Parmitamo returns from space station

(ANSA) - Rome, February 6 - Italian astronaut Luca Parmitano aka 'AstroLuca' returned from the International Space Station (ISS) Thursday after becoming the first European astronaut to command it.
    Parmitano stepped out of a Soyuz shuttle in Kazakhstan and smiled to onlookers.
    He came back down to earth with colleagues Alexander Skvortsov and Christina Koch.
    Earlier this month Parmitano chatted to Italian Premier Giuseppe Conte in a video link from the ISS.
    "Welcome aboard the International Space Station," said the Italian astronaut, who is the current commander of the ISS and has been leading a series of tough spacewalks to service the cosmic-particle-hunting Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer (AMS-02).
    "I'm excited," replied Conte.
    "The Space Station is humanity's outpost in space and it is its greatest feat of engineering.
    "Space and scientific research are strategic sectors for Italy which the government intends to keep focusing on.
    "It's a strategic sector because involvement from the technological point of view makes it possible to develop increasing awareness of our planet".
    Parmitano, who is widely known by his Twitter handle Astroluca, also hailed Italy's efforts on the space-science front.
    "Italy is on the podium," he said.
    "Many of the Italian experiments (on the ISS) are innovative," he added, citing the example of the newly installed Italian Mini-Euso telescope.
    "It will be able to shoot over 100,000 ultraviolet photos a second".
    Conte asked Parmitano for his assessment so far of the Beyond mission, with the Italian set to return to Earth on February 6.
    "The whole mission has achieved superlative results in terms of the quantity of work done and this is only thanks to the crew," he said.
    "We are a highly important example of team work.
    "There are three very demanding weeks to go before the end of the mission.
    "Every spacewalk has a very high risk component.
    "You just have to remember that a fault in my space suit (during a spacewalk) six years ago caused a water leak in the helmet, putting my life in danger.
    "Although this mission's space walks have a much higher tariff, there haven't been an technical difficulties, apart from the job itself.
    "It was particularly difficult to have worked almost totally from the Canadarm, with my legs locked to the robotic arm my only link to the Space Station".