Col. Nick Hague, a Space Force Guardian and NASA astronaut, launched Saturday from Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida alongside Roscosmos cosmonaut Aleksandr Gorbunov as part of the SpaceX Dragon Crew-9 mission.

Because NASA rotates space station crews approximately every six months, this newly launched flight with two empty seats reserved for Wilmore and Williams won’t return until late February. Officials said there wasn’t a way to bring them back earlier on SpaceX without interrupting other scheduled missions.

A Space Force guardian has launched into space to help with a NASA mission and bring two stranded astronauts back to Earth.

Crew-9 is the ninth crew rotation mission to the space station with SpaceX under NASA’s Commercial Crew Program. The crew is set to spend about five months in the orbiting laboratory, conducting spacewalks, research, and experiments before returning to Earth in February 2025 with Williams and Wilmore.