Four parachutes deployed as SpaceX’s Dragon splashed down in the sea off US’ Florida, marking the return of Sunita Williams and other members of the Crew-9 to Earth after nine months in space.
As lakhs watched the YouTube live streaming of the long-awaited return of the astronauts, the NASA control room burst into applause as the capsule safely landed in water at 5.57 pm ET, minutes after entering the Earth’s atmosphere.
American astronaut Nick Hague and Russian cosmonaut Aleksandr Gorbunov were also on board. As communications were restored after a short blackout during atmospheric re-entry, Hague said, “What a ride! I see a capsule full of friends here.”
Splashdown confirmed! #Crew9 is now back on Earth in their @SpaceX Dragon spacecraft. pic.twitter.com/G5tVyqFbAu
— NASA (@NASA) March 18, 2025
A pod of dolphins danced around the capsule charred by re-entry at temperatures of 2,000 degrees Celsius as recovery team members performed safety checks and placed harnesses that will allow it to be hoisted on to a recovery capsule. After being removed from the capsule, Williams and Wilmore will be flown to Houston to begin a 45-day rehabilitation program.
Wilmore and Williams, both former US Navy pilots and veterans, flew to the International Space Station in June last year, on what was supposed to be a days-long roundtrip to test out Boeing’s Starliner on its first crewed flight.
Propulsion problems on the spacecraft delayed their return as the spaceship flew back empty. They were reassigned to NASA’s SpaceX Crew-9 mission. Their prolonged space stay became a point of global attention and political debate.
President Donald Trump and SpaceX founder Elon Musk have repeatedly blamed former president Joe Biden of abandoning the astronauts.
Trump also drew criticism for his remarks on Williams, calling her “the woman with the wild hair” and speculating about the personal dynamic between her and Wilmore. “They’ve been left up there — I hope they like each other, maybe they love each other, I don’t know,” he said during a recent White House press conference.
On Sunday, the Crew-10 docked with the space station, paving the way for the Crew-9 team to depart. 17 hours before splashdown, the Crew-9 departed from the orbital lab.
Though astronauts are sent for six-month missions, Wilmore and Williams’ stayed 286 days. However, the record for the longest space stay by a US astronaut belongs to Frank Rubio at 371 days in 2023, while the world record remains with Russian cosmonaut Valeri Polyakov, who spent 437 consecutive days aboard the Mir station.
As the astronauts re-orient to life on Earth, they face challenges such as muscle and bone loss, fluid shifts that can lead to kidney stones and vision issues, and the readjustment of balance upon returning to a gravity environment.