Boeing Starliner's Astronauts Including Sunita Williams May Now Return In Feb 2025, Says NASA

Washington: NASA astronauts – Butch Wilmore and Sunita Williams – who travelled to International Station on Boeing Starliner may return back to return in February 2025 but in a different craft and it's unlikely it would be Starliner, US ncy informed on Thursday. w two astronauts could return on X's Crew Dragon in February 2025 if Starliner is still deemed unsafe to return to Earth.

U.S. ncy has been discussing potential plans with X to leave two seats empty on an upcoming Crew Dragon launch for NASA astronauts Butch Wilmore and Sunita Williams, who became first crew to fly Boeing's Starliner capsule.

Mission originally planned for just 8 days 

astronauts' test mission, initially expected to last about eight days on station, has been drawn out by issues on Starliner's propulsion system that have increasingly called into question craft's ability to safely return m to Earth as planned.

A Boeing spokesperson said if NASA decides to change Starliner's mission, company "will take actions necessary to configure Starliner for an uncrewed return."

Thruster failures during Starliner's initial approach to ISS in June and several leaks of helium - used to pressurize those thrusters - have set Boeing off on a testing campaign to understand cause and propose fixes to NASA, which has final say. Recent results have uneard new information, causing greater alarm about a safe return.

latest test data have stirred disagreements and debate within NASA about wher to accept risk of a Starliner return to Earth, or make call to use Crew Dragon inste.

Using a X craft to return astronauts that Boeing h planned to bring back on Starliner would be a major blow to an aero giant that has struggled for years to compete with X and its more experienced Crew Dragon.

Starliner can be docked to maximum 90 days

Starliner has been docked to ISS for 63 of maximum 90 days it can stay, and it is parked at same port that Crew Dragon will have to use to deliver upcoming astronaut crew.

Early Tuesday morning, NASA, using a X rocket and a rthrop Grumman capsule, delivered a routine shipment of food and supplies to station, including extra clos for Wilmore and Williams.

Starliner's high-stakes mission is a final test required before NASA can certify craft for routine astronaut flights to and from ISS. Crew Dragon received NASA approval for astronaut flights in 2020.

Starliner development has been set back by manment issues and numerous engineering problems. It has cost Boeing $1.6 billion since 2016, including $125 million from Starliner's current test mission, securities filings show.

Concerns at NASA

A meeting this week of NASA's Commercial Crew Program, which oversees Starliner, ended with some officials disagreeing with a plan to accept Boeing's testing data and use Starliner to bring astronauts home, officials said during a news conference.

"We didn't poll in a way that led to a conclusion," Commercial Crew Program chief Steve Stich said.

"We heard from a lot of folks that h concerns, and decision was t clear," Ken Bowersox, NASA's operations chief, ded.

A Boeing executive was t at Wednesday press conference.

While decision has been me on using Starliner or Crew Dragon, NASA has been buying Boeing more time to do more testing and gar more data to build a better case to trust Starliner. Sometime next week is when NASA expects to decide, officials said.

ncy on Tuesday delayed by more than a month X's upcoming Crew Dragon mission, a routine flight called Crew-9, that is expected to send three NASA astronauts and a Russian cosmonaut to ISS.

NASA's ISS program chief said ncy has t yet decided which astronauts y would pull off mission for Wilmore and Williams if needed.

Boeing's testing so far has shown that four of Starliner's jets h failed in June because y overheated and automatically turned off, while or thrusters re-fired during tests appeared weaker than rmal because of some restriction to ir propellant.

Ground tests in late July at White Sands Missile Range in New Mexico have helped reveal that thrusters' overheating causes a teflon seal to warp, choking propellant tubes for thrusters and reby weakening ir thrust.

"That, I would say, upped level of discomfort, and t having a total understanding of physics of what's happening," Stich said, describing why NASA w appears more willing to discuss a Crew Dragon contingency after previously downplaying such a prospect to reporters.

With inputs from Reuters