arrived in Afghanistan. The silver military award, recognizing soldiers who've been personally engaged by an attacker during conflict, was considered an achievement in and of itself as well as an affirming rite of passage for the newly deployed. White had earned it for using her own body to shield a group of civilian women and children from gunfire that broke out in the midst of her third mission in Kandahar province. All of them survived. She never mentioned the badge to anyone in her battalion.