Oldest Astronaut Celebrates 70th Birthday with Return from Space Mission

Wed Oct 22 2025 18:30:33 GMT+0300 (Eastern European Summer Time)

America's oldest astronaut, Dan Pettit, marks a remarkable milestone as he returns from space on his 70th birthday.

Dan Pettit, the oldest astronaut actively serving in the United States, has triumphantly returned to Earth, coinciding with his 70th birthday. The Soyuz MS-26 spacecraft, which carried Pettit alongside Russian cosmonauts Alexey Ovchinin and Ivan Vagner, made a successful parachute-assisted landing in the vast steppes of Kazakhstan at 06:20 local time (01:20 GMT) on Sunday. Over the course of their mission, the team spent an impressive 220 days aboard the International Space Station (ISS), completing 3,520 orbits around the Earth, as shared by the US space agency, NASA.

This mission was Pettit’s fourth journey into space, contributing to his remarkable overall total of 590 days spent in orbit. While he is revered in the annals of NASA, he’s not the oldest person to have ventured into space; that accolade belongs to John Glenn, who flew at the age of 77 in 1998 before passing away in 2016. Following the landing, Pettit and his fellow cosmonauts will need time to readjust to the effects of gravity. Transit arrangements have been made for Pettit to return to Houston, Texas, while Ovchinin and Vagner will head to Russia's space training base, known as Zvyozdniy Gorodok.

Prior to their departure from the ISS, Pettit and his crewmates handed over command to Japanese astronaut Takuya Onishi. Their return follows the recent re-entry of two NASA astronauts, Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams, who spent over nine months aboard the ISS due to unforeseen technical complications, extending their stay far beyond the initial eight days planned.

Kazakhstan
NASA
Russia
International Space Station
Space exploration
United States