Firstly, I understand people will disagree with me on this and that's fine – if you disagree please just explain why.
Based on what I've read on this, I can see why Trump and Elon MIGHT feel like the return flight was held back for political reasons... But I'm not really able to take either side of this argument as it stands, so I'll give my thoughts for why that is in the hope someone might be able to convince me one way or the other...
Firstly, the assumption that NASA is apolitical should be questioned. This might just be my ignorance, but I still haven't seen any good reasoning for why NASA would delay the return flight. As others have noted the capsule was already there, but NASA seemingly just decided to randomly keep them up there months longer than necessary? Why?
And while it's not fair to blame the Biden administration for this directly, ultimately the actions of any government agency would be the responsibility of the current administration to some extent, so if there was any suspicion that the return flight was being pushed back for political reasons the Biden administration should have intervened.
I imagine if Elon did push for an earlier return and was denied this without a good reason he might have questioned why, and I could imagine someone in that position might assume a political motive – perhaps reasonably depending on those private conversations had.
I also think there's an argument to be made that if the Biden administration was friendlier with Elon and didn't go out of their way to alienate him that this return flight would have happened earlier too. Perhaps because Elon could have spoke to Biden directly as he did with Trump, or because NASA would have changed their calculation on the PR of the return.
I have tried repeatedly to find a reason why the return flight might have been delayed, but haven't been able to find any good reason for this so I'm on the fence about why this might have happened. If someone can give me a reasonable explanation for why they weren't returned earlier (especially if it's a reason Elon would have been aware of) I'd likely conclude Elon is most likely lying.
Either way the argument, "Elon is wrong because the capsule was up there the whole time so they could have been brought back whenever, but NASA just decided to push it back" is not a convincing explanation that there was no political calculation here.
The normal process is that you always have at least one US and one Russian Vehicle docked to the ISS. In emergencies, each crewmember uses their spacecraft to return to earth.
The normal rotation is that an additional spacecraft arrives at the ISS (so there are now 3 vehicles docked in total) and then the older spacecraft leaves with its crew. So before the single dragon leaves, a new dragon would arrive.
I think the general idea is to always have at least some Russians and Americans on the ISS at all times (although they are doing swapped missions now so even having only one vehicle left would ensure that most of the time) and to always have crew on the ISS, even if one vehicle needs to return early due to technical problems.
The Crew-10 was not a rescue mission because they just rotated with Crew-9 which carried the Starliner Astronauts back. Crew-9 could be called a rescue mission because they took back the Starliner Astronauts. But Rescue makes it sound more urgent and dedicated than it actually is. They would have flown anyways, just with more crew.
That is exactly what it is. That mission has been scheduled for more than 6 months (though the exact date changed a couple of times for technical reasons).
My understanding is that Crew 9 was always scheduled for a 6 month mission and they couldn't come back before Crew 10 arrived (in March 2025) or else the ISS would be shortstaffed.
The two astronauts in question are simply hitching a ride back on this scheduled mission.
> Firstly, the assumption that NASA is apolitical should be questioned. This might just be my ignorance, but I still haven't seen any good reasoning for why NASA would delay the return flight. As others have noted the capsule was already there, but NASA seemingly just decided to randomly keep them up there months longer than necessary? Why?
Why is anybody actually thinking that? The return of Crew-9 is the culmination of a well orchestrated series of missions to cope with the outage of Starliner Calypso. It may have slipped the attention of some, but space missions are not like buying groceries. These assumptions are basically just betraying a lack of understanding how space travel works. Musk, OTOH, should know this.
Furthermore, there is the long-standing policy of having at least one working capsule at the ISS for emergencies. A lifeboat or escape pod, so to speak. Plus, there are only two docking slots for large-enough capsules, such as Starliners or Dragons, on the ISS. So you have to schedule your trips even more than for normal space missions. You have to coordinate and swap crafts in sequence and deal with the launch windows schedule -- which is exactly what has happened. Again, Musk should know this.
> I think there's an argument to be made that if the Biden administration was friendlier with Elon and didn't go out of their way to alienate him that this return flight would have happened earlier too. Perhaps because Elon could have spoke to Biden directly as he did with Trump, or because NASA would have changed their calculation on the PR of the return.
Why would the CEO of a contractor of a US government agency need to speak to the president of the USA to do the job they were hired for? The agency has more capable people to decide on such matters than any White House staff.
It's all a huge charade of grandstanding and chest-thumping. Disappointing.
I think it’s a hugely complex problem but it basically boils down to a few key things.
- could ISS support docking an additional crew dragon for the time it would take to return the starliner crew without adversely disrupting other scheduled spacecraft flow?
- could spacex have delivered an additional crew dragon to the ISS and departed before any other without downstream impact to future crew dragon missions?
- was someone willing to pay for all of this?
- could it have been done safely for all crews and the ISS?
If the answer was yes to all of those questions, then there likely was a political reason behind waiting to return them on crew 9. What that is, I can’t speculate.
If any question gives a “no” then the decision was probably not political but operational in nature.
I think the only question that might be a no is 'was someone willing to pay for all of this.' But I think even that being a 'no' is suggestive of a political motivation, given that the alternative (that "we" ended up going with) was borderline ridiculous in the chaos that it caused. We ended up, for the first time ever, with a Russian cosmonaut was in control of an American spacecraft, and a rookie cosmonaut with only basic training on the Dragon at that.
It also forced NASA to completely change their safety standards. In particular NASA requires there be a 'lifeboat' on on the ISS for all crew in case of an emergency, but because of the Boeing crew (and the lack of a corresponding vessel), NASA approved a new 'configuration' of the Dragon where up to 3 people could strap themselves to the floor of it, where cargo would normally go, in case of the need of a mass escape from the ISS. [2]
There are stories that Musk was willing to foot the bill. Of course thats easy to say after the other decisions have been made, but my guess is my second point was probably the real no—at least not in a timely or safe enough manner to make the overall future mission disruptions worth it from NASA’s POV.
> I still haven't seen any good reasoning for why NASA would delay the return flight
So many comments spread unsourced assertions on the topic on both sides. Let me change that.
On 24 Aug 2024, NASA stated in a conference published on X[0]:
> NASA has decided that Butch and Suni will return with Crew-9 next February.
So the decision sounded like it stemmed from NASA, and the plan a year ago was for a return in the time frame that actually occurred.
On 28 Sept 2024, the spacecraft that would bring Ms Williams and Mr Wilmore was launched. They restated the same plan[1]:
> A SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket and a Dragon spacecraft will launch Crew-9 to the space station for about a five-month mission. Hague and Gorbunov will join Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams, who are already aboard the space station, and all will return to Earth as a crew of four in February 2025.
Thus there was no action after Mr Trump took office that changed the plan.
(Note that the SpaceX article we’re commenting on has a mistake, stating that Mr Grebenkin has come down on 18 March, but Mr Grebenkin came down on 25 Oct; it is indeed Gorbunov that came down.)
On 7 March 2025, Ken Bowersox, associate administrator, Space Operations Mission Directorate, stated[2] on the motivation for this:
> When it comes to adding on missions or bringing a capsule home early: those were always options but we ruled them out pretty quickly just based on how much money we've got in our budget and the importance of keeping crews on the International Space Station.
When asked specifically about a request from Mr Musk to have an earlier return:
> Was anyone outside NASA or the White House involved in the decision not to bring Suni and Butch back sooner? — There may have been some conversations that I wasn't part of. When we made the technical decisions about Starliner […] our leadership at NASA was trying to make sure that we considered everything just at a technical level and that's what we did.
Based on what I've read on this, I can see why Trump and Elon MIGHT feel like the return flight was held back for political reasons... But I'm not really able to take either side of this argument as it stands, so I'll give my thoughts for why that is in the hope someone might be able to convince me one way or the other...
Firstly, the assumption that NASA is apolitical should be questioned. This might just be my ignorance, but I still haven't seen any good reasoning for why NASA would delay the return flight. As others have noted the capsule was already there, but NASA seemingly just decided to randomly keep them up there months longer than necessary? Why?
And while it's not fair to blame the Biden administration for this directly, ultimately the actions of any government agency would be the responsibility of the current administration to some extent, so if there was any suspicion that the return flight was being pushed back for political reasons the Biden administration should have intervened.
I imagine if Elon did push for an earlier return and was denied this without a good reason he might have questioned why, and I could imagine someone in that position might assume a political motive – perhaps reasonably depending on those private conversations had.
I also think there's an argument to be made that if the Biden administration was friendlier with Elon and didn't go out of their way to alienate him that this return flight would have happened earlier too. Perhaps because Elon could have spoke to Biden directly as he did with Trump, or because NASA would have changed their calculation on the PR of the return.
I have tried repeatedly to find a reason why the return flight might have been delayed, but haven't been able to find any good reason for this so I'm on the fence about why this might have happened. If someone can give me a reasonable explanation for why they weren't returned earlier (especially if it's a reason Elon would have been aware of) I'd likely conclude Elon is most likely lying.
Either way the argument, "Elon is wrong because the capsule was up there the whole time so they could have been brought back whenever, but NASA just decided to push it back" is not a convincing explanation that there was no political calculation here.