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NASA, SpaceX Delay Flight that Was to Retrieve Stuck Astronauts

The NASA SpaceX Dragon Endeavour spacecraft on a Falcon 9 rocket, that will carry the NASA's Crew-10, is docked after the launch was scrubbed at the Kennedy Space Center Launch Complex 39A at NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Titusville, Florida, USA, 12 March 2025. EPA/CRISTOBAL HERRERA-ULASHKEVICH
The NASA SpaceX Dragon Endeavour spacecraft on a Falcon 9 rocket, that will carry the NASA's Crew-10, is docked after the launch was scrubbed at the Kennedy Space Center Launch Complex 39A at NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Titusville, Florida, USA, 12 March 2025. EPA/CRISTOBAL HERRERA-ULASHKEVICH
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NASA, SpaceX Delay Flight that Was to Retrieve Stuck Astronauts

The NASA SpaceX Dragon Endeavour spacecraft on a Falcon 9 rocket, that will carry the NASA's Crew-10, is docked after the launch was scrubbed at the Kennedy Space Center Launch Complex 39A at NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Titusville, Florida, USA, 12 March 2025. EPA/CRISTOBAL HERRERA-ULASHKEVICH
The NASA SpaceX Dragon Endeavour spacecraft on a Falcon 9 rocket, that will carry the NASA's Crew-10, is docked after the launch was scrubbed at the Kennedy Space Center Launch Complex 39A at NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Titusville, Florida, USA, 12 March 2025. EPA/CRISTOBAL HERRERA-ULASHKEVICH

NASA and SpaceX on Wednesday delayed the launch of a replacement crew of four astronauts to the International Space Station that would have set in motion the long-awaited homecoming of US astronauts Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams.
NASA had been set to launch a SpaceX rocket from Florida carrying a replacement crew for the International Space Station in a mission that would set up the return to Earth of Wilmore and Williams - stuck in space for nine months after a trip on Boeing's faulty Starliner.
The launch was called off due to a hydraulic system issue with a ground support clamp arm for the Falcon 9 rocket, Reuters quoted NASA as saying in a statement.
Launch teams are working to address the issue, it said in another statement.
NASA said it is now targeting a launch no earlier than 7:03 p.m. EDT (2303 GMT) Friday after mission managers put off a launch attempt on Thursday because of high winds and rain forecast in the flight path of Dragon.
With a Friday Crew-10 launch, the Crew-9 mission with astronauts Wilmore and Williams would depart the space station on Wednesday, March 19, it said.
The US space agency had moved up the mission by two weeks after President Donald Trump and his adviser Elon Musk, CEO of SpaceX, called for Wilmore and Williams to be brought back earlier than NASA had planned.
A planned eight-day stay on the orbiting station has dragged on for Wilmore and Williams, both veteran astronauts and US Navy test pilots. Starliner returned to Earth without them last year.
SpaceX's rocket had been scheduled to blast off from the Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral at 7:48 p.m. ET (2348 GMT) with a crew of two US astronauts and one astronaut each from Japan and Russia.
Wilmore and Williams have been working on research and maintenance with the space station's other astronauts and have remained safe, according to NASA. Williams told reporters in a March 4 call that she is looking forward to seeing her family and dogs upon returning home.
"It's been a roller coaster for them, probably a little bit more so than for us," Williams said of her family. "We're here, we have a mission - we're just doing what we do every day, and every day is interesting because we're up in space and it's a lot of fun."
The flight, known as Crew-10, normally would be considered a routine astronaut rotation. Instead, it has become entangled in politics as Trump and Musk have sought - without offering evidence - to blame former President Joe Biden for the delayed return of Wilmore and Williams.
The demands by Trump and Musk for an earlier return were an unusual intervention in NASA's human spaceflight operations. The mission previously had a target date of March 26, but NASA swapped a delayed SpaceX capsule with a different one that would be ready sooner.
When the new crew arrives aboard the station, Wilmore, Williams and two others - NASA astronaut Nick Hague and Russian cosmonaut Aleksandr Gorbunov - can return to Earth in a capsule that has been attached to the station since September, as part of the prior Crew-9 mission.
Wilmore and Williams cannot leave until the new Crew-10 craft arrives so that the ISS staffed with enough US astronauts for maintenance, according to NASA.
Wilmore and Williams flew to the station in June as the first test crew of Boeing's Starliner, which suffered propulsion system issues in space. NASA deemed it too risky for the astronauts to fly home on the Boeing craft. This led to the current plan to bring them home in a SpaceX capsule.

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Water Levels Plummet at Drought-Hit Iraqi Reservoir

Kochar Jamal Tawfeeq, director of the Dukan Dam facility, gives an interview by the reservoir northwest of Iraq's northeastern city of Sulaimaniyah in the autonomous Kurdistan region on June 4, 2025, where waters have been receding due to a mix of factors including lower rainfall, severe drought, and diversion of inflowing rivers from Iran. (AFP)
Kochar Jamal Tawfeeq, director of the Dukan Dam facility, gives an interview by the reservoir northwest of Iraq's northeastern city of Sulaimaniyah in the autonomous Kurdistan region on June 4, 2025, where waters have been receding due to a mix of factors including lower rainfall, severe drought, and diversion of inflowing rivers from Iran. (AFP)
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Water Levels Plummet at Drought-Hit Iraqi Reservoir

Kochar Jamal Tawfeeq, director of the Dukan Dam facility, gives an interview by the reservoir northwest of Iraq's northeastern city of Sulaimaniyah in the autonomous Kurdistan region on June 4, 2025, where waters have been receding due to a mix of factors including lower rainfall, severe drought, and diversion of inflowing rivers from Iran. (AFP)
Kochar Jamal Tawfeeq, director of the Dukan Dam facility, gives an interview by the reservoir northwest of Iraq's northeastern city of Sulaimaniyah in the autonomous Kurdistan region on June 4, 2025, where waters have been receding due to a mix of factors including lower rainfall, severe drought, and diversion of inflowing rivers from Iran. (AFP)

Water levels at Iraq's vast Dukan Dam reservoir have plummeted as a result of dwindling rains and further damming upstream, hitting millions of inhabitants already impacted by drought with stricter water rationing.

Amid these conditions, visible cracks have emerged in the retreating shoreline of the artificial lake, which lies in northern Iraq's autonomous Kurdistan region and was created in the 1950s.

Dukan Lake has been left three quarters empty, with its director Kochar Jamal Tawfeeq explaining its reserves currently stand at around 1.6 billion cubic meters of water out of a possible seven billion.

That is "about 24 percent" of its capacity, the official said, adding that the level of water in the lake had not been so low in roughly 20 years.

Satellite imagery analyzed by AFP shows the lake's surface area shrank by 56 percent between the end of May 2019, the last year it was completely full, and the beginning of June 2025.

Tawfeeq blamed climate change and a "shortage of rainfall" explaining that the timing of the rains had also become irregular.

Over the winter season, Tawfeeq said the Dukan region received 220 millimeters (8.7 inches) of rain, compared to a typical 600 millimeters.

- 'Harvest failed' -

Upstream damming of the Little Zab River, which flows through Iran and feeds Dukan, was a secondary cause of the falling water levels, Tawfeeq explained.

Also buffeted by drought, Iran has built dozens of structures on the river to increase its own water reserves.

Baghdad has criticized these kinds of dams, built both by Iran and neighboring Türkiye, accusing them of significantly restricting water flow into Iraq via the Tigris and Euphrates rivers.

Iraq, and its 46 million inhabitants, have been intensely impacted by the effects of climate change, experiencing rising temperatures, year-on-year droughts and rampant desertification.

At the end of May, the country's total water reserves were at their lowest level in 80 years.

On the slopes above Dukan lies the village of Sarsian, where Hussein Khader Sheikhah, 57, was planting a summer crop on a hectare of land.

The farmer said he hoped a short-term summer crop of the kind typically planted in the area for an autumn harvest -- cucumbers, melons, chickpeas, sunflower seeds and beans -- would help him offset some of the losses over the winter caused by drought.

In winter, in another area near the village, he planted 13 hectares mainly of wheat.

"The harvest failed because of the lack of rain," he explained, adding that he lost an equivalent of almost $5,700 to the poor yield.

"I can't make up for the loss of 13 hectares with just one hectare near the river," he added.

- 'Stricter rationing' -

The water shortage at Dukan has affected around four million people downstream in the neighboring Sulaimaniyah and Kirkuk governorates, including their access to drinking water.

For more than a month, water treatment plants in Kirkuk have been trying to mitigate a sudden, 40 percent drop in the supplies reaching them, according to local water resource official Zaki Karim.

In a country ravaged by decades of conflict, with crumbling infrastructure and floundering public policies, residents already receive water intermittently.

The latest shortages are forcing even "stricter rationing" and more infrequent water distributions, Karim said.

In addition to going door-to-door to raise awareness about water waste, the authorities were also cracking down on illegal access to the water network.

In the province of roughly two million inhabitants, the aim is to minimize the impact on the provincial capital of Kirkuk.

"If some treatment plants experience supply difficulties, we will ensure that there are no total interruptions, so everyone can receive their share," Karim said.