NASA has changed its flight plans ahead of a SpaceX mission to bring home stranded astronauts on the International Space Station (ISS) and has removed two crew members from the trip roster.
SpaceX’s Crew 9 will now fly a two-person mission to the ISS to bring back Boeing crew Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams, who have been trapped in space for eight months.
Zena Cardman and Stephanie Wilson will no longer fly on the mission, but will be “eligible for reassignment to a future mission.” POT announced on Friday.
Even though the two NASA astronauts will return to Earth, leaving Cardman and Wilson behind will put a dent in Crew-9’s mission, since “they trained as a crew of four,” NASA chief astronaut Joe Acaba said in a statement.
NASA astronaut Nick Hague and Russian cosmonaut Aleksandr Gorbunov will continue the mission as commander and mission specialist, respectively.
The two Americans were ousted in favor of the Russian crew member to continue to honor the agreement with Roscosmos to carry a Russian astronaut, “who can operate its critical systems for safe and continued operations on the station,” on every SpaceX flight, NASA said. In return, the U.S. receives seats on the Soyuz spacecraft.
SpaceX’s Crew 9 will now fly a two-man mission to the ISS to bring back the stranded Boeing crew, Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams, who have been trapped in space for eight months.
The flight is expected to take off in February 2025, delaying it by five months from its original Sept. 24 launch.
Although he acknowledges that it will be a change for the crew, Acaba has “the utmost confidence in our entire crew, who have been excellent throughout the training for the mission.”
“Zena and Stephanie will continue to assist their crewmates prior to launch and exemplify what it means to be a professional astronaut,” he said.
The two astronauts hold no grudges and both say they believe the two men will do well.
“I’m confident that Nick and Alex will assume their roles with excellence,” said Cardman, a scientist.
NASA astronaut Nick Hague and Russian cosmonaut Aleksandr Gorbunov will continue the mission as commander and mission specialist, respectively. The flight is expected to take off in February 2025, which will delay it by five months from its original Sept. 24 liftoff.
Zena Cardman and Stephanie Wilson will no longer fly on the mission, but will be “eligible for reassignment to a future mission,” NASA announced Friday (pictured left to right: Gorbunov, Hague, Cardman and Wilson)
Hague has already spent 203 days in space and this will be her third launch and second mission to the ISS, NASA said.
He also completed a development rotation with the Department of Defense’s Space Force, where he served as director of test and evaluation from 2020 to 2022, before returning to NASA, where he worked on the Boeing Starliner Program.
For Gorbunov, on the other hand, this will be his first trip into space.
Once the pair arrive at the ISS, they will become members of the Expedition 72 crew, where they will join Wilmore and Williams, among others, to conduct scientific research and maintenance activities, NASA said.
Wilmore and Williams were trapped on the ISS because their Boeing spacecraft was faulty, and several attempts to bring them home also failed, including considering sending them home on the same ship that stranded them.
Wilmore and Williams were trapped on the International Space Station because their Boeing spacecraft had a fault, and several attempts to bring them home failed as well, including considering sending them home on the same ship that stranded them. (Pictured: a SpaceX spacecraft)
A complete timeline of Boeing’s Starliner program, from the announcement of its big contact to the incident that left two astronauts stranded aboard the ISS
Ultimately, NASA decided that the risk of a fatal accident was too high to bring astronauts home on Starliner.
Boeing officials cooperated with the decision, but did not necessarily agree with it.
‘For their part, Boeing engineers believe that the capsule is completely safe and could easily bring the crew home safely if necessary.’
‘NASA looked at all the same test data but decided, ‘We just don’t have enough certainty.’
The impact of this decision on NASA’s relationship with Boeing remains to be seen.
