Soyuz MS-05

Three International Space Station crew members from Russia, Italy and the U.S. are on the verge of closing out a four-and-a-half month space flight, set for a parachute-and-rocket assisted touchdown in the Kazakh steppe on Thursday aboard their Soyuz MS-05 spacecraft.

Sergey Ryazansky of Rocsosmos, ESA's Paolo Nespoli and NASA Astronaut Randy Bresnik have finished preparations for their homecoming after 138 days aboard the Space Station and are ready to depart the complex Wednesday night for a brief free-flight ahead of a rocket-powered braking maneuver to set the stage for landing in frigid weather with temperatures expected below -10° Celsius in the desginated landing area in south-central Kazakhstan - a stark contrast to the crew's last contact with Earth's climate when departing on a warm summer night.