Boeing’s Starliner spacecraft returned to Earth and landed in the US state of New Mexico on Friday (6), leaving behind the two astronauts it had taken to the International Space Station (ISS). The two will remain there until February 2025, when they are scheduled to return to the planet.
Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams were sent by NASA (the United States space agency) on the inaugural manned flight of Starliner, which aimed to carry out tests so that the spacecraft could become part of the agency’s Commercial Crew Program, which foresees periodic manned flights to the ISS using the vehicle.
However, the spacecraft experienced setbacks with helium leaks and thrusters that abruptly stopped working during the initial stage of its first flight. As a result, NASA made the decision to leave the pair on the ISS and rescue them with a SpaceX Crew Dragon capsule in February.
During this time, they took on typical tasks of the station’s official crew, such as conducting spacewalks outside the space station, maintaining the orbiting laboratory, and carrying out a tight schedule of scientific experiments.
Who are Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams?
Butch Wilmore, 61, is an astronaut and test pilot for NASA. A captain in the United States Navy, he was born in Tennessee, graduated as an electrical engineer and studied aircraft electrical systems for his master’s degree, and participated in combat missions in Iraq and Bosnia as part of the NATO (North Atlantic Treaty Organization) fleet.
He joined NASA in 2000, where he began a two-year training program and then served as a support worker for the team based at Cape Canaveral, Florida. He first went into space in 2009, on the STS-129 mission aboard the Atlantis shuttle, developed by the agency. Between 2014 and 2015, he spent 167 days in orbit working as a flight engineer and commander of a long mission on the ISS.
Suni Williams, 58 years old, was born in the US state of Ohio. She graduated in engineering from the Florida Institute of Technology and in physical education from the US Naval Academy.
He joined NASA in 1998, when he joined a team that offered preparatory courses for those who would carry out missions to the ISS, which included information on piloting, survival techniques and diving. Suni also worked in a collaboration between the North American agency and the Russian Space Agency on a mission to the international station and also participated in two other space missions, in 2006 and 2012.
See images of the International Space Station (ISS)
*With information from Giovana Christ, from CNN; and CNN International
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This content was originally published in Stranded in space: find out who the two astronauts who were left behind are on the CNN Brasil website.
Source: CNN Brasil
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