A long-awaited rocket with a replacement crew for two stranded NASA astronauts has finally launched to the International Space Station (ISS).
US astronauts Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams have been stuck on the ISS for nine months, having had their journey home repeatedly delayed.
Mission Crew-10 was initially scheduled to launch the replacement crew of four astronauts from Florida on Wednesday, but a last-minute issue with the rocket’s ground systems forced a delay.
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NASA said on Thursday that SpaceX, headed and founded by tech billionaire Elon Musk, had resolved the issue – flushing a suspected pocket of air out of a hydraulic clamp arm – and that the weather was 95% favourable for a Friday launch.
The crew is now expected to arrive at the ISS on Saturday night.
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Mr Wilmore and Ms Williams, who have been on the ISS since June 2024, originally planned to go to space for just eight days but got stuck on the station after their Boeing Starliner spacecraft started experiencing problems.
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The mission has become entangled in politics as Donald Trump and his adviser Elon Musk, who is also SpaceX’s CEO, claimed – without evidence – that former President Joe Biden left the astronauts on the station for political reasons.
NASA said the two astronauts have had to remain on the ISS to maintain its minimum staffing level.
by David Blevins, Sky correspondent in Washington
Picture the scene – two NASA astronauts hitch-hiking on the celestial highway.
That’s the impression created by the president of the United States.
Donald Trump has used evocative words like “abandoned” to describe their plight.
He claimed his predecessor, Joe Biden, had failed Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams.
The pair are still in the International Space Station, nine months after they arrived on an eight-day mission.
In a parallel universe moment in the Oval Office, the President said of the astronauts: “I hope they like each other… maybe they’ll love each other.”
Referencing pictures of Williams floating in space, he added: “I see the woman with the wild hair, good solid head of hair she’s got. There’s no kidding, there’s no games with her hair.”
But NASA refutes the President’s claim, emphasising it’s got nothing to do with politics.
Their prolonged mission is the result of technical issues with Boeing’s Starliner spacecraft.
Keen to get in on the drama, SpaceX CEO Elon Musk began talking about a “rescue mission”.
One small step into space has become one giant leap for political spin.
NASA brought forward the Crew-10 mission from 26 March, swapping a delayed SpaceX capsule for one that would be ready sooner.
Mr Trump and Mr Musk’s demand for an earlier return was an unusual intervention and put additional pressure on NASA’s preparation and safety process.
NASA’s commercial crew programme manager, Steve Stich, said SpaceX’s “rapid pace of operations” had required changes to some of the ways it verifies flight safety.
The agency had to address some “late-breaking” issues, NASA space operations chief Ken Bowersox told reporters, including investigating a fuel leak on a recent SpaceX Falcon 9 launch and deterioration of a coating on some of the Dragon crew capsule’s thrusters.
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