Pilot Sunita “Suni” Williams and Commander Barry “Butch” Wilmore from NASA’s Boeing Starliner will return home in 2025 on a SpaceX flight. The news comes more than two months after the astronauts embarked on their mission, which was scheduled to be an eight-day stay in space.
“NASA has decided that Butch and Suni will return with [SpaceX’s] Crew-9 next February, and that Starliner will return unscrewed,” NASA administrator Bill Nelson said during a press conference on August 24, according to the space agency’s website.
Nelson went on to note that Boeing “has worked very hard with NASA to get the necessary data to make this decision” while pointing out that space travel comes with risks.
After extensive review by experts across the agency, NASA's @BoeingSpace Crew Flight Test will return with an uncrewed #Starliner. Astronauts Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams are scheduled to return to Earth next spring aboard #Crew9: https://t.co/bfjenUU1Jf pic.twitter.com/c4NzZVJcvw
— NASA (@NASA) August 24, 2024
“We want to further understand the root causes and understand the design improvements so that the Boeing Starliner will serve as an important part of our assured crew access to the ISS,” he explained, per NASA. “Space flight is risky, even at its safest and even at its most routine, and a test flight by nature is neither safe nor routine, and so the decision to keep Butch and Suni aboard the International Space Station and bring the Boeing Starliner home uncrewed is a result of a commitment to safety: our core value and our North Star. I’m grateful to both the NASA and Boeing teams for all their incredible and detailed work.”
Williams and Witmore embarked on their ISS mission on June 5. The mission was a test for Starliner in order to receive NASA’s approval for future routine flights. After launching from Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida, the Starliner’s technical issues unfurled, resulting in a months-long stay in space for the commander and the pilot. Among the mechanical issues were helium leaks, per NASA.
Butch and Suni will continue to contribute to @ISS_Research aboard the station before heading home in a @SpaceX Dragon spacecraft. Read about their work so far: https://t.co/zy3B0KXzEP
Follow our blogs for the latest @Space_Station and #Starliner updates: https://t.co/M7G4xLhChJ pic.twitter.com/0wX2xeom9V
— NASA (@NASA) August 24, 2024
Following a review, NASA concluded that it was safer for Williams and Whitmore to return home via SpaceX’s Crew Dragon capsule in February 2025.
NASA’s Commercial Crew Program manager, Steve Stich, insisted that Starliner “is a very capable spacecraft and, ultimately, this comes down to needing a higher level of certainty to perform a crewed return.”
“The NASA and Boeing teams have completed a tremendous amount of testing and analysis, and this flight test is providing critical information on Starliner’s performance in space,” Stich added. “Our efforts will help prepare for the uncrewed return and will greatly benefit future corrective actions for the spacecraft.”