After being marooned in space for a gruelling 286 days, NASA astronauts Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams have bemoaned the agonies of terrestrial life, confessing “gravity stinks for a period”. The spacefarers’ ordeal began in June 2024 with a botched test flight that saw them confined to the International Space Station (ISS).
But nearly 10 months later the pair arrived back on Earth with a splashdown in the Gulf of Mexico on March 18, before they were removed from the SpaceX capsule and taken away for health checks due to their long stay in space. Adapting to gravity again has proven challenging for the astronauts and their convalescence has included two months dedicated to intense physical therapy, focusing on two hours a day of strength and conditioning training aimed at regaining lost muscle mass.
At 62, Butch is vocal about the lingering back pain post-rehab, while Suni, 59, has found fatigue impeding her early morning rises, something she once favoured.
Butch said: “We’re still floating in the capsule in the ocean, and my neck starts hurting, while we still hadn’t even been extracted yet.”
Their struggle to regain full fitness underscores the millennia-long evolution of human physiology, tailored to Earth’s gravitational demands, reports the Mirror.
Suni added: “Gravity stinks for a period, and that period varies for different people, but eventually you get over those neurovestibular balance type of issues. It’s been a little bit of a whirlwind.”
The two astronauts had initially planned for a brief stay on the ISS of about a week after taking off aboard Boeing’s new Starliner crew capsule on June 5, 2024.
However, an array of technical glitches encountered en route to the ISS led NASA to bring back the Starliner without its crew, switching the test pilots over to SpaceX and thus extending the stay in space for the pair by months until February. Later complications with the SpaceX capsule further delayed their return by an additional month.
Upon completion of the mission, Williams and Wilmore had orbited Earth 4,576 times and traversed an astonishing 121 million miles before their ocean touchdown. Both have undergone extensive readjustment, including consultations with psychologists and psychiatrists to debrief their ordeal on the ISS.
Mr Wilmore said: “You’re thrown together day and night seven days a week at 24 hours a day, and just like any family there’s a point where something rubs you the wrong way or something – that happens anywhere.”
Mr Wilmore and Ms Williams, both veterans from the US Navy holding the rank of captain, maintained that spending extended time in orbit was not bothersome – a sentiment echoing their tenure in the military – but admitted the prolonged absence caused strain for their loved ones on terra firma.