NASA Officials: Starliner Astronauts Are Not Stuck, Stranded on Space Station

‘We launched Butch and Suni with Starliner. We’re bringing them home on a Dragon. That’s the only difference to me,’ said NASA’s commercial crew program manager

Nick Hague (R), Suni Williams, and Butch Wilmore. NASA via AP

MERRITT ISLAND, Fla.—Astronauts Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams are not stuck or stranded on the International Space Station, National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) officials said on March 14. Rather, they have been completing an extension of their mission to space and always had the ability to come home at the end of it.

“First principle in space flight, you always have a way to come home, and Butch and Suni have had a way to come home,” Steve Stich, manager of NASA’s Commercial Crew Program at Kennedy Space Center, told members of the press during a Crew-10 post-launch press conference.

Wilmore and Williams arrived at the International Space Station during the first manned test flight of the Boeing CST-100 Starliner capsule, but issues with that spacecraft arose, and NASA deemed it unsafe for manned re-entry. Stich explained that before the ultimate decision was made, the two astronauts had three contingencies: Come home on Starliner, SpaceX’s Crew-8 capsule, or SpaceX’s Crew-9 capsule.

Ultimately, the third option was chosen, and Starliner’s test flight crew was assimilated into the liveaboard Expedition 72 crew. Their fitted seats and spacesuits arrived with SpaceX Crew-9, and then they continued their work until Crew-10 arrived to relieve them of their duties.

“For me, it’s a normal handover,” Stich said of the upcoming Crew-9 and Crew-10 role swap. “Uniquely, this time, we launched Butch and Suni with Starliner. We’re bringing them home on a Dragon. That’s the only difference to me.”

That normalcy is also expected to play out in how they are received back on Earth, as Wilmore and Williams go through the same training and pre-return protocols as any crewmember.

Dina Contella, deputy manager of NASA’s International Space Station Program, pointed out that Wilmore and Williams have spent more than 280 days in space; short of longer duration flights astronauts have taken.

“Like any astronauts coming back, there’s a reclamation period, and so that'll vary by crew member, and also does vary by how long they’ve been on orbit, sometimes,” she said.

Crew-10 is expected to dock at International Space Station at approximately 11:30 p.m. ET on March 15, and Crew-9 is set to start their journey home no earlier than 4 a.m. on March 19.

Wilmore and Williams have spent almost 10 months in space, but officials said that extra time was, and is, ultimately seen as a positive thing.

“Every astronaut that launches into space, we teach them, ‘Don’t think about when you’re coming home. Think about how well your mission is going, and if you’re lucky, you might get to stay longer,’” said Ken Bowersox, associate administrator of the Space Operations Mission Directorate at NASA Headquarters in Washington.

Bowersox is an astronaut veteran of the Space Shuttle era who knows what it is like to have his stay on International Space Station extended: during Expedition 6, Space Shuttle Columbia broke up upon re-entry in 2003 and caused a suspension of all shuttle flights for more than two years.

He arrived in Space Shuttle Endeavour and was scheduled to come home aboard Space Shuttle Atlantis in March 2003, but had to go home aboard a Russian Soyuz two months later.

“I was so happy that we did get to stay longer,” he said. ”The reasons were terrible that we stayed longer on our mission, but one of the positives about everything that happened was more time in space.”

Bowersox flew Expedition 6 with NASA astronaut Don Pettit, who is currently back on International Space Station as a part of Expedition 72.

“The only time we ever came closer to an argument in space was when we argued over who might get to stay longer,” Bowersox said. “Because they were talking about having us extend for an extra six months and spend a year in space.”

With this perspective, Wilmore and Williams, who were only expected to get a few days in space on the International Space Station, and fly one spacecraft, got to spend exponentially more time aboard the station doing other things they would not have been able to do if their mission went according to plan.

They were able to conduct spacewalks and Williams got the opportunity to serve as the Expedition 72 commander from Sept. 22, 2024, to March 7.

Crew-9, which included NASA astronaut Nick Hague and Roscosmos cosmonaut Aleksandr Gorbunov, is set to be the last of the SpaceX commercial crew missions to splash down off the coast of Florida. While there is a possibility of a same-day return as its March 19 departure, the exact day remains contingent upon the weather.

Bowersox and SpaceX Dragon Mission Management director Sarah Walker were asked again about claims made by SpaceX founder Elon Musk that the Biden administration refused an offer to bring Wilmore and Williams back sooner.

They were unable to answer, saying they were not a part of those conversations.

“I can’t give you a lot of clarity there, because those discussions I wasn’t part of,” Bowersox said. ”So I can’t tell you it did happen. All I can tell you is NASA is an incredible nonpartisan agency. We get support from whoever is in office.

“Our presidents always care a lot about what happens at NASA, and it’s great to see that that trend continue with our current president,” he added. ”He injects a lot of energy into our thought processes and that’s been helpful for us.”