Despite SpaceX’s already planned return of two NASA astronauts who were “virtually abandoned” on the ISS this summer, President Donald Trump claims he has directed the corporation to do so since then.
Late on January 28, Elon Musk, the CEO of SpaceX, wrote on his own social media platform, X, that Trump had requested that he return astronauts Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams “as soon as possible.”
“The @POTUS has asked @SpaceX to bring home the 2 astronauts stranded on the @Space_Station as soon as possible. We will do so,” he said. “Terrible that the Biden administration left them there so long.”
For two reasons, the remark fueled misunderstanding throughout the space sector. One was that there wasn’t
There were two reasons why the remark caused misunderstanding in the space sector. First, it was unclear whether Musk’s statement was meant to be taken seriously because neither NASA nor the White House made an official announcement confirming plans to send the astronauts back.
A few hours later, Trump posted on his own social media platform, Truth Social, to confirm the plan. “I have just asked Elon Musk and @SpaceX to ‘go get’ the 2 brave astronauts who have been virtually abandoned in space by the Biden Administration,” he wrote. “They have been waiting for many months on @Space Station. Elon will soon be on his way. Hopefully, all will be safe. Good luck Elon!!!”
Problems with the Crew Dragon flying the subsequent trip to the ISS, Crew-10, caused a delay in that return, which was originally scheduled for early March. In order to allow SpaceX more time to finish a new Crew Dragon spacecraft that would fly that mission, NASA announced on December 17 that it was delaying the Crew-10 flight, which had been planned for February, to late March. The Crew-9’s homecoming would probably be postponed until early April.
The Crew-10 mission may be further delayed because to other problems with that Crew Dragon spacecraft, according to industry rumors. This might result in SpaceX using a different Crew Dragon for Crew-10, like the one being built for the Ax-4 commercial astronaut mission to the ISS. Axiom Space, a company that develops commercial space stations, had planned to launch Ax-4 as early as April.
In June, Boeing’s CST-100 Starliner aircraft made its first crewed mission to the station, carrying Williams and Wilmore on board. NASA prolonged the Crew Flight Test mission’s stay at the ISS for over two months in order to look into problems with the spacecraft thrusters, even though it was initially only supposed to last eight days.
After determining that the thruster issues presented an excessive danger, NASA made the decision in late August to return Starliner without a crew. The eight-day stay was extended to more than eight months when NASA decided to reassign two astronauts who were scheduled to travel on the Crew-9 mission to make room for Williams and Wilmore to return on that ship.
Williams and Wilmore may return at any moment in an emergency, either on their original Starliner or on a Crew Dragon spacecraft, according to NASA, which has long denied reports that they were stuck on the ISS.
The two astronauts, who have been on other ISS trips, have also expressed their satisfaction with the chance to stay on the station longer. During a media briefing in September, Wilmore declared, “Things that I can’t control I’m not going to fret over,”
Williams remarked, “You just sort of turn to and take on the next activity of the day.” “That’s what we do. We’re professionals.”
NASA also resisted the notion that Crew-9 was a “rescue” mission. At a pre-launch briefing, Steve Stich, the commercial crew program manager for NASA, stated, “I really look at it as a crew rotation mission where we rotate the crews.” “We just happen to have two crewmembers already there a little early.”
The former NASA leadership claimed that the White House had little say in the decision to maintain Williams and Wilmore on the station last summer, despite both Musk and Trump criticizing the Biden administration for having “virtually abandoned” them.
In August, then-NASA Administrator Bill Nelson stated, “I can tell you unequivocally, from a personal standpoint, that politics has not played any part in this decision.” “It absolutely has nothing to do with it.”
