Veteran astronauts Butch Wilmore and Sunita Williams arrived at the ISS in June aboard Boeing’s Starliner spacecraft and will spend eight days in the orbiting laboratory.
But there were problems with the Starliner’s propulsion system during the flight, so NASA opted to make major changes to the plans.
After weeks of intensive testing on the Starliner, the space agency decided to return it to Earth without its crew, and bring the two stranded astronauts back home with members of the SpaceX mission, called Crew-9.
Two astronauts from Crew-9 arrived at the ISS in late September aboard the Dragon spacecraft, with two empty seats for Wilmore and Williams. All four were scheduled to return home in February 2025.
But NASA said on Tuesday that Crew-10, which will relieve Crew-9 and the stranded pair, will now launch before March 2025, and that both crews will remain on board for a “handover period”.
“The change gives NASA and SpaceX teams time to complete the process on the new Dragon spacecraft for the mission,” NASA said in a blog post.
The bottom line is that Wilmore and Williams will spend nine months in space, rather than eight days as originally planned.
SpaceX, the private company founded by billionaire Elon Musk, has been flying regular missions every six months to allow the ISS crew to rotate.