Home At Last: ‘Stranded’ NASA Astronauts Safely Returns To Earth

Four NASA astronauts eventually made their way back to Earth on Tuesday after an unplanned nine-month space voyage, capping a mission that garnered international interest and turned into a political hot spot.

Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams, together with fellow American Nick Hague and Russian cosmonaut Aleksandr Gorbunov, were on board a SpaceX Crew Dragon spaceship that rocketed through the stratosphere before deploying parachutes for a soft splashdown off the coast of Florida at 5:57 p.m. (2157 GMT).

As the gumdrop-shaped spacecraft, named Freedom, bobbed smoothly on the waves under a clear, sunny sky, ground crews cheered. Freedom had been burned from enduring temperatures as high as 3,500 degrees Fahrenheit (2,000 degrees Celsius) during re-entry.

“What a ride — I see a capsule full of grins,” said Hague.

A joyful pod of dolphins appeared as an unexpected escort as swift boats hurried to the capsule for preliminary safety inspections. As teams unlocked the hatch, the astronauts were assisted onto mobility aids one by one while displaying thumbs-up gestures and waving.

After that, they will take a helicopter to Houston, where they will start a physical rehabilitation program and meet their families in a day or two.

“PROMISE MADE, PROMISE KEPT,” the White House posted on X, repeating a contentious claim that President Donald Trump’s administration had accelerated the recovery timeline.

The quartet left the International Space Station early Sunday, beginning their 17-hour journey home after final farewells and hugs with the remaining crew.

Wilmore and Williams, both ex-Navy pilots and veterans of two prior space missions, flew to the orbital lab in June last year, on what was supposed to be a days-long roundtrip to test out Boeing’s Starliner on its first crewed flight.

However, propulsion issues rendered the spacecraft unfit for their return, forcing it to return empty. They were subsequently reassigned to NASA’s SpaceX Crew-9 mission, which arrived at the ISS last September with a reduced crew of two — rather than the usual four — to accommodate the pair, who had become widely referred to as the “stranded” astronauts.

With Crew-10 docking Sunday, Crew-9 was finally cleared to depart. Wilmore and Williams’ 286-day stay exceeds the typical six-month ISS rotation but ranks sixth among US records. Frank Rubio holds the longest single-mission U.S. stay at 371 days, while Russian cosmonaut Valeri Polyakov retains the world record at 437 days.

Despite the challenges of prolonged spaceflight — including muscle and bone loss, vision issues, and balance readjustment — experts say their nine-month stay is manageable in terms of health risks.

However, the unexpected nature of their extended mission, initially without sufficient supplies, sparked public sympathy.

“If you found out you went to work today and were going to be stuck in your office for the next nine months, you might have a panic attack,” Joseph Keebler, a psychologist at Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University, told AFP.

“These individuals have shown unbelievable resilience.”

Source: AP

NASA astronaut Butch Wilmore is helped out of a SpaceX Dragon spacecraft onboard the SpaceX recovery ship Megan.