NASA astronauts Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams made their long-awaited return to Earth on Tuesday, bringing an end to a mission that had originally started with a failed test flight over nine months ago, according to the Associated Press.
Their journey back home was aboard a different SpaceX capsule, which safely splashed down in the Gulf of Mexico earlier this evening, just hours after departing the International Space Station. The landing took place off the coast of Tallahassee, Florida.
Initially expected to be in space for just a few days, Wilmore and Williams ended up spending a staggering 286 days in orbit—an extension of 278 days beyond their original plan. Over the course of their mission, they circled the Earth 4,576 times and covered an astonishing 195 million miles (X million kilometers) before finally touching down.
“SpaceX welcomes you back,” came the message from Mission Control in California as their capsule made a safe return.
While history has seen astronauts endure longer spaceflights, none have faced such an unpredictable mission or an extension of this magnitude.
The situation took an unusual twist in late January when former President Donald Trump publicly urged Elon Musk to hasten the astronauts’ return, criticizing the Biden administration for the prolonged delay. Since SpaceX’s new crew capsule wasn’t yet flight-ready, the company opted to send up a previously used one, which helped speed up the timeline by several weeks.
About The Author
