ISS astronauts celebrate New Year’s 16 times

It’s a New Year’s sunrise like no other.

The astronauts aboard the International Space Station will celebrate New Year’s a total of 16 times as the vessel hurdles across the universe and into 2025.

“As 2024 comes to a close today, the Exp 72 crew will see 16 sunrises and sunsets while soaring into the New Year,” the ISS crew posted on X about the unique celebration.

NASA astronauts Don Pettit and Butch Wilmore hailed the start of 16 New Year’s celebrations on the ISS. NASA

Despite the ISS’s speedy 90-minute orbit around the Earth — as it travels about 17,500 miles per hour — NASA specified that the station’s clocks are set to Greenwich Mean Time (GMT).

That means its crew will officially celebrate New Year’s Day at 7 p.m. EST.

Butch Wilmore, who is stuck on the ISS with Suni Williams after their Boeing Starliner craft malfunctioned over the summer, hailed the start of the New Year’s celebrations in a message to Earth with ABC News.

“Well, Happy New Year from the International Space Station,” Wilmore said as he stood beside fellow astronaut Don Pettit.

“We’ll get a go around the planet here every 90 minutes, so we’ll get 16 New Year’s celebrations here on the International Space Station.

Due to the space station’s orbit around the Earth, the astronauts will see 16 sunrises on Tuesday. @Space_Station/X

The astronauts will also see 16 sunsets as 2024 concludes. @Space_Station/X

“We’d love to be there with you in Times Square to watch the ball drop,” he added as Pettit pulled out an orange ball and let it go in the weightlessness of space.

“We have our own ball, but it doesn’t drop. It just kind of stays in place,” Wilmore joked. “We look forward to midnight, Eastern Time, in Times Square, and we’ll be there, virtually with you.”

Pettit added: “While we’re on the International Space Station, we’re separated from our families. We’re separated from our friends, but we have our crew here, and they become our family.”

The astronauts joked that their ball drop, in the weightlessness of space, did not compare to the one in Times Square. NASA

Wilmore and Williams are making the best of the holidays in space after it was revealed earlier this month that their trip back home was delayed yet again to at least late March.

The American astronauts have been stuck on the ISS since their June 5 blastoff aboard the faulty Boeing Starliner — and they were originally slated for just eight days in space.

They were set to return in February aboard a SpaceX craft, but the company delayed the trip as it needed more time to prepare a new capsule.