Crew-12 undocks Wednesday for a splashdown off California the next morning

Four crew members are scheduled to leave the International Space Station in a SpaceX Dragon capsule at 1:05 a.m. EDT on Wednesday, October 7, and land in the Pacific off California about 34 hours later, near 11:25 a.m. EDT on Thursday, October 8. Both times are targets, and NASA states them as no earlier than.

The crew of NASA’s SpaceX Crew-12 arrived at the station in February and has spent the last several days handing the outpost to the Crew-13 astronauts who docked on October 1. The timing matters because Wednesday’s undocking is set for the small hours of the morning on the East Coast, while the landing is set for the middle of the next morning, so the Dragon spends a day and a half between leaving the station and reaching the water.

NASA’s October 3 schedule for Crew-12

NASA and SpaceX published the departure plan in a commercial crew blog post dated October 3, 2026. It sets undocking no earlier than 1:05 a.m. EDT on Wednesday, October 7, and splashdown off the coast of California at about 11:25 a.m. EDT on Thursday, October 8. The post adds that the splashdown time “could adjust slightly” depending on which return location is selected.

The dates reflect a review of weather and splashdown conditions off California. Mission managers continue to watch spacecraft readiness, recovery team readiness, weather, sea states and other factors, and the post schedules another weather review about 48 hours before undocking. NASA’s wording throughout is conditional: the agency calls the times targets, and it leaves room for the recovery location to be chosen late, which is the reason the splashdown time carries its own “adjust slightly” language.

Meir, Hathaway, Adenot and Fedyaev aboard Dragon

The four returning are NASA astronauts Jessica Meir, the commander, and Jack Hathaway, the pilot, along with Sophie Adenot of the European Space Agency and Roscosmos cosmonaut Andrey Fedyaev, both mission specialists. NASA’s mission wrap-up gives their launch date as February 13, 2026, and counts research on crystal growth, the Cold Atom Lab, bone scaffolds made from wood, antibiotic-resistant bacteria and 3D metal printing among their work. A separate NASA advisory for the crew’s return briefing lists studies of pneumonia-causing bacteria and of how physical characteristics affect blood circulation in spaceflight, so the load coming home includes samples and results from a stay of roughly eight months.

Command of the station passed on October 4. At 10:20 a.m. EDT, Meir handed Expedition 75 command to Roscosmos cosmonaut Pyotr Dubrov in a ceremony NASA streamed on its website.

The Crew-13 handover that set the clock

Departure waited on the replacement crew, because the station keeps a continuous crew and Crew-12 could not leave until Crew-13 had arrived and handed over. NASA’s advisory for the crew’s return briefing said Crew-12 would leave after Crew-13 arrived and a handover period was finished, with weather at the California splashdown sites checked before the hatch closed.

Crew-13 lifted off from Cape Canaveral at 11:10 a.m. EDT on October 1 and docked at Harmony about 7 hours and 50 minutes later, according to NASA’s launch release. Commander Jessica Watkins, pilot Luke Delaney, Canadian astronaut Joshua Kutryk and cosmonaut Sergey Teteryatnikov joined Expedition 75 members Anil Menon, Pyotr Dubrov and Anna Kikina to take up a research load that NASA’s release lists as stem cell work, crop production studies and human health monitoring in microgravity, and NASA’s October 2 station blog put the population at 11. Crew-12 spent the following days packing cargo, configuring Dragon and running pressure suit tests. The station’s traffic has been heavy: NASA’s station blog lists six visiting spacecraft docked at once, including both Dragon crew vehicles, a Cygnus cargo ship, Soyuz MS-29 and two Progress freighters, and Crew-12’s capsule is one of the two Dragons.

Weather and recovery limits on the splashdown

Every figure above carries the same caveat: the October 3 post gives a no-earlier-than undocking, and splashdown follows from it. A weather call at the California sites, a recovery-team issue or a spacecraft concern would push both times, and the roughly 34 hours between undocking and landing would carry the new date with them. NASA’s post names the review that decides this, and it separates the undocking target from the splashdown estimate, which tells readers which number is firmer: the departure time comes first, and the landing estimate depends on it and on the return location.

The October 3 post is the latest NASA update on the schedule that was readable on October 5. The weather review it schedules, about 48 hours ahead of the 1:05 a.m. EDT undocking, is the next point at which NASA could confirm or change either time.

This article was produced with the assistance of AI and reviewed by Morning Overview editors prior to publication.

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