Sunita Williams and Barry Wilmore departed the International Space Station (ISS) early on Tuesday morning and splashed down off the coast of Florida after a journey of 17 hours. Boeing’s Starliner, their original return spacecraft, was deemed unsafe for the journey home, forcing the astronauts to stay in space much longer than planned.

NASA astronauts Suni Williams and Butch Wilmore are back on Earth. NASA and SpaceX's Crew-9 mission successfully splashed down into the Gulf of America, off the Florida Coast on Tuesday evening. It comes nearly 10 months after Williams and Wilmore launched to the International Space Station aboard Boeing's Starliner spacecraft.