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Crew-12 astronauts due to splash down off California after 237 days on the space station

Four SpaceX Crew-12 members undocked from the International Space Station on Wednesday and are due to splash down off California on Thursday after a 237-day mission. Their replacements, Crew-13, arrived on 1 October.

2 outlets · 2L · 0C · 0R First reported Account updated
Image: CBS News
Image: ABC News (Australia)

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The story, neutrally told

Left · 2Four people undocked from the International Space Station in the Crew Dragon "Freedom" at 8:05 a.m. Eastern Time on Wednesday 7 October, starting their return from a 237-day stay in orbit. Left · 2The crew are NASA's Jessica Meir (commander) and Jack Hathaway (pilot), European Space Agency astronaut Sophie Adenot of France, and Russian cosmonaut Andrey Fedyaev. Left · 1CBS News reported that the capsule's Draco thrusters were to fire for nine minutes and 20 seconds from 10:46 a.m. ET on Thursday, with splashdown off the California coast at 11:34 a.m. ET.

Left · 1ABC News (Australia) described the trip home as a 27-hour voyage, and said NASA reported the crew would drink fluids with salt tablets during descent to help their bodies adjust to gravity. Left · 1Over the mission the four are to have flown around the planet 3,792 times and logged nearly 101 million miles. Meir will have logged 442 days in space in total, with four spacewalks on this mission and three on an earlier stay, and Adenot carried out three spacewalks. Left · 1The crew launched on 13 February to oversee scientific investigations meant to prepare for future Moon and Mars exploration, according to NASA. They also helped prepare a Falcon 9 booster for a second flight.

Left · 2The replacement Crew-13 launched on 1 October: commander Jessica Watkins, pilot Luke Delaney, Canadian astronaut Joshua Kutryk and cosmonaut Sergey Teteryatnikov. ABC said the launch took eight hours to reach orbit and set a US speed record, and that Crew-13 will stay six months. Left · 1Also aboard are Soyuz MS-29 commander Pyotr Dubrov, cosmonaut Anna Kikina and NASA astronaut Anil Menon, who launched from Baikonur on 14 July and plan to stay eight months. Meir handed station command to Dubrov in a ceremony on Sunday, calling the departure "bittersweet". Left · 1As the capsule left, Meir radioed thanks to colleagues, Houston, SpaceX and international partners, saying "We have had the most incredible of expeditions."

Left · 1ABC added background on the crew: this was Meir's second flight (her first lasted 205 days), and the first for Hathaway, a US Navy commander, and Adenot, a French Air Force colonel. Fedyaev previously spent 186 days on the ISS in 2023. The report also noted NASA's view that the station can remain a working laboratory until at least 2030.

Every sentence links to the reporting it rests on. The pill in front of each says where its sources sit: Left, Centre or Right when one side supplies at least half of them, Mixed when they are evenly split. The number is how many outlets it cites.

Left2 outlets

Framing
Both outlets treat the return as a routine, upbeat rotation story. CBS News gives a detailed account of the undocking, the planned splashdown schedule and crew farewells. ABC News (Australia) offers an explainer on what to expect, with crew biographies and ISS background.
Emphasis
CBS stresses mission statistics, handover of command and timings; ABC stresses crew profiles, the Crew-13 successors and NASA's research aims.
Leaves out or plays down
Neither outlet reports disagreement or controversy. ABC does not give the splashdown time in the text provided, and CBS gives little on research goals.
Charged language
“bittersweet”“huggle”
For example
“it's a lot of mixed, swirling emotions for all of us when one leaves a home like this up on the space station.” — CBS News
“Here is what to know about their expected splashdown voyage.” — ABC News (Australia)

Centre0 outlets

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Right0 outlets

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