by Cape Canaveral, FLA. (AP) – One of NASA’s two rather stuck astronauts has retired at the space agency, less than five months after his unexpected long space travel came to an end.
NASA announced Butch Wilmore’s departure on Wednesday.
Wilmore and Suni Williams launched last summer as test pilots on the first astronaut flight from Boeing. What a trip of a week to the international space station should have become in a stay of more than nine months because of the Boeing Starliner. Starliner came back empty and Wilmore and Williams returned to Earth with SpaceX in March.
Wilmore, 62, had already retired at the Navy. Williams, 59, also a retired naval captain, is still at NASA. Earlier this week, she joined second Lady Usha Vance in Johnson Space Center in Houston and participated in a summer reading for school children.
Wilmore, selected as an astronaut, logged 464 days in a job at three missions. His last space flight made almost two -thirds of that total: 286 days.
“During his career, Butch has an example of the technical excellence of what is needed from an astronaut,” said Nasa’s Chief Astronaut Joe Acaba in a statement. “While he steps into this new chapter, the same dedication will undoubtedly continue to show what he then decides to do.”
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