Wilmore and Williams, two veteran NASA astronauts and retired US Navy test pilots, launched into space as the first crew of Starliner in June for a planned eight-day test mission. But problems with Starliner’s propulsion system led to repeated delays in their return home, culminating in NASA’s decision to require them to bring a SpaceX spacecraft back this year as part of the agency’s crew rotation schedule.

On the morning of March 18 (Eastern US time), astronauts Wilmore and Williams were strapped in the Crew Dragon spacecraft with two other astronauts and separated from the ISS at 1:05 a.m. Eastern US time (12:05 p.m. Vietnam time) to begin the 17-hour trip back to Earth, saying goodbye to the other 7 astronauts of the station.

The four-person crew re-entered Earth's atmosphere at about 5:45 p.m. on March 18 (04:45 a.m. on March 19, Vietnam time). Using Earth's atmosphere and two sets of parachutes, the spacecraft slowed from about 17,000 mph to 17 mph as it landed about 50 miles off Florida's Gulf Coast under clear skies.

The crew capsule has been pulled from the water and placed on a boat. The astronauts will be flown onto a NASA plane and taken to crew housing at the space agency’s Johnson Space Center in Houston for several days of health checks before NASA surgeons give them the green light to return home to their families.

Thus, the two astronauts Wilmore and Williams have recorded 286 days in space, longer than the average 6-month ISS mission, but still far behind the record of American astronaut Frank Rubio, who has 371 consecutive days in space (ending in 2023). This is the unexpected result of a coolant leak on a Russian spacecraft.

At the end of her third spaceflight, astronaut Williams has spent a total of 608 days in space, behind American astronaut Peggy Whitson's record of 675 days. Russian cosmonaut Oleg Kononenko set the world record last year with 878 days in space.