NASA Astronauts Stranded Since June to Return on SpaceX Capsule March 16

NASA astronauts Butch Wilmore and Sunita Williams, who arrived at the International Space Station (ISS) on June 6, 2024, for an eight-day mission, have been stranded for over nine months due to technical issues with Boeing's Starliner spacecraft. Their return to Earth is now scheduled for Sunday, March 16, 2025. The return process begins with the launch of the Crew-10 mission aboard a SpaceX Dragon capsule, named Endurance, on March 12 at 7:48 p.m. ET from Kennedy Space Center, Florida. The new crew, consisting of NASA astronauts Anne McClain and Nichole Ayers, Japanese astronaut Takuya Onishi, and Russian cosmonaut Kirill Peskov, is expected to dock with the ISS on March 13. This will allow Wilmore and Williams, along with two Crew-9 members, Nick Hague and Aleksandr Gorbounov, to return to Earth. The SpaceX Dragon capsule carrying the returning astronauts is expected to depart the ISS on March 16, with splashdown planned off the Florida coast, weather permitting. While their stay was prolonged, Wilmore and Williams have not surpassed the record of 371 days in space set by astronaut Frank Rubio in 2023.