Many of us have been stuck in places without a quick way to get home. If you’ve ever had to bunk down in an airport overnight after a cancelled flight, you know how desperately you just want to get home. But what if you were literally lost in space with no rocket to book a ride on?
American astronauts Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams aren’t actually lost. We know where they are, it’s just that where they are is low-earth orbit in outer space. The International Space Station is their precise address. Like the crew and passengers on The Minnow from Gilligan’s Island, Wilmore and Williams were expecting a short trip but ended up with a “vacation” that has no definite end in sight.
The two rocketed to the ISS in June of 2024 for what was supposed to be an eight-day mission. But Boeing’s troubled Starliner craft (does the company have any craft today that aren’t troubled?) broke down and NASA decided it was too risky to put humans on the ship for a ride back down to earth. Among other problems, the large capsule’s thrusters malfunctioned and the spaceship has been leaking helium.
Boeing competitor SpaceX, owned by Elon Musk, also produces space capsules to transport astronauts up and down, and the company is a NASA contractor like Boeing. For the past eight months Musk has made it clear that he would be happy to send the Crew Dragon capsule up to rescue the stranded Americans, but for some reason that has not happened.
We may know, now, what that reason was. Wait for it because you’re going to be shocked: Butch Wilmore said Musk’s offer was “rebuffed” by the Biden White House. That’s in keeping with a Democratic administration that doesn’t seem to care about human lives enough to plan a military withdrawal without subjecting U.S. troops to deadly terrorist attacks.
Musk himself is confirming this, stating on X/Twitter that the Biden White House “refused to allow it.” Now, President Trump has given the go-ahead and the astronauts are expected to return by the end of March, 2025.
Let’s take a peak at the reaction online:
This one seems likely:
“Cat Ryan” asks good questions:
