Astronaut Butch Wilmore news: Astronaut Butch Wilmore retires from NASA after spending extended 9 months in space

Butch Wilmore retirement NASA, Astronaut Butch Wilmore news: Wilmore and Williams stayed at the ISS for over nine months as NASA and Boeing attempted to investigate what went wrong in their spacecraft.

By: Express Web Desk

Updated: August 7, 2025 11:09 AM IST

3 min read

Butch Wilmore retirement NASA: butch wilmore, nasa

Butch Wilmore retirement NASA: Wilmore, 62, along with Williams, piloted the first crewed flight of Boeing’s Starliner spacecraft on June 5, 2024 for a 8-day mission. (AP Photo/ File)

Astronaut Butch Wilmore retirement: NASA astronaut Barry “Butch” Wilmore has announced his retirement after working for 25 years with the American space agency and serving as a US Navy test pilot before becoming an astronaut. His announcement comes less than five months after he and astronaut Sunita Williams returned from a test mission aboard the International Space Station for over nine months, far longer than expected.

Wilmore, 62, along with Williams, piloted the first crewed flight of Boeing’s Starliner spacecraft on June 5, 2024 for a 8-day mission and gained worldwide traction when their spacecraft experienced several technical issues, including thruster outages and gas leaks.

Wilmore and Williams stayed at the ISS for over nine months as NASA and Boeing attempted to investigate what went wrong in their spacecraft and whether Starliner would be safe to carry astronauts home.

The space agency then decided that bringing the astronaut duo via the Boeing Starliner would be risky and announced in August last year that Williams and Wilmore would join the next International Space Station crew rotation along with two other astronauts on SpaceX’s Crew-9 mission and will be aboard the ISS for some additional months.

Wilmore and Williams returned to Earth in March after over nine months’ stay in space. However, both the astronauts have maintained that they were prepared for their extended stay in space, saying they understood the risks and uncertainty associated with test flying a spacecraft, CNN reported.

On his announcement to retire, Butch Wilmore said “From my earliest days, I have been captivated by the marvels of creation, looking upward with insatiable curiosity,” according to a NASA news release.

“This curiosity propelled me into the skies and eventually to space, where the magnificence of the cosmos mirrored the glory of its creator in ways words can scarcely convey,” Wilmore added.

Steve Koerner, acting head of NASA’s Johnson Space Center in Houston, said “Wilmore’s commitment to NASA’s mission and dedication to human space exploration is truly exemplary.”

From the homepage