Soyuz capsule from space station returns to earth

A Soyuz capsule carrying two Russian and a US crew members from the International Space Station has landed in Kazakhstan, ending a record-breaking stay for the Russian pair.

The capsule landed on the Kazakh steppe about three and a half hours after undocking from the space station in an apparently trouble-free descent.

In the last stage of the landing, it descended under a red-and-white parachute at about 7.2 meters per second, with small rockets fired in the final seconds to cushion the touchdown.

The astronauts were extracted from the capsule and placed in nearby chairs to help them adjust to gravity, then given medical examinations in a nearby tent.

Oleg Kononenko and Nikolai Chub returned after 374 days aboard the space station; on Friday they broke the record for the longest continuous stay there.

Also in the capsule was US astronaut Tracy Dyson, who was in the space station for six months.

Eight astronauts remain in the space station, including US astronauts Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams, who have remained long past their scheduled return to earth.

They arrived in June as the first crew of Boeing's new Starliner capsule.

But their trip was marred by thruster troubles and helium leaks, and the US space agency NASA decided it was too risky to return them on Starliner.

The two astronauts are to ride home with SpaceX next year.