When the Soyuz spacecraft returns from the ISS, a parachute slows it’s fall, but not enough for a safe landing. That’s why there are retrorockets on board that fire just moments before touchdown; they slow the spacecraft that extra little bit so the landing is slow and survivable for the crew. It works, but it seems a little counter-intuitive if you think about it. When NASA had capsule-type vehicles in the 1960s — the same kind its revisiting now with Orion and SpaceX is using with the Dra