NASA said Friday that the return mission of the two astronauts has been successfully launched.
U.S. astronauts Barry Wilmore and Sunita Williams have now been on the International Space Station (ISS) since June, although they think they only have a week to go.
NASA said the SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket pushed the Dragon spacecraft into orbit carrying NASA astronauts Anne McClain and Nichole Ayers.
The spacecraft is expected to dock later on Saturday.
NASA astronauts Nick Hague, Williams and Wilmore, as well as Roscosmos Cosmonaut Aleksandr Gorbunov will now leave ISS no earlier than March 19, NASA said.
Williams and Wilmore arrived at the International Space Station during the first manned test flight of Boeing’s Starliner spacecraft in early June. They were only going to stay on the International Space Station for a week, but many technical problems with the crafts put them in trouble.
The Starliner produced by Boeing is a partially reusable spacecraft consisting of crew members and capsules about 3 meters high in service modules.
Unlike the crew built by Elon Musk’s SpaceX Company, the Starliner does not land on water, but on dry land.
The SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket carries Crew Dragon Capsule Endurance, and the Crew 10 mission takes off from NASA’s launch complex 39A at the Kennedy Space Center. Jennifer Briggs/Zuma Press Wire/DPA
