Astronauts Return Olympic Torch to Earth
Winter Olympics coming
A Soyuz capsule carried an International Space Station crew of three back to Earth on Monday along with an Olympic torch that was displayed in open space as part of Russia's preparations for the Sochi 2014 Winter Games.
Slowed by parachutes and braking rockets fired to soften the impact, the Soyuz TMA-09M hit the Kazakh steppe on schedule at 8:49 a.m. (0249 GMT) after a three-and-half-hour descent from the space station, live footage on Russian and NASA TV showed.