NASA astronauts Suni Williams and Butch Wilmore have successfully returned to Earth after more than nine months (286 days) aboard the International Space Station (ISS), NASA stated.
Their mission, which far exceeded the planned 8 days, was complicated by technical problems with the Boeing Starliner spacecraft they arrived in orbit on.
The astronauts were brought back by SpaceX. The Dragon Freedom capsule landed in the Gulf of Mexico at the scheduled time of 17:57 Eastern Time.
Wilmore and Williams were joined on the capsule by NASA astronaut Nick Hague (171 days) and Roscosmos cosmonaut Aleksandr Gorbunov (286 days), who were also on the ISS during their mission.
Image: NASA
All four astronauts were safely removed from the capsule and transported to medical facilities for check-up.
The Crew-10 mission delivered US astronauts Nicole Ayers and Anne McClain, Russian Kirill Peskov and Japanese Takuya Onishi to the station. The mission was originally scheduled for launch on March 12, but was delayed due to technical problems.
Image: NASA
What happened to NASA astronauts?
As TechCrunch notes, Williams and Wilmore went to the ISS in June 2024 on the CST-100 Starliner as part of a mission that was to be key for Boeing in competition with SpaceX.
- In 2014, the aerospace giant won a contract with SpaceX to ferry astronauts to the ISS for NASA, with the prospect of further flights into the solar system.
- SpaceX made its first manned flight with Crew Dragon in 2020. The Boeing Starliner project, meanwhile, has been plagued by budget cuts and delays.
- The June 2024 flight was supposed to demonstrate that these problems had been overcome. The plan was for Williams and Wilmore to stay on the ISS for a short time and then return to Earth. However, the Starliner experienced maneuvering engine malfunctions and a helium leak in the station's service module.
- In September, the Starliner returned to Earth autonomously, with the two astronauts remaining on the station and coordinating their return with Hague and Gorbunov.
Political context
The mission of astronauts Wilmore and Williams attracted the attention of US President Donald Trump, who shortly after taking office ordered the astronauts to return quickly.
According to Reuters, he accused his predecessor, Joe Biden, of "abandoning" them on the station for political reasons without any provided evidence.
In response, NASA moved the Crew-9 mission to an earlier date, selected a SpaceX capsule that was ready to launch earlier, and expedited safety checks.
Upon the astronauts' return, Trump said they would visit the Oval Office after they recovered. Earlier this month, Wilmore denied that the decision to keep them in orbit until Crew-10 arrived was politically motivated.
SpaceX CEO Elon Musk, a close adviser to Trump, also called for the astronauts to return earlier. He said the Biden administration rejected SpaceX's proposal to organize a special Dragon rescue mission last year.
NASA said the decision to keep the astronauts on the station was necessary to maintain the full-time crew, and that the agency's budget and operational needs did not allow for a separate rescue mission.
