( CNN ) -- Nearly five months of cramped living in zero gravity will come to an end Thursday for one American astronaut and two Russian cosmonauts aboard the International Space Station . Their Soyuz capsule is set to undock at 8:30 p.m . ET , and land less than three and a half hours later in Kazakhstan . Soyuz modules are vital to the Russian space program . They are launched into space as capsules atop a rocket , and are capable of landing on land , not requiring a body of water to splash down in . A Soyuz carried the first ever crew to the ISS in November 2000 , according to NASA . One is docked there at all times , in case the crew needs to leave in an emergency . It became the standard mode of transportation to the station after the deadly 2003 Columbia space shuttle accident . The modern version , the Soyuz TMA , is made of three parts . Two of them jettison then burn upon reentry into Earth 's atmosphere , according to NASA . Only the Descent Module will land on Earth , carrying Commander Kevin Ford of NASA , Russian Soyuz Commander Oleg Novitskiy and Russian Flight Engineer Evgeny Tarelkin . NASA TV will broadcast the undocking and landing live . The undocking of the Soyuz will mark the beginning of the 35th ISS mission , which awaits the arrival of two more Russian cosmonauts and an American astronaut in two weeks . The journey up to the station takes longer than the return trip to Earth , NASA said . The Soyuz needs a total of two days to catch up with the ISS in its orbit . More space and science news on CNN 's Light Years blog .
NASA : The trip back to Earth should take two hours . One American and less than three and a half Russian will land 8:30 p.m . ET . Russians Soyuz space modules have proven very reliable . It is the standard transportation mode to the ISS after a deadly space shuttle crash .