NASA astronauts Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams should be paid more after their eight-day test flight of the Boeing Starliner spacecraft turned into a nearly 10-month post on the International Space Station, according to President Donald Trump.
The president made his opinion on that matter clear to members of the press in the Oval Office on March 21.
He was asked about Wilmore and Williams being set to receive only $5 a day more for their 286 days in space—totaling $1,430—and if there was anything the government could do about it.
“Well, nobody’s mentioned this to me,” Trump said. “If I have to, I’ll pay it out of my own pocket, OK? I’ll get it for them.”
The president sounded surprised at the extra pay they have received so far, and stated: “That’s not a lot for what they had to go through.”
He thanked Elon Musk, whose SpaceX Crew Dragon capsule was used to bring the astronauts home at the end of its ninth crewed mission for NASA.
The Epoch Times has reached out to NASA for confirmation of the extra pay, as well as for further clarification on the astronauts’ overtime pay structure.
NASA officials previously told members of the press that all of its astronauts are told before their launch to prepare for a possible extension of their mission.
Wilmore and Williams happened to get the longest mission extension yet.
However, the astronauts always had a way home, said Steve Stich, manager of NASA’s commercial crew program.
Whether it was attempting to do so in the Boeing Starliner capsule or finding room for them in the Crew-8 Dragon capsule, he said.
However, they remained onboard due to a variety of factors, especially safety concerns and the need to satisfy demands on ongoing experiments and space station maintenance.
So Starliner’s crew was tasked with helping to close out Expedition 71, becoming crew members of Expedition 72, which Williams commanded for a significant time, and then coming home at the end of SpaceX Crew-9’s 171-day mission.
Along with the extra science and maintenance work, Wilmore and Williams had to get extra training on the re-entry and splashdown procedures of their new spacecraft.
Williams now holds the record for the most time spent spacewalking by a woman and ranks fourth overall, totaling 62 hours and six minutes outside in the nine spacewalks she’s taken over her three space missions.
She has also accrued the second-most days in space of any NASA astronaut, 608.
She falls short only to former NASA Astronaut Peggy Whitson, who holds the record of 675 cumulative days in space.
Meanwhile, Wilmore came home, having now spent 464 days in space over his three trips to orbit.
Wilmore and Williams have now flown in four different types of human-rated spacecraft in orbit: the Space Shuttle, the Russian Soyuz, the Boeing Starliner, and the SpaceX Crew Dragon.
