An American astronaut and two Russian cosmonauts returned to Earth after being on board the International Space Station for six months.

Owned by 15 nations, the ISS is a US$100 billion research complex in space.

The Expedition 40 crew composed of former station commander Steve Swanson and cosmonauts Alexander Skvortsov and Oleg Artemyev rode a Russian Soyuz capsule back to Earth and landed at the southeast of Dzhezkazgan, Kazakhstan at 8:30 am, Wednesday.

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The capsule landed so flawlessly that cameras were even able to capture the moment the parachute deployed, an instance very rarely caught on film.

During a change-of-command ceremony broadcast last Tuesday, Swanson said they had a lot of fun and, managed to accomplish a lot during their time in space.

The men did a record number of science experiments, upgraded the station's prototype humanoid robot and repaired broken equipment aboard the space station.

"We did a lot of maintenance, which is good and bad. I love doing maintenance, but it means things broke," Swanson stated.

While the three men are back on Earth, the crew that took their place are already aboard the ISS. The new space crew, Expedition 41, includes the new station commander, Max Suraev, NASA astronaut Reid Wiseman and the European Space Agency's Alexander Gerst.

As the three men descended to earth, Wiseman took a shot of the Soyuz. He captioned it with "Our view of the picture perfect reentry of TMA-12M."

On September 25, another three crew members are set to fly to the ISS, including the first ever Russian woman to serve on the station.

The three flying to the Space Station are NASA astronaut Barry Wilmore and cosmonauts Elena Serova and Alexander Samokutyaev.

"Getting three new faces up here will be lots of fun," Wiseman stated.