SpaceX launched a rescue mission on Saturday to retrieve two astronauts, Butch Wilmore and Sunita Williams, who have been stuck at the International Space Station (ISS) after safety concerns grounded their Boeing spacecraft.
The mission involves a downsized SpaceX crew sent to bring them home, although their return isn’t expected until early next year.
The SpaceX capsule rocketed toward orbit to retrieve Wilmore and Williams, after Boeing’s Starliner spacecraft returned to Earth empty earlier this month due to a series of technical issues, including thruster problems and helium leaks.The mission now falls to Nasa’s Nick Hague and Russia’s Alexander Gorbunov, who will fly to the ISS to bring the stranded astronauts back to Earth.
Since Nasa rotates ISS crews every six months, the newly launched flight with two empty seats reserved for Wilmore and Williams won’t return until late February. Officials confirmed that an earlier return was not possible without disrupting other scheduled missions.
By the time of their return, Wilmore and Williams will have spent more than eight months in space, despite originally planning to be gone for just one week as part of Boeing’s first astronaut flight in June. Nasa eventually deemed Boeing’s Starliner too risky after the issues encountered during its mission to the ISS.
Nasa made adjustments to the SpaceX mission to accommodate the astronauts’ return, cutting two astronauts from the initial launch plan to make space for Wilmore and Williams. As a result, Sunita Williams has since been promoted to commander of the space station, which will soon return to its normal crew size of seven. When Hague and Gorbunov arrive, four astronauts who have been living at the ISS since March will depart in their own SpaceX capsule, an event delayed by Starliner’s complications.
“There’s always something that is changing. Maybe this time it’s been a little more visible to the public,” Hague noted before the flight, acknowledging the unpredictable nature of spaceflight.
Hague, an experienced astronaut, was chosen to lead the rescue mission, drawing on his previous experience of managing a launch emergency. Six years ago, a Russian rocket he was aboard failed shortly after liftoff, and the capsule he and a cosmonaut were in was catapulted to safety.
Rookie Nasa astronaut Zena Cardman and veteran Stephanie Wilson were initially scheduled for this flight but were pulled after Nasa opted for SpaceX to handle the retrieval of Wilmore and Williams. Nasa confirmed both astronauts would be eligible for future missions. Gorbunov’s participation in the mission is part of an ongoing agreement between Nasa and the Russian Space Agency.
“I don’t know exactly when my launch to space will be, but I know that I will get there,” Cardman said during the launch livestream at Nasa’s Kennedy Space Center.
Hague acknowledged the difficulties of launching with a reduced crew and returning with astronauts trained on a different spacecraft. “We’ve got a dynamic challenge ahead of us,” Hague said. “We know each other and we’re professionals and we step up and do what’s asked of us.”