The founder of SpaceX said President Trump had asked his company to return two astronauts aboard the space station to Earth “as soon as possible.” NASA said it would do that “as soon as practical.”

While Suni Williams and Butch Wilmore’s situation is unusual, their return trip will be pretty routine, as they were already slated to fly home on a SpaceX capsule as part of a scheduled crew rotation.

NASA astronauts Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams flew to the ISS in the summer of 2024 for a routine eight-day test mission. However, due to problems with the propulsion system of Boeing’s Starliner capsule,