Astronauts Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams were stuck in space for more than 2 months. The Boeing’s Starliner spaceship was launched last June, and the astronauts were only expected to be in space for a week or two. But unexpected issues occurred as the Starliner travelled to the orbiting outpost that caused it to stay in space longer.
“If Butch and Suni do not come home on Starliner and they are kept aboard the station, they will have about eight months on orbit. We have done multiple successful long duration missions, even up to a year,” said NASA Chief Astronaut Joe Acaba.
NASA officials said that they are doing their best, analyzing everything, from technical experts to engineers. With the statement of the associate administrator of NASA’s Space Operations Mission Directorate Ken Bowersox, said that they will complete their analysis next week.
“Around the end of next week, potentially beginning of the following week,” said Ken Bowersox.
NASA is deciding whether they will use the SpaceX’s Dragon capsule to fly and bring the two astronauts’ home, together with the Starliner or NASA will alter their original plan of sending two astronauts instead of four so they can all come back home, and the new astronauts will not be staying for six months in space. In that case, the Starliner capsule will return to Earth without a crew, according to NASA.