Sunita-Williams: The date of when Sunita Williams and her colleague Barry Wilmore, who are stuck on the International Space Station, will return to Earth has not been decided yet. The US space agency NASA said that Sunita Williams and Barry Wilmore have been stuck in space since June. Both astronauts reached the International Space Station on June 5 aboard the Boeing Starliner commercial spacecraft. Their mission in space was only for 10 days, but due to a malfunction in the Starliner, they have been stuck in space for the last one and a half months. Helium gas was leaking from five places in the Starliner, due to which the reaction control system of the spacecraft stopped working.
Due to a malfunction in the Starliner, Sunita and Wilmore’s stay on the space station has been extended for 50 days. Despite all efforts, NASA and Boeing are still unable to decide the date of return home. Steve Stich, manager of NASA’s Commercial Crew Program, said in a press conference on Thursday, “Even today we do not have any major announcement to tell the date of return.” “We are making good progress, but right now we are not fully ready to bring the Starliner back to Earth.”
The return date will be decided after the test
NASA officials have already said that the spacecraft has enough fuel to stay in orbit until mid-August. Stich said that NASA and Boeing can test the spacecraft as early as next week. After this test, the date of return of the passengers will be decided.
Astronauts are completely safe: NASA
NASA officials said that for now, the astronauts are completely safe in space. Its return was delayed so that more and more data could be collected about the problem in the thrusters. Boeing Vice President and the company’s commercial crew program manager Mark Nappe said that such things have happened before as well. For the last several weeks, efforts are being made to understand the leakage of helium and the anomalies caused by it in the thrusters.
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