Here we go again—Boeing’s Starliner coughs up a helium leak and some dodgy thrusters, and suddenly the media’s got its collective knickers in a twist, painting astronauts Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams as castaways on some cosmic Gilligan’s Island.
Launched June 5, 2024, for what was supposed to be a breezy eight-day capsule checkout to the ISS, but these two got the short end of Boeing’s engineering stick when their spacecraft leaks sucked out NASA’s collective confidence in the vehicle. So, by September 6, Starliner slunk back to Earth, unmanned and unloved, leaving our intrepid duo to bunk with Expedition 72 for a nine-month “extended stay.” Stranded! Trapped! Cue the violins and the breathless headlines—except, hold up, you social media warriors, they weren’t exactly sending SOS signals with a cracked coconut radio.
Enter SpaceX, “Fanboys” favorite knight in shining aluminum. Crew-9, with Nick Hague and Aleksandr Gorbunov, blasted off September 28, 2024, sporting two empty seats on their trusty Dragon like it was no big deal—because it wasn’t. Although, I think the real story is what ever happened to Zena Cardman and Stephanie Wilson who seem lost to history after getting the NASA boot.
Anyways, after months of sciencing it up alongside the ISS crew, Wilmore and Williams are hitching a ride home with Crew-9, expecting to touch down later this month. Meanwhile, Crew-10—Anne McClain, Nichole Ayers, Takuya Onishi, and Kirill Peskov—will launch no earlier than March 14, for a six-month shift of experiencing 16 sunrises and sunset from orbit every 24 hours. Tough work. Oh, but the headlines! “SpaceX Saves the Day!” “Rescue Mission Underway!” Give me a break. This isn’t Apollo 13; it’s a crew swap with a side of Boeing booboos.
Let’s talk economics, you clickbait vultures, since you love a juicy angle. What, did you think NASA should’ve scrambled a Falcon9 “turn-and-burn” launch just to yank two astronauts out of orbit? A Falcon 9 launch to the ISS runs about $250 million a pop—chump change for Elon, maybe, but not when Crew Dragon was already on deck as a backup. Sending an extraneous unwarranted mission to retrieve Wilmore and Williams would’ve been like chartering a private jet to pick up your cousin from the airport instead of waiting for their delayed Southwest flight. They were fine up there. Integrated into ISS ops, not twiddling their thumbs. Crew-10’s slight delay from February to March? Scrubs happen. SpaceX dotting i’s and crossing t’s, not some frantic scramble to play savior. NASA’s been crystal clear: no one was “stranded.” Backup plans exist for a reason, not for your melodramatic thumbnails.
Location: Bldg. 8, Room 183 – Photo Studio
Subject: Official USCV Crew-9 Crew Portrait with Zena Cardman, Nick Hague, Stephanie Wilson and Aleksandr Gorbunov
Photo Credit: NASA / BILL STAFFORD and ROBERT MARKOWITZ
Graphic: Boeing Space
So, to the teleprompt reading and selfie-stick journalist churning out “Rescue of the Century” drivel for likes and retweets—chill. This was a glitch, a pivot, a routine rotation with a dash of corporate embarrassment for Boeing. SpaceX didn’t swoop in with capes; they just did their job. Wilmore and Williams weren’t damsels in distress; they were pros clocking overtime. Stop hyping a routine “Tuesday glitch” into a blockbuster disaster movie. The ISS isn’t a deserted island—it’s a workplace. Take your sensationalism and shove it—preferably out an airlock.
