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3w ago

NASA Astronaut Butch Wilmore Retires After Pioneering Nine-Month ISS Mission

His departure underscores NASA’s reliance on diverse commercial crew providers after Starliner failures extended his stay for nearly nine months

Image
Boeing Crew Flight Test crew members Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams during Suited CFT FS Joint Ascent Sim training at NASA’s Johnson Space Center on October 31, 2022.
The SpaceX Dragon spacecraft floats off the coast of Florida as support teams work to recover the vehicle. NASA astronauts Nick Hague, Suni Williams, Butch Wilmore, and Roscosmos cosmonaut Aleksandr Gorbunov returned on the capsule Tuesday evening after departing the International Space Station.
FILE - Astronaut Butch Wilmore is interviewed at Johnson Space Center on March 31, 2025, in Houston. (AP Photo/Ashley Landis, file)

Overview

  • Wilmore concluded a 25-year NASA career with 464 cumulative days in space aboard the Space Shuttle, Soyuz, Boeing Starliner and SpaceX Dragon.
  • When Starliner’s propulsion module suffered helium leaks and thruster malfunctions in June 2024, NASA kept him on the ISS to prioritize crew safety.
  • The agency sent Starliner home empty last fall and returned Wilmore on SpaceX’s Crew-9 Dragon in March 2025 as part of established contingency protocols.
  • A former U.S. Navy test pilot, Wilmore performed five spacewalks totaling 32 hours and led station maintenance and research tasks during his extended mission.
  • His retirement draws fresh attention to Boeing Starliner’s reliability challenges and reinforces NASA’s strategy of balancing multiple commercial crew partners.