Posted: Thu, Jun 16, 2005, 9:06 PM ET (0106 GMT)
A Russian capsule carrying experiments that flew in space for over two weeks safely returned to Earth early Thursday. The capsule from the Foton-M2 spacecraft landed 137 km from the Kazakh city of Kostanay, at a location near the Russian border, at 3:37 am EDT (0737 GMT). Foton-M2 was launched on May 31 and spent over two weeks in Earth orbit; the spacecraft carried a suite of experiments, including 39 provided by the European Space Agency. Some of those experiments were reflights of similar investigations lost on the Foton-M1 launch failure in 2002. Another Foton mission, Foton-M3, is planned for 2007, also with ESA participation.
