NASA astronauts who are still in space hit out at ‘narrative’ as they set the record straight

The pair of NASA astronauts who are still in space have spoken out over a 'narrative' as they set the record straight on the situation.

Sunita 'Suni' Williams and Barry 'Butch' Wilmore docked their Boeing Starliner onto the International Space Station (ISS) last summer, unaware that they'd be trapped in the ship for a further eight months following a bout of technical faults.

According to the BBC, a number of issues, including fuel leaks, helium leaks and five dead manoeuvring thrusters, affected the spacecraft's expendable propulsion system - this would have been used to push the capsule away from the ISS and towards Earth.

Several return missions were planned and subsequently cancelled by NASA in the weeks that followed, prompting the firm to reach out to representatives at SpaceX.

Williams and Wilmore have since assured the public they weren't stranded on the International Space Station - nor were they weren’t abandoned following claims made by President Donald Trump and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk that they were 'stranded' by the Joe Biden administration.

Taking to X late last month (28 January), the Tesla CEO penned: "The @POTUS has asked @SpaceX to bring home the 2 astronauts stranded on the @Space_Station as soon as possible. We will do so.

"Terrible that the Biden administration left them there so long."

Trump echoed such sentiments, claiming on Truth Social that the pair were 'virtually abandoned in space by the Biden Administration'.

NASA astronauts Sunita Williams and Barry Wilmore have been in space since last June (MIGUEL J. RODRIGUEZ CARRILLO / Contributor / Getty Images)

Speaking in an interview with CNN’s Anderson Cooper on Thursday (13 February), Wilmore explained: "That’s been the rhetoric. That’s been the narrative from day one: stranded, abandoned, stuck - and I get it. We both get it.

"But that is, again, not what our human spaceflight program is about. We don’t feel abandoned, we don’t feel stuck, we don’t feel stranded."

Wilmore then urged: "If you’ll help us change the rhetoric, help us change the narrative. Let’s change it to 'prepared and committed'.

"That’s what we prefer."

Williams added: "Butch and I knew this was a test flight.

"We knew that we would probably find some things (wrong with Starliner) and we found some stuff, and so that was not a surprise."

Thankfully, however, just last week, the Mail reported that NASA has brought forward SpaceX's rescue mission, with the astronauts now scheduled to be home around this time next month (19 March).

The @POTUS has asked @SpaceX to bring home the 2 astronauts stranded on the @Space_Station as soon as possible. We will do so.

Terrible that the Biden administration left them there so long.

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) January 28, 2025

This is two weeks earlier than the initial estimated return - early April.

By this new date, however, the pair would have remained in space for a staggering 287 days.

Citing a report from Ars Technica, NASA and SpaceX are supposedly working to resolve the issue with C213 Dragon, which was initially scheduled to launch in February, but was delayed due to what is believed to be battery problems.

According to the source, SpaceX's Endurance ship will be reused to swap out the crew and allow the two to hitch a ride back to Earth.

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