The American astronaut of Salvadoran origin, Frank Rubio, stated this Wednesday that "it is good to be home" and back on Earth after having spent the record of 371 continuous days on the International Space Station (ISS).
Rubio, the second to be taken out of the descent capsule of the Russian Soyuz MS-23 spacecraft, which landed on time at 11:17 GMT in the Kazakh steppe, waved to the NASA and Russian space agency team. , Roscosmos, which received him and immediately began measuring his pressure.
The astronaut, smiling and thumbs up, told the team trying to wipe the sweat from his forehead that "he was fine."
He then told a NASA representative who asked him questions: "It's good to be home."
Unlike his two companions, cosmonauts Sergei Prokopiev and Dmitri Petelin, with whom he had spent more than a year in space and with whom he returned to Earth today, he did not want to eat fruit, according to images broadcast live by NASA.
As a gift and souvenir of his long mission on the ISS, he received a traditional Russian matrioshka, that colorful wooden figure that keeps smaller ones inside.
His image appears on the first doll. Prokopiev and Petelin received the same gift.
After about 30 minutes sitting, the three crew members were taken in their seats to the medical tent in the Kazakh steppe.
Rubio, who was born in Los Angeles, but whose mother, Myrna Argueta, still lives in El Salvador, has a doctor of medicine degree. He is a family doctor and certified flight surgeon, so he used his knowledge in the mission that has just concluded.
On the 11th, 47 years old, he became the new holder of the absolute record for an American astronaut with the most continuous days in space, surpassing his predecessor, Mark Vande Hei, who had spent 355 consecutive days on the ISS.
The astronaut of Salvadoran origin was the twelfth Hispanic astronaut to fly to the station.
With his 371 days in space, he is now the Hispanic astronaut with the most days on the international orbital platform.
All of this on his first mission, for which Rubio had prepared for five years.
In fact, for the three crew members who returned to Earth today, it is the longest continuous flight in the entire history of the ISS.
The previous records were recorded at the Russian MIR station. There, cosmonauts Valery Poliakov and Sergei Avdeyev spent 437 (1994-1995) and 379 days (1998-1999), respectively, in space.
