Alert – Frail astronauts go through barrage of health tests after brutal nine months in space as NASA makes stunning admission about Trump

After nine gruelling months trapped on the International Space Station (ISS), NASA’s stranded astronauts have finally returned home.

Sunita Williams and Butch Willmore splashed down aboard a SpaceX Crew Dragon capsule off the coast of Tallahassee, Florida Tuesday at 5:57 pm ET, where they were circled by a pod of dolphins.

They were accompanied by the other members of NASA’s Crew-9 Mission, American astronaut Nick Hague and Russian cosmonaut Aleksandr Gorbunov.

After a recovery ship pulled the capsule from the water, the pair smiled and waved as they were helped through the hatch and took their first breaths of fresh air in months.

Steve Stich, manager, NASA’s Commercial Crew Program, said at a news conference: ‘The crew’s doing great.’

The returning astronauts were then loaded onto stretchers, which is standard practice for astronauts returning from space after being weakened by their time in microgravity.

Following their initial health checks, Williams and Wilmore will be flown to their crew quarters at NASA’s Johnson Space Center in Houston for several more days of routine health checks.

If given the all-clear by NASA’s flight surgeons they will finally be able to return to their families, 286 days after setting out on a trip that was supposed to last just eight.

NASA’s stranded astronauts Suni Williams and Butch Wilmore have finally returned to Earth after spending nine gruelling months aboard the ISS. Williams was all smiles as she was hauled from the Dragon capsule

After splashing down off the coast of Tallahassee, Florida the pair were helped onto stretchers by NASA’s medical crew. This is standard practice for astronauts whose muscles have been weakened by their time in microgravity 

Sunita Williams gives a thumbs-up after emerging from the capsule. Following their initial checks, the astronauts will be taken to their crew quarters at NASA’s Johnson Space Center in Houston for several more days of routine health checks.

Shortly after the crews return, NASA made a stunning admission about President Trump's involvement in the stranded astronaut's return mission.  

'We are thrilled to have Suni, Butch, Nick, and Aleksandr home after their months-long mission conducting vital science, technology demonstrations, and maintenance aboard the International Space Station,' said NASA acting Administrator Janet Petro in a statement. 

'Per President Trump's direction, NASA and SpaceX worked diligently to pull the schedule a month earlier. 

'This international crew and our teams on the ground embraced the Trump Administration's challenge of an updated, and somewhat unique, mission plan, to bring our crew home. 

'Through preparation, ingenuity, and dedication, we achieve great things together for the benefit of humanity, pushing the boundaries of what is possible from low Earth orbit to the Moon and Mars.'

Williams and Wilmore were initially scheduled to spend eight days on the ISS when they launched aboard Boeing's Starliner spacecraft for the capsule's first crewed test flight on June 5.

The two astronauts safely reached the space station, but only after five of Starliner's 28 thrusters failed.

The spacecraft had already suffered technical issues, including helium leaks and more thruster failures, before and during the launch. 

After a fiery re-entry, the SpaceX Crew Dragon capsule was slowed by four large parachutes and spashed down safely at 5:57 pm ET (21:57 GMT) on Tuesday

Williams and Wilore returned to Earth aboard a SpaceX Crew Dragon capsule (pictured). Upon arrival, the capsule was circled by an inquisitive pod of dolphins 

The NASA support team pulled the entry vehicle out of the water and onto a waiting boat so that the astronauts could step out and take their first breaths of fresh air in months 

Pictured: SpaceX Dragon being pulled onto the recovery ship after it landed

Butch Wilmore is seen smiling as he is helped out of the capsule and onto a stretcher for his medical examination 

By June 18, it was clear that the Starliner would not be flying home on schedule. NASA pushed Williams and Wilmore's return to later that month, giving its engineers and Boeing time to try and sort out the spacecraft's malfunctions from the ground. 

But more issues kept cropping up, and a few extra weeks stretched into a months-long delay for the astronauts' homecoming. 

In August, NASA officials decided to send Starliner home without its crew, explaining that it would be too risky to let Williams and Wilmore fly home inside the spacecraft. 

Instead, the pair would hitch a ride home on SpaceX's Crew-9 Dragon capsule, which brought Hague and Gorbunov to the ISS later that month and was originally scheduled to return to Earth in February 2025. 

This move extended the Starliner crew's space mission to at least eight months. 

As the astronauts' extended mission stretched on, health experts began raising concerns about their well-being. 

Living on the ISS takes a toll on the human body. Astronauts are subjected to low gravity, extreme levels of space radiation, the mental impacts of isolation and more.

In November, doctors told DailyMail.com that Williams appeared 'gaunt' in a photo that was taken in September and said that she looked like she had lost weight. 

On their return mission, Williams (right) and Wilmore (left) were joined by the other members of NASA's Crew-9 mission: American astronaut Nick Hague (second from right) and Russian cosmonaut Aleksandr Gorbunov (second from left) 

Russia's Alexander Gorbunov waves after being helped out of a SpaceX capsule. His return comes after a 171-day mission on the ISS 

NASA astronaut Nick Hague gives a thumbs-up to the camera as recovery crews help him onto a stretcher 

Later that month, an unnamed NASA source told the New York Post that the agency was scrambling to 'stabilize the weight loss and hopefully reverse it.'

The unnamed employee who is 'directly involved with the mission' said that Williams has been 'unable to keep up with the high-caloric diets that astronauts must consume' while on the ISS. 

'The pounds have melted off her and she's now skin and bones. So it's a priority to help her stabilize the weight loss and hopefully reverse it,' the NASA source said.

Later that month, Williams hit back at the weight loss 'rumours' in a live video published by NASA, claiming that she had actually put on muscle. 

Just a day after Williams' comments, an unnamed NASA employee told the New York Post that the agency was monitoring Wilmore's weight loss too.

That source said that while his weight loss did not appear as pronounced as Williams' 'gaunt' look, doctors were taking precautions to ensure he didn't reach a tipping point. 

In mid-December, NASA announced that the two astronauts would be staying on the ISS even longer, with a targeted return date of sometime in March 2025. 

That was because the Starliner and Crew-9 astronauts could not leave the space station until SpaceX's Crew-10 mission brought a team of four astronauts to the ISS to replace them.

During their months on the space station Suni Williams (top left) and Butch Wilmore (top right) became part of the Crew-9 mission and spent their time performing maintenance on the station and conducting scientific experiments

Williams (right) and Wilmore (left) left Earth in June last year for a test flight of the Boeing Starliner crew capsule. The original plan was to take the shuttle up to the ISS, stay for eight days while NASA performed diagnostics on the capsule, and then return to Earth. Pictured: Williams and Wimore prepare to board the Boeing Starliner on June 1

Crew-10 was supposed to launch in February, but the brand-new Dragon spacecraft SpaceX planned on using began suffering technical issues.

On December 17,  NASA announced that the Crew-10 launch would be pushed back to give SpaceX more time to work on the spacecraft, and therefore, the Starliner and Crew-9 astronauts' return was also delayed. 

At that time, they were expected back in late March or early April. 

But in late January, the Starliner fiasco entered the political spotlight when President Donald Trump announced that he had asked SpaceX Chief Executive Elon Musk, the newly-minted head of his DOGE agency, to 'go get' Williams and Wilmore. 

Trump claimed they had been 'virtually abandoned' by the Biden administration, and Musk reiterated these claims in a post on X. 

A couple weeks later on February 11, NASA announced that the Starliner astronauts would be coming home slightly earlier than expected. It's unclear whether this decision was related to Trump and Musk's statements. 

The agency decided to use a different, ready-to-fly spacecraft to launch the Crew-10 mission, which meant Williams, Wilmore and the Crew-9 astronauts would be able to leave the ISS about two weeks earlier. 

The Crew-10 mission launched from NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida on March 14 and docked to the ISS 28 hours later. 

The Starliner capsule quickly developed a number of serious technical issues including helium leaks and thruster failures. In September 2024, NASA determined that it was not safe to pilot the capsule home and Starliner returned to Earth uncrewed 

The Starliner and Crew-9 astronauts stuck around for a few days to get the new ISS crew up to speed on space station operations. 

But in the early hours of Tuesday morning, they boarded the Crew-9 Dragon capsule, undocked from the ISS and began the journey back to Earth. 

They are now back on Earth, bringing an end to this unexpectedly long and highly controversial saga.