NASA announced its final decision on the future fate of Boeing’s troubled Starliner spacecraft and astronauts

NASA has announced its final decision regarding the future fate of Boeing’s Starliner spacecraft and its two astronauts. Williams and Wilmore, instead of returning to Earth from the ISS after 8 days, have already been in orbit for almost 3 months and will return no earlier than February 2025, reports The Washington Post.

This decision by NASA was a serious blow to the reputation of Boeing, which previously assured that the Starliner is a safe vehicle for delivering astronauts to the International Space Station (ISS). As Starliner approached the station on June 6, five of the 28 thrusters responsible for the ship’s orientation suddenly failed. Four of them were recovered. However, in addition to this, the ship encountered a number of small helium leaks in the propulsion system.

Boeing and NASA engineers spent several months trying to figure out the cause of the failure and came to some possible conclusions. However, NASA said there are no guarantees that Starliner will be able to safely return astronauts to Earth this September.

It was decided that Starliner would return to Earth without a crew, and Williams and Wilmore would remain aboard the ISS until February 2025. It is planned to return them to Earth using the SpaceX Crew Dragon spacecraft.

For Boeing, this is another significant blow, as the use of their direct competitor’s spacecraft could make it difficult to continue using the Starliner for regular space flights. The Starliner’s future is now uncertain, given years of technical problems and development cost overruns.

Still, NASA hopes Boeing can make the necessary changes to the Starliner to make it a full-fledged ISS flight vehicle on par with SpaceX’s Crew Dragon.

In 2014, NASA signed contracts with Boeing and SpaceX to develop spacecraft to deliver astronauts to the ISS. Interestingly, some NASA officials insisted on concluding a contract exclusively with Boeing.

However, SpaceX, owned by Elon Musk, already in 2020 made the first manned flight to the orbital station using its new ship. Instead, Boeing was able to send its first manned Starliner spacecraft to the ISS only in early July 2024.

According to NASA, in September of this year, only two astronauts will go to the ISS aboard Crew Dragon instead of four. The spacecraft will return to Earth in February 2025 with its crew, as well as Williams and Wilmore, who will have been in orbit for eight months by then.