On Tuesday night, U.S. President Donald Trump and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk shared posts saying that SpaceX would “go get” two astronauts from the International Space Station (ISS) soon. This has raised some questions because NASA already has plans to bring the astronauts, Sunita “Suni” Williams and Barry “Butch” Wilmore, back home using a SpaceX capsule in March.
Right now, SpaceX is set to bring Williams and Wilmore back from the ISS. They have been living in space since early June after arriving on a Boeing Starliner capsule. Their mission was supposed to be just a week long, but the Starliner had some problems, so NASA decided to send it back to Earth without the astronauts. Instead, Williams and Wilmore will return on a future SpaceX capsule.
Because of this, they will end up staying at the ISS for about 10 months. NASA decided to include them in an upcoming SpaceX mission called Crew-9, which is scheduled to return in March. This mission was originally going to have four astronauts, but two seats were given to Williams and Wilmore.
Crew-9 is set to come back to Earth after another mission, Crew-10, launches and reaches the ISS to bring four new astronauts. Although Crew-9 was supposed to return next month, NASA pushed it back to March to give SpaceX more time to prepare the Crew-10 capsule.
It’s not clear if Trump and Musk’s comments mean Crew-9 will come back before Crew-10. NASA hasn’t replied to requests for more information yet.
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