{"id":4075,"date":"2024-09-13T23:00:33","date_gmt":"2024-09-13T23:00:33","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/tradetrovex.com\/index.php\/2024\/09\/13\/stranded-astronauts-say-space-is-happy-place-but-admit-tough-times\/"},"modified":"2024-09-13T23:00:33","modified_gmt":"2024-09-13T23:00:33","slug":"stranded-astronauts-say-space-is-happy-place-but-admit-tough-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/tradetrovex.com\/index.php\/2024\/09\/13\/stranded-astronauts-say-space-is-happy-place-but-admit-tough-times\/","title":{"rendered":"Stranded astronauts say space is \u2018happy place\u2019 \u2013 but admit \u2018tough times\u2019"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Two astronauts who are set to be stuck in space for eight months have said the International Space Station is now their \u201chappy place\u201d but admitted to \u201ctough times\u201d.<\/p>\n<p>Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams said in a press conference on Friday that it was hard to watch their Boeing Starliner <strong>capsule return to Earth <\/strong>without them last week \u2013 but said they do not feel let down by the company.<\/p>\n<div class=\"sdc-site-outbrain sdc-site-outbrain--AR_6\">    <\/div>\n<p>The pair expected to be in space for eight days but will <strong>remain there until 2025<\/strong> after <strong>NASA<\/strong> determined the problem-plagued capsule posed too much risk for them to return to Earth.<\/p>\n<p>The two Starliner test pilots \u2013 both retired Navy captains and longtime NASA astronauts \u2013 will now be staying at the space station until late February.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThat\u2019s how it goes in this business,\u201d said Ms Williams, adding that \u201cyou have to turn the page and look at the next opportunity\u201d.<\/p>\n<div class=\"ad ad--teads\">        <\/div>\n<p>Mr Wilmore said: \u201cIt\u2019s been quite an evolution over the last three months, we\u2019ve been involved from the beginning through all the processes of assessing our spacecraft.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cAnd it was trying at times. There were some tough times all the way through.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Ms Williams said that the transition to station life was \u201cnot that hard\u201d since both had completed previous stints there.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThis is my happy place. I love being up here in space,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n<p>Mr Wilmore said he was \u201con board\u201d with \u201cchanges that need to be made\u201d at Boeing.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cObviously, when you have issues like we\u2019ve had, there\u2019s some changes that need to be made.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cBoeing\u2019s on board with that. We\u2019re all on board with that.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>He added: \u201cWhen you push the edge of the envelope again and you do things with spacecraft that have never been done before, just like Starliner, you\u2019re going to find some things.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The pair also said they will vote in November\u2019s <strong>US elections<\/strong>.<\/p>\n<p>Mr Wilmore and Ms Williams are now fully-fledged station crew members, chipping in on routine maintenance and experiments.<\/p>\n<p>They, along with seven others on board, welcomed a Soyuz spacecraft carrying two Russians and an American earlier this week, raising the station population to 12 \u2013 a near record.<\/p>\n<p>Ms Williams will soon take over as station commander.<\/p>\n<p>The pair will have to wait until next year for a <strong>SpaceX<\/strong> capsule to bring them back to Earth. That spacecraft is due to launch later this month with a reduced crew of two, with two empty seats for the stranded astronauts for the return leg.<\/p>\n<p>Mr Wilmore and Ms Williams also said they appreciated all the prayers and well wishes from Earth.<\/p>\n<p>Mr Wilmore revealed he will miss out on family milestones including his youngest daughter\u2019s final year of high school.<\/p>\n<p>Their Starliner capsule marked the first Boeing spaceflight with astronauts. It endured a series of thruster failures and helium leaks before arriving at the space station on 6 June.<\/p>\n<p>It landed safely in the New Mexico desert earlier this month, but Boeing\u2019s path forward in NASA\u2019s commercial crew programme remains uncertain.<\/p>\n<p>The space agency hired SpaceX and Boeing as an orbital taxi service a decade ago after the shuttles retired. SpaceX has been flying astronauts since 2020.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n<div>This post appeared first on sky.com<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Two astronauts who are set to be stuck in space for eight months have said&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":4076,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4075","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-tech-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/tradetrovex.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4075","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/tradetrovex.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/tradetrovex.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tradetrovex.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4075"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/tradetrovex.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4075\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tradetrovex.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4076"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/tradetrovex.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4075"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tradetrovex.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4075"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tradetrovex.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4075"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}