Four people are about to leave the International Space Station the way commercial crews leave it now: hatch closed, Dragon sealed, a short burn away from home.
NASA’s SpaceX Crew-12 — NASA astronauts Jessica Meir and Jack Hathaway, ESA (European Space Agency) astronaut Sophie Adenot, and Roscosmos cosmonaut Andrey Fedyaev — is cleared to undock on Wednesday, October 7, 2026. Per NASA’s space station blog, Dragon is targeting autonomous undocking from the Harmony module’s space-facing port at 8:05 a.m. EDT. Hatch closing between Dragon and the station is set for about 6:20 a.m. EDT.
If the timeline holds, splashdown is scheduled for about 11:34 a.m. EDT Thursday, October 8, off the coast of California — a parachute-assisted Pacific landing after a roughly 27-hour trip home. NASA says that would complete Crew-12 after 237 days in space: nearly eight months away from Earth.
Times are no-earlier-than targets. Mission managers are still watching spacecraft readiness, recovery-team readiness, and weather in the Pacific recovery zone. NASA’s own return advisory stresses that undocking depends on those conditions.
Who is coming home
Meir commands the Dragon flight home. Hathaway is the pilot. Adenot and Fedyaev fly as mission specialists. For Meir and Fedyaev, this is a second trip to station. For Hathaway and Adenot, Crew-12 was a first.
They launched at 5:15 a.m. EST on February 13, 2026, from Space Launch Complex 40 at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station. Dragon docked to the orbital outpost at 3:15 p.m. the next day. The homebound quartet spent recent days packing personal items, cargo, and scientific samples, and preparing the salt-tablet drink bags crews use for fluid loading before re-entry — a standard step that helps the body handle gravity again after a long flight.
Eleven people, then seven
Crew-12’s departure closes a brief full house. NASA’s SpaceX Crew-13 — Jessica Watkins, Luke Delaney, CSA astronaut Joshua Kutryk, and Roscosmos cosmonaut Sergey Teteryatnikov — arrived October 1 and has already started research work. With both crews aboard, the station held 11 people. After Dragon leaves Harmony’s zenith port, seven residents remain to keep the lab running through spring 2027, including Crew-13 and the longer-staying trio of NASA’s Anil Menon and Roscosmos cosmonauts Pyotr Dubrov and Anna Kikina, who arrived July 14.
That handover is the point of Commercial Crew rotations: one crew settles in while another finishes the job and comes home with samples and lessons for the next long stay.
How to watch
NASA is streaming the return on its platforms, including nasa.gov/live and NASA+. Coverage of hatch closing was set to begin around 6:00 a.m. EDT Wednesday, with undocking coverage from about 7:45 a.m. Splashdown coverage is planned to start around 10:20 a.m. EDT Thursday. ESA is also carrying undocking and splashdown on its channels for Adenot’s return.
After undocking coverage ends, NASA plans audio-only communications while Dragon moves away from the complex. The deorbit burn, entry, and splashdown are the Thursday show.
Four astronauts, 237 days, one Dragon pointed home. The station keeps working with the new crew. Earth is a little more than a day of carefully planned burns away.
No Ground. Stay curious.
