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Sunita “ Suni ” Williams and Barry “ Butch ” Wilmore have returned to Earth after a nine - month stay on the International Space Station ( ISS ) — a trip that lasted far longer than originally project thanks toleaks and pusher problemson the Boeing Starliner spacecraft they used to get there .
Williams and Wilmore splashed down in the Gulf of Mexico in a SpaceX Dragon capsule at 5:57 p.m. ET on Tuesday , after a 17 - hour comeback journeying from the ISS .
Their return tick the end of one of the unknown chapters in recent spaceflight chronicle , thanks to the problems that Boeing ’s Starliner experienced and the direction that SpaceX CEO Elon Musk has politicized the astronaut ’ coming back .
Williams and Wilmore initially launched to the ISS in June 2024 as part of a mission that was crucial to Boeing ’s endeavor to compete with SpaceX. The aviation behemoth won a contract alongside SpaceX in 2014 to send astronaut to the ISS for NASA with an eye on eventually carrying them even farther out into the solar system .
SpaceX performed itsfirst crewed flightwith its Crew Dragon spacecraft in 2020 — during the former daylight of the COVID pandemic . Boeing ’s Starliner project , meanwhile , was drag on down bycost overrunsand delays .
The flight in June 2024 was supposed to help Boeing face past all that . The goal was to send Williams and Wilmore to the ISS and then bring them back home after a light hitch . But Starliner receive trouble before they even docked with the ISS . Once the astronauts ultimately got aboard , NASA and Boeing spent a few weeks perform test before deciding to bring Starliner back without them .
NASA quickly bug out working with SpaceX on a architectural plan to bring Willams and Wilmore back . After some back - and - off , they decide to wait until early 2025 to bring the duo home so that the ISS would n’t be short - staffed .
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In recent month , though , Musk has claimed ( without providing any grounds ) that he offered to bring in the astronauts home earlier — and that former president Joe Biden declined the offer because it would help his political rival Donald Trump .
NASA ’s former administrator and deputy administrator under Biden havebothsaidthe space agency was not aware of any offer . CNNreported on Tuesdaythat senior White House official also claim they were n’t cognizant of any offer .
Watch the teamreturn to earth :
Watch Dragon and Crew-9 return to Earth →https://t.co / ZZEmGU8Aarhttps://t.co / aqY6RNsEfK
This story was updated to include a television of the astronauts returning .
