Back to Earth with a thump: Tim Peake prepares to bid farewell to the ISS

Astronauts Chris Hadfield and Samantha Christoforetti describe the 'wild ride' in the Soyuz capsule and adjustments to life back on Earth that await Tim Peake

In astronaut circles, the return to Earth aboard the Soyuz capsule is described in a hundred ways, but a common thread runs through them. Even when all goes smoothly, the ride itself is never smooth. "It is physically extremely violent," says Chris Hadfield, the retired Canadian astronaut. "We often describe it as 15 explosions followed by a car crash."

It is with such thoughts in mind that Tim Peake will leave the International Space Station on Saturday morning after 186 days in orbit. At 4am UK time he and two others, Nasa's Tim Kopra and Russian cosmonaut Yuri Malenchenko, will say farewell to their crewmates, clamber into the Soyuz, and close the hatch. Six hours later, they will hit the planet. With luck, not too hard.