Three International Space Station crew members are scheduled to end their mission and return to Earth on Thursday, December 14, just days before a new increment of space travelers begins its mission to take their places on station. Expedition 53 Commander Randy Bresnik, and Flight Engineers Paolo Nespoli, IZ0JPA, and Sergey Ryazanskiy will undock the Soyuz MS-05 spacecraft from the space station at 1716 UTC, landing in Kazakhstan several hours later, concluding 139 days in space since their launch on July 28.

A change-of-command ceremony will take place on December 13, when Bresnik will turn over command of the ISS to Cosmonaut Alexander Misurkin, at which point Expedition 54 will begin aboard the station, with Mark Vande Hei, KG5GNP, and Joe Acaba, KE5DAR, filling out the crew until the newcomers’ arrival 5 days later.

On Sunday, December 17, Scott Tingle, KG5NZA, Anton Shkaplerov, and Norishige Kanai will head into space from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan in a Soyuz MS-07.