[imagesource: NASA]

Back in 1968, NASA executed what would come to be known as their boldest and most dangerous undertaking in the race to the moon.

Apollo 8 was the first crewed spacecraft to leave low Earth orbit, and also the first human spaceflight to orbit the moon.

It would set the stage for the Apollo 11 moon landing seven months later.

Another notable event in the Apollo 8 mission was the landing, which took place at night. Since then, no other spacecraft has drifted back to Earth in the dark, until Sunday, when SpaceX safely returned four astronauts from the International Space Station.

The Dragon capsule, Resilience, re-entered Earth’s atmosphere, parachuting into the Gulf of Mexico off the coast of Panama City, ending the second manned flight for SpaceX. According to The Huffington Post, the trip lasted just upwards of six hours.

Before we watch her land, here’s Resilience blasting off in November last year:

BBC rounded up highlights from the landing:

If you want to watch the full landing mission, have at it:

Mission Control welcomed astronauts Shannon Walker, Victor Glover, Mike Hopkins, and Soichi Noguchi, back with a bit of flight humour.

“We welcome you back to planet Earth and thanks for flying SpaceX,” SpaceX’s Mission Control radioed moments after splashdown. “For those of you enrolled in our frequent flyer program, you’ve earned 68 million miles on this voyage.”

“We’ll take those miles,” said spacecraft commander Mike Hopkins. “Are they transferrable?” SpaceX replied that the astronauts would have to check with the company’s marketing department.

Within half an hour after splashdown, the capsule was retrieved and lifted onto the recovery ship with the astronauts exiting shortly thereafter in high spirits.

Hopkins was the first out, doing a little dance as he emerged.

“It’s amazing what can be accomplished when people come together,” he told SpaceX flight controllers at company headquarters in Hawthorne, California. “Quite frankly, you all are changing the world. Congratulations. It’s great to be back.”

The mission lasted 167 days, making it the longest for a crew capsule launching from the US to date.

Once the astronauts finished their medical checks, they hopped a helicopter back to Houston.

“It’s not very often you get to wake up on the space station and go to sleep in Houston,” chief flight director Holly Ridings told reporters.

Resilience will head back to Cape Canaveral, where she will undergo refurbishment for SpaceX’s first private crew mission in September.

[source:huffpost]