A routine spaceflight carrying astronauts to the International Space Station has been scrubbed due to a problem with the launchpad’s ground system. The Crew-10 mission, which was scheduled to depart on Wednesday night from Florida, was called off just before the countdown began.
The astronauts who crewed the Boeing Starliner will have to wait a few more days to make their highly anticipated homecoming. Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams, NASA astronauts who flew to the station in June on the maiden crewed voyage of the Starliner, are now expected to attempt to launch again no earlier than Friday night.
The issue that prompted the delay was with the hydraulics system used to control clamp arms holding the Falcon 9 rocket in place while it is vertical on the launch pad. NASA and SpaceX initially planned to launch the Crew-10 mission as soon as Thursday, but high winds and precipitation forecasted for the Dragon’s flight path have since been ruled out.
Had the Crew-10 mission gotten off the ground on schedule, Wilmore and Williams would likely have returned Sunday with the Crew-9 astronauts. However, the two-day delay means the Starliner saga is another two days from ending. The Starliner astronauts will now join Crew-9 astronauts Nick Hague and Aleksandr Gorbunov to depart no earlier than March 19 for a splashdown landing off the Florida coast.
NASA will provide launch coverage starting at 3 p.m. EST on Friday, with streaming services offering live updates throughout the mission.
Source: https://eu.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2025/03/13/spacex-crew-10-launch-scrubbed-starliner-astronauts/82357898007