NASA has decided to bring forward the return of the Crew-9 mission and, with it, that of astronauts Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams, who left for the International Space Station on June 5, 2024, in the Boeing Starliner spacecraft. Despite messages from Elon Musk and Donald Trump, the reason is not political, but operational.
A few days early. Barring any further delays to their journey, Butch and Suni will return home on March 19th. Considering they were launched into space for a week, that’s nine months later than planned. But if we stick to the latest date NASA was working with, the astronauts will return a few days early.
Background. In June 2024, Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams set off for the ISS aboard the Starliner space capsule, Boeing’s alternative to SpaceX’s Crew Dragon spacecraft. It was the first manned voyage of Boeing’s spacecraft, and was supposed to be the final certification test before it began regularly transporting astronauts to the International Space Station.
However, shortly after its launch, the Starliner experienced serious problems with its propulsion system, forcing the suspension of its return. The situation lasted several months until NASA decided to return the ship empty. This mishap left the astronauts on the space station and forced NASA to find a different solution for their return.
What are they waiting for? Once the fate of the Starliner had been decided, Wilmore and Williams became part of the permanent ISS crew. They work on experiments in orbit and station maintenance. They have even done spacewalks: Wilmore has done two on this mission, and has become the woman with the most hours of extravehicular activity.
So that they could return, NASA reserved two empty seats for them on SpaceX’s Crew-9 mission. The Crew Dragon spacecraft in which they will return to Earth has been docked to the ISS since September, but it is customary for outgoing astronauts to spend a few days with the incoming astronauts before returning home to share any information regarding the scientific experiments on board or the maintenance of the station. And the Crew-10 mission is not ready yet.
Another spacecraft change. The Crew-10 mission was supposed to take off in a new Crew Dragon spacecraft, called C213, which has not yet flown into space. However, a technical issue, apparently related to the spacecraft’s batteries, forced the delay of its first flight until at least the end of April.
Instead of continuing to delay the schedule (and with it, the return of Wilmore and Williams), NASA has opted for a logistical maneuver: reassigning to the Crew-10 mission a spacecraft that has already been tested, the C210 ‘Endurance’, which was being prepared to fly with the private Axiom-4 mission in the spring. Thanks to this change of ship, the return of Crew-9 is not only not delayed, but actually brought forward a few days.
New dates. NASA plans to launch the Crew-10 mission on March 12, 2025, which would allow Crew-9 to return on March 19 with Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams on board, along with their colleagues Nick Hague (from NASA) and Aleksandr Gorbunov (from the Russian agency Roscosmos).
This change of dates is due, as we have seen, to a technical and operational issue, but it explains why Elon Musk and Donald Trump posted on social networks that SpaceX would rescue the two astronauts “abandoned on the ISS” as soon as possible. A propagandistic narrative of what was really going on behind the scenes.
