India, March 19 -- NASA Crew-9 astronauts Sunita Williams, Nick Hague, Butch Wilmore, and Russian cosmonaut Aleksandr Gorbunov breathed earthly air for the first time in over nine months on Wednesday (India time) after the successful splashdown of SpaceX's Dragon capsule.

Their SpaceX Crew Dragon capsule named Freedom's heat shield endured scorching temperatures of around 3,000 degrees Fahrenheit (1,650 degrees Celsius) while re-entering the Earth's atmosphere. The spacecraft deployed its parachutes and splashed down off the coast of Florida, near Tallahassee, at 5.57 pm ET on Tuesday (3:27 am IST, Wednesday).

The Crew-9 members' successful return is due to a contingency plan devised by NASA with technical assistance from Elon Musk to b...