Astronauts Suni Williams and Butch Willmore are back on earth after a nine-month delay in departure from the International Space Station (ISS).
Both the Astronauts had launched from Earth on June 5, 2024, on a mission to test a new Boeing capsule meant for astronaut rotation missions. But, during the flight the capsule showed signs of helium leakage along with some problems with the aircrafts thrusters. Because of this, the astronauts and teams at NASA had chosen to keep the team on the International Space Station until they found a better way to bring Williams and Willmore home.
NASA came up with a solution in August of 2024 when they announced that the astronauts were getting back to earth no earlier than February of 2025. NASA had decided that Williams and Wimlore would wait for flight Crew-9 to arrive on the International Space Station and leave with the crew after their mission was completed. They took off two members from the original four-member flight Crew-9 team, leaving enough seats for Williams and Willmore to fit on the aircraft back home. This plan made it so the stranded astronauts had a safer way back home, but it required NASA to push back their arrival back on Earth by six months.
Recently both Williams and Willmore returned to Earth on March 12, 2025. They had arrived on the Dragon Aircraft from SpaceX along with Nick Hague and Aleksandr Gorbonov, members of flight Crew-9.
After Williams and Wilmores arrival back home, there have been controversial claims on why they stayed in space for so long. President Donald Trump and Elon Musk have made claims that former President Joe Biden had left the astronauts in space for political reasons. In an interview with Fox news Musk said, “At the president’s request or instruction, we are accelerating the return of the astronauts which was postponed, kind of to a ridiculous degree.” Musk’s claims have been refuted by other astronauts, including both Williams and Wilmore. In a news conference on March 4, before both the astronauts had arrived on earth, Williams says that he has no reason to doubt Musk’s claims but adds that “from my standpoint, politics is not playing into this at all. From our standpoint, I think they would agree, we came up prepared to stay long even though we plan to stay short.”
Image courtesy of Pixabay.
