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NASA Astronaut Mark T. Vande Hei Beats American Record for Longest Time in Space
Yesterday, in the early hours of March 30th, 2022, NASA astronaut Mark T. Vande Hei returned to Earth with two Russian cosmonaut colleagues. He has just set the record for the longest consecutive time spent in space by an American at 355 consecutive days in space, beating out the previous record held by Scott Kelly after spending 340 consecutive days in space in 2016.
Mark T. Vande Hei returned to Earth with his two Russian colleagues, cosmonauts Anton Shkaplerov and Pyotr Dubrov. Still remaining on the ISS includes the members of SpaceX Crew-3, NASA astronauts Kayla Barron, Thomas Marshurn, Raja Chari, and ESA astronaut Matthias Maurer of Germany. They launched on November 11th, 2021, and have a planned return date of late April 2022. Three Chinese Taikonauts are also currently onboard.
“I promised my wife I will not be flying to space again, so that will be bittersweet. I’m very, very grateful to have had this amazing opportunity to come up to the space station here with such wonderful people who I consider friends for the rest of my life; to serve my country and all of humanity.” - Mark T. Vande Hei on returning to Earth
SpaceX Crew-4 is currently set to launch no sooner than April 19th, 2022. This mission includes NASA astronaut and Crew-4 Pilot Bob…
