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A crew of three are due to return from the International Space Station (ISS) early on Friday, to a very different planet they left last year. No strangers to isolation, Russian Oleg Skrypochka and Jessica Meir from the US left Earth in September 2019, well before Covid-19 emerged. Another American, Andrew Morgan, has been on the ISS since July 2019. The coronavirus pandemic has changed the usual routine for returning space crews.

"It's quite surreal to see it unfolding on Earth below," Ms Meir told reporters during a recent video call.

"From here, Earth looks just as stunning as usual, so it's hard to believe all of the changes that have taken place since we left."

The trio are scheduled to return to Earth at 05:00 GMT on Friday, by which time Mr Skrypochka and Ms Meir will have spent 205 days in space, and Mr Morgan 272 days. The capsule normally lands somewhere in Kazakhstan, then a search team picks up the crew and brings them to the closest airport and they all fly home. This time Kazakhstan has declared a state of emergency and most of the airports are closed. The search party is currently in strict quarantine and will have to take a test immediately before going out to pick up the arrivals, to ensure they cannot be infected//BBC