Reaching orbit from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center, the newest crew includes NASA’s Anne McClain and Nichole Ayers, both military pilots; and Japan’s Takuya Onishi and Russia’s Kirill Peskov, both former airline pilots. They will spend the next six months at the space station, considered the normal stint, after springing Wilmore and Williams free.

Two Nasa astronauts have returned to Earth with a soft splashdown off Florida’s coast after being stuck in space for nine months. Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams only expected to be gone for a week when they launched to the International Space Station on Boeing’s new Starliner crew capsule in June.