In June, two American astronauts set off on an eight-day mission into space. But… oops! A major technical problem is still preventing them from returning home today. And their eight-day mission will last… eight months! Let me explain.
What happened?
Does this topic mean anything to you? Normal! We talked about it in this section in July!
Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams are American NASA astronauts. On June 5, they blasted off to the International Space Station (ISS), a laboratory located in space. To get there, they were aboard a brand new space capsule: StarlinerThis trip was to test this ship, created by the Boeing company.
Their stay at the ISS was to last about a week. As for the outward journey, they were to return to our planet in Starliner. The capsule, however, encountered several problems in mid-flight. It was therefore impossible to take the same ship for the return trip. It was therefore postponed, then postponed… then postponed again.
Hello Earth?
Last Saturday, NASA told reporters that Butch and Suni will ultimately stay on the ISS for a total of eight months. Their return flight is scheduled for February!
And we forget Starlinertheir test ship that didn’t quite pass the test. NASA engineers did a lot of analysis to understand its technical problems. They hoped to fix them and use the device to bring the astronauts back to Earth. But, as a safety precaution, another ship will take care of it.
It is finally a ship from SpaceX, a company specializing in spaceflight, that will bring them home. This device was already supposed to go into space in February, with four astronauts on board. Finally, there will only be two, in order to bring back our stranded travelers!
While we’re here!
I can assure you that even though they will be spending the holidays in space, the two Americans are not alone, far from it. Seven other astronauts from other countries are living with them on the ISS. And while they are in this large space laboratory, they will take advantage of it to conduct some experiments for NASA, to maintain the station and maybe even to go out into space!
Camille Lopez
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