NASA shares major update on astronauts stranded in space as rescue mission is delayed
Two astronauts who are stranded up on the International Space Station will have to wait even longer for rescue.
You might have been following the story of NASA astronauts Barry ‘Butch’ Wilmore, 61, and Sunita ‘Suni’ Williams, 59, and their eight day mission which has left them in space a lot longer than they planned.
On 5 June they embarked on what ought to have been a mission to space that lasted little over a week, but a wrench was thrown into the works when technical faults occurred and left the pair of them stuck in space and waiting for a return trip.
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They had flown up to the ISS in Boeing's Starliner, but the spacecraft developed a number of faults on the way and it was decided that the astronauts would not make their scheduled return trip in it.
When the spacecraft returned to Earth it was decided that Wilmore and Williams would not be on board, and with the way crew handover works up in space they were stuck waiting for the next chance to rotate off the station.
While the astronauts had been due to come back from space by the end of February, NASA has now explained that there's some more bad news on the way for the duo.
NASA said that the rescue mission had been delayed by at least another month as SpaceX apparently needs more time to get their new Dragon capsule ready for launch.
Instead of going up to the International Space Station in February it will instead not be launching before March.
There are other capsules which could possibly be used, but in order to keep things all on schedule the plan is currently to stick with what's already happening.
"Fabrication, assembly, testing, and final integration of a new spacecraft is a painstaking endeavor that requires great attention to detail," NASA's Steve Sitch said of the delays.
"We appreciate the hard work by the SpaceX team to expand the Dragon fleet in support of our missions and the flexibility of the station programme and expedition crews as we work together to complete the new capsule’s readiness for flight."
While the duo of stranded astronauts face an even longer wait than expected there have been some concerns over their health.
Some people seeing photos of the pair had been worried that they were suffering from malnutrition, though NASA have said all of their astronauts regularly undergo health checks and the astronauts themselves have said they're in good health.
While some people might dream of going to space it's possible that these two would very much like to come back down to Earth.
Joe Harker