The two American astronauts -- Sunita 'Suni' Williams -- 'the woman with the wild hair' as described by US President Donald Trump -- and Barry 'Butch' Wilmore will return to earth soon, said National Aeronautics and Space Administration.
The two astronauts have been stranded on the International Space Station since June 2024 as against the originally planned eight day trip -- with two others, NASA astronaut Nick Hague and Roscosmos cosmonaut Aleksandr Gorbunov.
Suni and Butch will board the SpaceX Dragon spacecraft next week to return to earth.
On March 12, a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket with the Dragon spacecraft will carry four astronauts -- NASA astronauts Anne McClain, Nichole Ayers, JAXA (Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency) astronaut Takuya Onishi, and Roscosmos cosmonaut Kirill Peskov -- to the ISS.
The rocket will lift off from Launch Complex 39A at NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida.
The flight is the 10th crew rotation mission with SpaceX to the space station, and the 11th human spaceflight as part of NASA's Commercial Crew Programme.
Ahead of Crew-9's return, mission teams will review weather conditions at the splashdown sites off the coast of Florida prior to departure from the space station, said NASA.
William and Wilmore's journey to the ISS would be the most reported space event in recent times mainly because of their inability to come back to Earth owing to problems with the thrusters and a helium leak with Boeing's spaceship Starliner that took them to the ISS.
On Thursday, March 6, 2025, Trump scored a political point against his predecessor Joe Biden, saying the latter left Willams and Wilmore stranded in space.
Trump said he had asked Elon Musk -- who owns SpaceX -- to rescue the two astronauts.
'We love you and we're coming up to get you. And you shouldn't have been up there so long,' Trump added.
Musk in a post on X -- which he also owns -- said: 'The astronauts were only supposed to be up there for 8 days and now have been there for 8 months. SpaceX could have sent up another Dragon and brought them home 6 months ago, but the Biden White House (not NASA) refused to allow it. President Trump asked to bring them back as soon as possible and we are doing so.'
Venkatachari Jagannathan can be reached at venkatacharijagannathan@gmail.com
Feature Presentation: Aslam Hunani/Rediff.com
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