NASA astronauts Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams splashed down off the Florida coast Tuesday evening, finally rescued after an unplanned 286-day odyssey in space.
The SpaceX Dragon capsule touched down in the Gulf of America at 5:57 pm ET near Tallahassee, where a pod of dolphins curiously circled the spacecraft while recovery teams raced to retrieve the returning astronauts. Wilmore and Williams were joined by American astronaut Nick Hague and Russian cosmonaut Aleksandr Gorbunov, who comprised the rest of the Crew-9 mission.
“It is awesome to have Crew-9 home. Just a beautiful landing,” said Joel Montalbano of NASA’s Space Operations Mission Directorate.
What began as an eight-day test mission of Boeing’s troubled Starliner spacecraft last June turned into a nine-month ordeal when the capsule developed serious technical problems almost immediately after reaching the International Space Station.
Five of Starliner’s 28 thrusters failed during the journey to the ISS, and the craft began leaking helium — issues that came on top of technical problems experienced before and during launch. By June 18, NASA knew the astronauts were trapped.
“It’s never easy. Spaceflight is always dynamic,” said Steve Stich of NASA’s Commercial Crew Program.
After months of troubleshooting, NASA made the difficult decision in August to send the Starliner back to Earth empty, determining it was too risky for Williams and Wilmore to return in the malfunctioning spacecraft. Instead, the astronauts would have to wait for a ride home on a SpaceX Dragon capsule.
Their wait was extended when delays hit the Crew-10 mission that was supposed to replace them at the station. The Crew-10 launch was pushed back when SpaceX needed to refurbish an older capsule, finally arriving at the ISS on March 16 after launching two days earlier.
The extended mission raised concerns about the astronauts’ health. In November, unnamed NASA sources told media outlets that Williams appeared “gaunt” and had lost considerable weight, describing her as “skin and bones.” The same sources claimed NASA was also monitoring Wilmore’s weight loss. Williams later denied these reports in a NASA video, claiming she had actually gained muscle during her stay.
As their mission dragged on, the astronauts’ predicament became a political flashpoint. After taking office in January, President Donald Trump publicly tasked SpaceX founder Elon Musk with rescuing the astronauts and bringing them home.
“I have just asked Elon Musk and @SpaceX to ‘go get’ the 2 brave astronauts who have been virtually abandoned in space by the Biden Administration,” Trump posted on social media.
In an interview with Sean Hannity on Tuesday, Musk claimed SpaceX had offered to return the astronauts months earlier.
“We definitely offered to return the astronauts earlier. There’s no question about that,” Musk said. “SpaceX could have brought the astronauts back after a few months at most, and we made that offer to the Biden administration. It was rejected for political reasons, and that’s just a fact.”
NASA officials acknowledged the Trump administration’s role in the rescue mission.
NASA acting Administrator Janet Petro released a statement saying, “Per President Trump’s direction, NASA and SpaceX worked diligently to pull the schedule a month earlier.”
When asked about claims that the Biden administration had political reasons for delaying the astronauts’ return, Montalbano said, “I wasn’t involved in any conversations with the previous administration. It was clear we had a request from the current administration, and the results you saw are what we saw today.”
After being pulled from the water, Williams and Wilmore smiled and waved as they took their first breaths of fresh air in over nine months. Following standard procedure for long-duration space travelers, they were placed on stretchers to accommodate bodies weakened by extended exposure to microgravity.
The astronauts will undergo several days of medical evaluations at NASA’s Johnson Space Center in Houston before finally reuniting with their families.
“Overall, I would say it was a really clean undocking, re-entry and landing. The Dragon vehicle performed extremely well,” said Stich.
The most beautiful footage you’ll see today! All four astronauts have safely returned to Earth. ❤️ pic.twitter.com/y9hciZQvkO
— DogeDesigner (@cb_doge) March 18, 2025