'Bring her back to Earth, Good luck': How Sunita Williams said 'goodbye' to Boeing Starliner as it departed ISS
Boeing Starliner returned to Earth, empty from the International Space Station leaving its crew members, Indian-origin astronaut Sunita Williams and her co-passenger Butch Wilmore, behind. They are not expected to return to Earth before February 2025 on a SpaceX Crew Dragon.
More than two months after it blasted off to space from the Space Launch Complex 41 of the Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida on 5 June, the Boeing Starliner capsule is back on Earth, safely, albeit without its two-member crew.
The #Starliner spacecraft is back on Earth.
¡ª NASA Commercial Crew (@Commercial_Crew) September 7, 2024
At 12:01am ET Sept. 7, @BoeingSpace¡¯s uncrewed Starliner spacecraft landed in White Sands Space Harbor, New Mexico. pic.twitter.com/vTYvgPONVc
Boeing Starliner returns, without crew
The troubled experimental space mission returned to Earth, empty from the International Space Station (ISS), leaving its crew members, Indian-origin astronaut Sunita Williams and her co-passenger Butch Wilmore, behind.
The return flight took six hours, with the Starliner parachuting into the New Mexico desert on Friday night.
Spot #Starliner on its way back to Earth! After the spacecraft undocks from the @Space_Station on Sept. 6, it will soar through Earth's skies before landing in New Mexico. If you're on the visibility path (all times MT) and skies are clear, look up and you might see it. pic.twitter.com/k5OfnZZNnb
¡ª NASA (@NASA) September 6, 2024
What Sunita Williams said
¡°You guys, it's time to bring Calypso home. We have your backs, and you¡¯ve got this. Bring her back to Earth. Good luck,¡± Williams told Boeing¡¯s Mission Control before Starliner undocked from the ISS for its unmanned journey to Earth.
Credit: Reuters
NASA took the unusual step of initially delaying and later abandoning their return mission onboard the Boeing Starliner, as it was deemed too risky, given the experimental craft's long list of technical issues.
When will Sunita Williams return
This has left Williams and Wilmore, who were on what was supposed to be an eight-day mission, stranded on the ISS for eight months.
They are not expected to return to Earth before February 2025 on a SpaceX Crew Dragon.
CREDIT: PTI
New roles for Williams and Wilmore
With the Boeing Starliner departing the ISS, Williams and Wilmore have now become full-time station crew members along with the seven others on board the ISS.
Another change the duo underwent was their spacesuits. Williams and Wilmore will no longer be wearing the blue spacesuits they wore at the start of the mission. Instead, they will have to switch to the spacesuits of the Crew Dragon. This is because the spacesuits of Starliner are incompatible with SpaceX Crew Dragon.
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Bobins Abraham is the Assistant News Editor at Indiatimes. He has more than twelve years of experience in TV and digital journalism. An avid student of history and geopolitics, he is a conservationist and environmentalist at heart. He writes on environment, sustainability, human-animal conflict and more.
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