After venturing out in space for over three hundred and forty days, the now famous Scott Kelly has finally once and for all returned to his home, Earth. According to NASA, Kelly and Russian cosmonauts Mikhail Kornienko and Sergey Volkov landed late Tuesday night in the Kazakhstan desert. When interviewed by reporters and local media, Kelly stated that “The hardest part is being isolated from people on the ground who are important to you.” According to CNN, Kelly continuously stayed in contact with the human world by uploading pictures on social media every day, keeping a journal of his personal experience in the space station, and keeping his twitter profile up to date. However, this mission into space was not all fun and games; while in the space station, Kelly and his fellow cosmonaut Mikhail Kornienko, continuously conducted hundreds and hundreds of experiments relating to the human body and what can occur to it while up in space for a large amount of time.

With his twin brother, Mark Kelly, on the ground, a vast amount of experiments have been conducted between the two over the past consecutive three hundred and forty days. According to CNN, Mark Kelly is a famous former astronaut who has volunteered to take part in NASA’s Twin Study Program with his brother. NASA wants to see how the identical twins measure up after a year in two very different environments; Scott in space and Mark on Earth. Scientific experiments including bone mass comparisons, help scientists identify the difference from living on earth and up in space for almost a year’s time.

In an interview with Dr. Sanjay Gupta of CNN, Kelly stated “I’ve flown in space four times now and I’ve been up here for a really long time and sometimes, when I think about it, I feel like I’ve lived my whole life up here.” When indeed he did not live his entire life up there, the mere three hundred and forty days may seem to have felt like forever due to the fact that an astronaut like Kelly up in the space station witnesses over sixteen sunrises and sunsets every ninety minutes.
Now back from his longest mission ever known to man, characteristics like walking, running, and eating, are all characteristics in which Kelly will have to re-adapt to while recovering from his journey. For example, the water molecules in space stick together; therefore, it makes drinking a little bit more complicated. Also, going outside for a walk in space is hard and requires months of preparation and lots of hard work. Months of rehabilitation and therapy will be required for Kelly to re-learn how to walk and move his body properly. Maddie Anderson (12) stated, “When he first went up into space, I did not believe his body would really change. Now, I think that it is cool that scientists are working on discovering the effects space had on his body.” Kelly’s mission will not end when he returns; NASA will spend years analyzing and picking apart the vast amounts of tests in which Kelly and his fellow cosmonauts conducted while up in the space station.