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Pilot Suni Williams, from the town of Needham in Norfolk County, has been stuck aboard the International Space Station since early June after NASA discovered multiple problems with the Boeing-built Starliner spacecraft.
The 59-year-old retired Navy officer, along with her colleague Butch Wilmore, were originally scheduled to return home after eight days. They’ll now hitch a ride back to Earth on a SpaceX Dragon capsule in February 2025.
Starliner returned without the astronauts on Sept. 7, after NASA decided the risk to their safety was just too great. Since then, Williams and Wilmore have kept busy supporting station research and performing maintenance.
But recent photos of the pair shared by NASA have sparked concerns over their health. Both Williams and Wilmore appear to have dropped below what’s considered a healthy body weight, pulmonologist Vinay Gupta told Daily Mail.
"What you're seeing ... is somebody that I think is experiencing the natural stresses of living at a very high altitude, even in a pressurized cabin, for extended periods," he told the outlet. "Her cheeks appear a bit sunken - and usually it happens when you've had sort of total body weight loss."
Williams’ apparent weight loss could be caused by not consuming the 3,500-calorie-per-day recommendation for astronauts to meet the increased energy requirements of living in space, Gupta told Daily Mail.
NASA, however, is disputing the claims. A spokesperson for the agency told Newsweek:
“All NASA astronauts aboard the International Space Station undergo routine medical evaluations, have dedicated flight surgeons monitoring them, and are in good health.”
A 1983 graduate of Needham High School, Williams became an astronaut in August 1998 after more than a decade as a helicopter pilot in the US Navy. She made her first trip to the International Space Station aboard Space Shuttle Discovery in December 2006.
Throughout her career, she has logged more than 3,000 flight hours in 30 different aircraft. In 2019, her hometown of Needham honored her by naming its new elementary school Sunita L. Williams Elementary School.
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