SpaceX Docks At ISS To Take Stranded Astronauts Home Next Year

AFP/APP

Washington: The SpaceX crew set to return two astronauts stranded on the International Space Station (ISS) successfully docked with the orbiting lab on Sunday, as shown in a live stream of the mission.

The Falcon 9 rocket launched from Cape Canaveral, Florida, at 1:17 PM (1717 GMT) on Saturday, and the Crew-9 mission’s Dragon spacecraft made contact with the ISS at 5:30 PM Sunday.

After docking, NASA astronaut Nick Hague and Russian cosmonaut Alexander Gorbunov joined the station crew just after 7:00 PM, warmly greeting their colleagues in microgravity.

“Welcome to our new compadres from Dragon Freedom,” said station commander Suni Williams, one of the two astronauts who had been stranded. She added, “Alex, welcome to the International Space Station, and Nick, welcome back home.”

When Hague and Gorbunov return from the ISS in February, they will bring back space veterans Williams and Butch Wilmore, whose stay was extended due to issues with their Boeing-designed Starliner spacecraft.

The newly developed Starliner, which was on its first crewed flight, delivered Wilmore and Williams to the ISS in June. Initially, their mission was to last only eight days, but complications with the Starliner’s propulsion system prompted NASA to reconsider their plans.

After extensive testing to assess the Starliner’s reliability, NASA decided to return the spacecraft to Earth without its crew and instead rely on SpaceX’s Crew-9 mission to bring the two stranded astronauts home.

SpaceX, founded by billionaire Elon Musk, regularly conducts crew rotation missions to the ISS every six months. The launch of Crew-9 had been postponed from mid-August to late September to allow NASA experts more time to evaluate the Starliner. The schedule was further delayed due to Hurricane Helene, which impacted Florida.

In total, Hague and Gorbunov will spend about five months on the ISS, while Wilmore and Williams will have been there for eight months. Crew-9 is expected to carry out around 200 scientific experiments during their time on the station.