CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. (AP) 鈥� The two astronauts since June welcomed their new ride home with Sunday鈥檚 arrival of a SpaceX capsule.
SpaceX on Saturday with a downsized crew of two astronauts and two empty seats reserved for , who will return next year. The Dragon capsule docked in darkness high over Botswana as the two craft soared 260 miles (420 kilometers) above Earth.
NASA switched Wilmore and Williams to SpaceX following concerns over the safety of their capsule. It was the first Starliner test flight with a crew, and NASA decided the thruster failures and helium leaks that cropped up after liftoff were too serious and poorly understood to risk the test pilots鈥� return. So Starliner returned to Earth empty earlier this month.
The Dragon carrying NASA鈥檚 Nick Hague and the Russian Space Agency鈥檚 Alexander Gorbunov will remain at the space station until February, turning what should have been a weeklong trip for Wilmore and Williams into a mission lasting more than eight months.
Two NASA astronauts were pulled from the mission to make room for Wilmore and Williams on the return leg.
NASA likes to replace its station crews every six months or so. SpaceX has provided the taxi service since the company鈥檚 first astronaut flight in 2020. NASA also hired Boeing for ferry flights after the space shuttles were retired, but flawed software and other Starliner issues led to years of delays and more than $1 billion in repairs.
Starliner inspections are underway at NASA鈥檚 Kennedy Space Center, with post-flight reviews of data set to begin this week.
鈥淲e鈥檙e a long way from saying, 鈥楬ey, we鈥檙e writing off Boeing,鈥欌�� NASA鈥檚 associate administrator Jim Free said at a pre-launch briefing.
The arrival of two fresh astronauts means the four who have been up there since March can now return to Earth in their own SpaceX capsule in just over a week. Their stay was extended a month because of the Starliner turmoil.
Although Saturday's liftoff went well, SpaceX said the rocket's spent upper stage ended up outside its targeted impact zone in the Pacific because of a bad engine firing. The company has halted all Falcon launches until it figures out what went wrong.
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Marcia Dunn, The Associated Press
