Just imagine that one of your beloved family members sets out in a trip supposed to last around 8 days but it turns out it may end up lasting as much as eight MONTHS.
It’s hard to imagine that someone would react in a very stoic way about it – especially if the unimaginable delay is caused by the by now legendary Boeing technical troubles.
But that’s exactly what’s happening with the families of astronauts Suni Williams and Butch Wilmore, who are finally speaking out about their predicament as their family members remain stranded in space.
They flew out in the maiden Boeing Starliner voyage on June 5, but thruster failures and helium leaks prompted NASA to postpone the pair’s return to Earth by months.
E! reported:
“‘You know, we sort of don’t expect him until February’, Butch’s wife Deanna Wilmore told Knoxville, Tenn. TV station WVLT in a recent remote interview. ‘February or March’ […] You just sort of have to roll with it and expect the unexpected.
[…] Suni’s husband, Michael Williams, said last week that he didn’t think she was disappointed to wind up spending more time at the space station, telling The Wall Street Journal, ‘That’s her happy place’.”
NASA’s chief astronaut Joe Acaba: “If Butch and Suni do not come home on Starliner and they are kept aboard the station, they will have about eight months on orbit.[…] We have done multiple successful, long duration missions, even up to a year.”
The duo will either carry out repairs on the plagued Starliner or hitch a ride on SpaceX’s Crew Dragon.
“While the rival group’s scheduled mission to launch four astronauts to the ISS on Aug. 18 was postponed to Sept. 24[…], joining its return flight to Earth could mean Butch and Suni would be back with their families before the new year.”
They now are part of the seven-person space station U.S. and Russian crew.
Time reported:
“A SpaceX Crew Dragon spacecraft, intended to carry four people for a five-month station stay beginning in September, [could} instead be launched with just a crew of two, leaving the other two seats empty to bring Williams and Wilmore home in February.”
The acceptable probability of not making it home alive is 1 in 270.
“‘We still believe in Starliner’s capability and its flight rationale’, Boeing said in an Aug. 7 statement after that possible plan was announced.
While NASA is not so confident, they are putting a brace face.
‘I spoke to both of them in the last day or so’, said Acaba. ‘They have fully integrated into the … crew. But, you know, we are humans, and this is hard on crew members and their families, and we take that into account’. Still, Acaba adds, there is only so much accommodation Wilmore and Williams will get in the added months they may be facing aloft: ‘They will do what we ask them to do; that’s their job as astronauts’.”
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