A record breaking run for American space duration is about to come to a close as NASA astronaut Scott Kelly returns from nearly a whole year in orbit.
It soon will be 340 days in a row living in space on board the International Space Station, a record for Kelly as he's doing his part to find out more about long duration weightless living.
"I'd like the legacy of this flight to be that we can decide to do hard things and hard things that will take us further away from the Earth," Kelly said as he participated in his last news conference from orbit.
Kelly's mission began last March, as he launched to space.
NASA calls his work on the orbiting outpost invaluable, as they have studied him and his health, and will compare his medical, physical and psychological condition to his twin brother, and fellow astronaut, Mark Kelly who remained on Earth and participated in the same study.
"I feel extremely fortunate to have been given this responsibility to do this," Kelly said.
All told, with four total missions on the ISS, Kelly will have spent 500 days off the planet.
He's tweeted stunning pictures of our world, including hurricanes and geographic landmarks seen from 250 miles above the Earth.
Along the way he's worked on science in the unique microgravity environment lab, all steps towards sending humans to space regularly and permanently in the future.
"I'm hopeful we will learn a lot about longer duration spaceflight, and how that will take us to Mars someday," adds Kelly.
And with one last weightless flip, Commander Kelly will soon hand over command of his home of nearly a year.
Kelly says this trip for him is like a long camping trip -- no running water meant no real shower. One of the first things he wants to do when he gets home is jump in his pool.
Four Russians completed a year in space on the former space station Mir.
Kelly and Kornienko, along with and cosmonaut Sergey Volkov, will land in Kazakhstan at 11:27 p.m. Tuesday, March 1 (10:27 a.m. Kazakhstan time on March 2).
NASA astronaut Scott Kelly and Russian cosmonaut Mikhail Kornienko marked their 300th consecutive day aboard the International Space Station on Jan. 21, 2016. The pair will land March 1 after spending a total of 340 days in space. (NASA)