NASA and SpaceX want to bring back stranded Starliner crew earlier than planned
NASA is creating the conditions for the Starliner crew to return to Earth two weeks earlier than planned. To this end, the Crew Dragon is changed.
Suni Williams (left) and Butch Wilmore on the ISS: technical problems with Crew Dragon C213
(Image: NASA)
The wait for Suni Williams and Barry Wilmore will soon be over. The US space agency NASA (National Aeronautics And Space Administration) wants to bring the stranded crew of the Starliner spacecraft back to Earth two weeks earlier than last planned. The spacecraft will be changed for this purpose.
On March 12, the Crew Dragon Endurance is scheduled to fly to the International Space Station (ISS), teilte NASA with – provided that the spacecraft from the US space company SpaceX is ready for use. It has to be checked, overhauled and refueled for the Crew-10 mission. Endurance has already flown three missions to the ISS. By bringing Crew-10 forward, the return flight of Crew-9 with Williams and Wilmore on board can take place earlier.
NASA changes the Crew Dragon
To enable the early launch, NASA is changing the spacecraft. The last plan was for Crew-10 to launch on March 25 with the new Crew Dragon C213. C213 is SpaceX's fifth and final Crew Dragon. Crew-10 was to be its debut. However, due to a technical problem, C213 is not expected to be ready for launch until the end of April.
Williams and Wilmore have been stuck on the ISS for over six months. They flew to the space station in the Starliner in June 2024. Due to technical problems with the Boeing spacecraft, it was decided to bring the Starliner back to Earth without a crew in September. A mission that was scheduled to last eight days has thus turned into a good nine months. The return mission was postponed several times, most recently in December.
Return with Crew-9
The two astronauts will fly back to Earth on the Crew-9 mission. The crew that flew to the ISS in September therefore only consists of two people. NASA has not given a date for the return of Crew-9 to Earth. This depends on the weather conditions off the coast of the US state of Florida.
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The return of Williams and Wilmore has now become a political issue: At the end of January, the new US President Donald Trump called on his new advisor and SpaceX boss Elon Musk to bring the two back "as soon as possible". He also used this as propaganda against the previous administration under President Joe Biden: The latter had "practically abandoned" the Starliner crew.
The NASA statement does not address this.
(wpl)
