Kerbin Arrival
And finally, Kerbin was sighted ahead of the ship.
Now the kerbonauts were getting ready for the final critical maneuver: aerocapture in Kerbin's atmosphere.
The aerocapture would plunge to a 32.4 km altitude within Kerbin's atmosphere.
As opposed to the Duna aerocapture, this time the fireworks were impressive.
The capture was successful, and after a second aerobraking pass a stable low Kerbin orbit was established.
The Kerbonauts were relieved to finally see the surface of their blue world again.
As opposed to previous manned missions, this time the ship would not return to the surface of the planet. Instead, the Ares spacecraft set course on an intercept trajectory to Space Station One.
The kerbonauts were finally safe in Kerbin orbit after a million km journey.
Since the Ares spacecraft would remain in orbit docked to SSO, an automated shuttle was launched to ferry the kerbonauts back to orbit.
The three kerbonauts boarded the shuttle and finally returned to the surface of Kerbin, landing at the Space Center.
Mission successful!
