Boeing’s Starliner spacecraft landed in a New Mexico desert late on Friday, months after its original departure date and without the two astronauts it carried when it launched in early June.
Starliner returned to Earth seemingly without a hitch, a Nasa live stream showed, nailing the critical final phase of its mission.
The spacecraft re-entered Earth’s atmosphere around 11pm ET at orbital speeds of roughly 27,400km/h (17,025mph). About 45 minutes later, it deployed a series of parachutes to slow its descent and inflated a set of airbags moments before touching down at the White Sands Space Harbor, an arid desert in New Mexico.
Because he jumped while in the stratosphere (middle level of 3-level atmosphere surrounding the earth). Therefore he didn’t have to manage the friction and heat that space shuttles have to endure when they enter the uppermost mesosphere, then stratosphere, then troposphere.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stratosphere