My last conversation with Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams, the astronauts now stranded on the International Space Station (ISS), was on May 1, 2024. They were then in pre-flight medical quarantine at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida, preparing for their May 6 launch. The mission was planned to be a swift eight-day test flight of Boeing’s new Starliner spacecraft to the ISS. Both astronauts had prior experience on the station and were excited about this mission, despite its short duration. The Starliner can be reused, and the quicker they returned to Earth, the sooner the spacecraft could be prepared for another flight.
“We want to go and get back as quickly as possible so they [can] turn our spacecraft around and also take all those lessons learned and incorporate it into the next Starliner,” Williams told me.
The schedule has drastically changed. The original May 6 launch was cancelled due to a leaky valve in the upper stage of their Atlas V rocket. When Williams and Wilmore finally launched on June 5, they encountered further problems, including thruster malfunctions and leaks in the gaseous helium that pressurizes them. Their intended eight-day stay, originally scheduled to end on June 13, has been extended to over two months as Boeing and NASA work to resolve the thruster issues and assess the Starliner’s safety for return.
On Aug. 7, the possibility arose that the Starliner might not be safe for their return. Williams’ and Wilmore’s short stay might be extended to eight months, meaning they wouldn’t return until February. Instead of using the Starliner for their return, NASA is considering sending it back empty. A SpaceX Crew Dragon spacecraft, meant to carry four astronauts for a five-month station stay starting in September, could be launched with only two astronauts, leaving the other two seats empty for Williams and Wilmore’s return next year.
So how are the astronauts adapting to a crowded space station, normally home to six or seven, now accommodating nine? Last month, after 35 days in space, Wilmore and Williams remained optimistic.
“We are having a great time here on ISS,” said Williams during a July 10 press conference from orbit. “Butch and I have been up here before and it feels like coming home. So yeah, it’s great to be here.”
We haven’t received any further updates from the astronauts, but the situation must be getting challenging. One issue is sleep. The space station has phone booth-sized privacy pods with sleeping bags, storage for snacks and personal items, and two laptop computers. While not soundproof, astronauts can wear headphones to sleep.
However, with only half a dozen pods, three astronauts are left without dedicated sleeping areas. One astronaut already on the station and Williams share a less comfortable sleep chamber called a CASA (Crew Alternate Sleep Accommodation) in the space station’s Columbus module, built by the European Space Agency. Wilmore has to make do with a sleeping bag in the Japanese Space Agency’s Kibo module.
“Butch is going to have to rough it a little bit,” Williams told me with a laugh back in May, when Wilmore faced the prospect of only eight days of such exposed sleeping.
The astronauts’ work schedule has also undergone significant changes over the past two months. They were initially supposed to spend most of their eight days working in the Starliner, checking its communications, life support, power, and other systems. But having completed that checklist, they have been assisting the rest of the crew with science experiments and maintenance tasks, including the repair of a urine processing pump.
Like the rest of the crew, Williams and Wilmore follow a busy schedule, dictated by a computer tablet that lists their daily chores, breaks, and meal intervals in 15-minute increments. A red marker moves through the schedule in real time, indicating their progress.
“Some days you feel like you’re just chasing the red line,” astronaut Nicole Stott, a space station veteran, told me during a conversation in 2017.
For their first two months in space, Wilmore and Williams had limited changes of clothing, as they were not packed for a months-long stay. Astronauts don’t do laundry in space; they simply dispose of clothes and change into fresh ones periodically. Last week, a Cygnus resupply vehicle, built by Northrop Grumman, arrived carrying 8,200 lbs. of hardware, fresh food like fruits and vegetables, and fresh clothes for the Starliner crew.
The first flight of a new crewed American spacecraft has happened only five times before, with the maiden voyages of the Mercury, Gemini, Apollo, space shuttle Columbia, and Dragon ships. Wilmore and Williams have joined the ranks of NASA giants like Alan Shepard, Gus Grissom, John Young, and Wally Schirra, who embarked on those first test flights.
“Every now and then, you have to stop and reflect and see your place and understand that, ‘Wow, this is really an honor,’” Williams told me in May. “It’s very humbling to be following the footsteps of the folks who have gone before.”
Those earlier astronauts, of course, flew home in the same spacecraft that took them to space. If Boeing can’t replicate that this time, it will be the company, not just the astronauts, that faces humility.
