Sunita “Suni” Williams and Barry “Butch” Wilmore have returned to the ground after a nine-month stay at the International Space Station (ISS)-a trip that lasted much longer than was originally planned thanks to the leaks and problems of the Boeing Starliner they used to get there.
Williams and Wilmore spread to the Gulf of Mexico in a Dragon Spacex capsule at 5:57 Afternoon, after a 17-hour return trip from ISS.
Their return marks the end of one of the foreign chapters in the latest history of flight in space, thanks to the problems that the Boeing’s Starliner experienced and how Spacex Elon Musk CEO has politicized the return of astronauts.
Williams and Wilmore initially began in ISS in June 2024 as part of a mission that was essential to Boeing’s attempt to compete with Spacex. Aviation Behemoth won a contract along with Spacex in 2014 to send astronauts to ISS for NASA with one eye to eventually carry them even further to the solar system.
Spacex performed her first flight captured by his Dragon crew ship in 2020 – during the first days of Covid Pandemia. The Starliner Boeing project, meanwhile, was withdrawn from cost overcoming and delays.
Flight in June 2024 had to help Boeing watch everything. The goal was to send Williams and Wilmore to ISS and then return them home after a short stay. But Starliner suffered problems before they even got in with ISS. After the astronauts finally got board, NASA and Boeing spent several weeks performing tests before deciding to return Starliner again without them.
NASA soon began working with Spacex on a plan to restore Willams and Wilmore. After a few back and forth, they decided to wait until the beginning of 2025 to bring the duo home so that the ISS would not be short staff.
In recent months, however, Musk has claimed (without providing) that he offered to bring astronauts earlier home – and that former President Joe Biden did not accept the offer because it would help his political rival Donald Trump.
Former Administrator and Deputy Administrator of NASA under Biden said both the spatial agency was unaware of any offer. CNN reported on Tuesday that senior White House officials also claim that they were unaware of any offer.
Look at the team to return to the ground:
This story was updated to include a video of astronauts returning.
