Sunita Williams

March 19, 2025 12:08 PM

Welcome back, Earth missed you: PM Modi hails Sunita Williams’ return

Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Wednesday hailed NASA astronaut Sunita Williams's return to Earth and said the achievement of Crew-9 astronauts “shows us what perseverance truly means.” In a post on X, PM Modi said, "Welcome back, #Crew9! The Earth missed you. Your journey has been a true test of grit, courage, and the boundless human spirit. Sunita Williams and the #Crew9 astronauts have once again shown us what perseverance truly means. Their unwavering determination in the face of the va...

March 19, 2025 9:49 AM

How does space travel affect astronaut health?

The human body was not built for spaceflight, with its microgravity conditions, exposure to high-energy radiation and other issues. As a result, trekking beyond the Earth's confines causes many physiological changes that affect an astronaut's health. Here is an explanation of some of the effects on human health caused by space travel. WHY IS SPACE TRAVEL TOUGH ON THE HUMAN BODY? The human body evolved over millions of years to function optimally in Earth's environment, which includes its grav...

March 19, 2025 9:04 AM

Sunita Williams’ home village in Gujarat celebrates her safe return with aarti and prayers

Joyous celebrations erupted in Jhulasan, the native village of NASA astronaut Sunita Williams, as villagers marked her safe return to Earth with traditional aarti and prayers on Wednesday. Williams had spent nearly nine months aboard the International Space Station (ISS) before returning safely. The festivities commenced soon after the successful splashdown of the Dragon spacecraft, which brought back Williams along with Crew-9 members Butch Wilmore, Nick Hague, and Russian cosmonaut Aleksandr ...

March 19, 2025 9:47 AM

NASA astronauts Sunita Williams and Butch Wilmore return to Earth after nine-month space mission

NASA astronauts Butch Wilmore and Sunita Williams returned to Earth in a SpaceX capsule on Tuesday with a soft splashdown off Florida's coast, nine months after their faulty Boeing Starliner craft upended what was to be a week-long stay on the International Space Station. Their return caps a protracted space mission that was fraught with uncertainty and technical troubles, turning a rare instance of NASA's contingency planning - and the latest failures of Starliner - into a global and political...

March 18, 2025 8:44 AM

Sunita Williams set to return home today after extended ISS mission

Indian-origin American astronaut Sunita Williams is scheduled to return to Earth on Tuesday evening, concluding an unusually extended stay aboard the International Space Station (ISS). A spacecraft carrying Williams and three other astronauts will undock from the ISS in a few hours and is expected to splash down off the coast of Florida at 5:57 p.m. US Eastern time (around 3 a.m. Wednesday IST), according to NASA. The crew aboard the spacecraft, named Dragon, is set to undock from the ISS and ...

March 13, 2025 9:31 AM

NASA, SpaceX delay flight that was to retrieve stuck astronauts

NASA and SpaceX on Wednesday delayed the launch of a replacement crew of four astronauts to the International Space Station that would have set in motion the long-awaited homecoming of U.S. astronauts Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams. NASA had been set to launch a SpaceX rocket from Florida carrying a replacement crew for the International Space Station in a mission that would set up the return to Earth of Wilmore and Williams - stuck in space for nine months after a trip on Boeing's fault...

March 8, 2025 6:27 PM

We love you, coming up to get you: Trump to astronauts Sunita Williams and Butch Wilmore

US President Donald Trump has announced that he has authorized Elon Musk to bring back American astronauts Sunita Williams and Butch Wilmore, who have been stranded at the International Space Station (ISS) since June last year. Speaking to the media at the Oval Office on Friday, Trump said, "We love you (astronauts), and we're coming up to get you. You shouldn’t have been up there for so long. The most incompetent president in our history allowed this to happen to you, but this president ...

January 31, 2025 11:44 AM

Sunita Williams sets new spacewalking record during 92nd US spacewalk

NASA astronaut Sunita "Suni" Williams achieved a historic milestone on January 30, 2025, by breaking the spacewalking record previously held by former astronaut Peggy Whitson. The International Space Station (ISS) shared the news on X: "NASA astronaut Suni Williams just surpassed former astronaut Peggy Whitson's total spacewalking time of 60 hours and 21 minutes today. Suni is still outside in the vacuum of space removing radio communications hardware." Williams, during this remarkable spacewa...

August 27, 2024 1:44 PM

NASA astronauts Sunita Williams and Butch Wilmore’s plight piles pressure on Boeing’s space unit

NASA's decision to send Boeing's Starliner capsule home without astronauts follows years of missteps by the planemaker in its space business and raises doubts over the future of the unit, analysts and industry sources said. Taking NASA astronauts Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams to the International Space Station (ISS) was to have been a turning point for Starliner after years of delays, technical glitches and supply chain mishaps. Starliner has cost Boeing $1.6 billion in overruns since 2016, a...

August 25, 2024 6:38 PM

Astronauts Butch Wilmore, Sunita Williams to remain in space till February 2025: NASA

The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) has said that it is "too risky" to bring astronauts Butch Wilmore and Sunita Williams back to Earth at this time, leading to the decision that Boeing's Starliner capsule will return without them. Wilmore and Williams will continue their work as part of the Expedition 71/72 crew and are now scheduled to return in February 2025. This means that what was initially intended to be a week-long test flight will extend to around eight months. "W...