Skip to main content

NASA selects new date for Starliner’s crewed return

Boeing Space's Starliner docked at the International Space Station in June 2024.
The Starliner spacecraft is shown docked to the Harmony module’s forward port at the International Space Station, 263 miles above the Mediterranean Sea. NASA

Boeing Space’s Starliner crew capsule is now expected to depart the International Space Station (ISS) on Tuesday, June 25, NASA has said.

Starliner, on its first crewed mission, delivered NASA astronauts Suni Williams and Butch Wilmore to the ISS on June 6 after launching atop a ULA Atlas V rocket from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida the previous day.

Recommended Videos

The Starliner and its two crew members were only supposed to stay at the ISS for about a week, but it was later decided to extend the mission to June 22 to conduct engine tests to evaluate the performance of the Starliner’s reaction control thrusters after some of them exhibited issues during the spacecraft’s final approach to the ISS when it arrived there earlier this month. Those tests were carried out over the weekend and mission teams supporting the Starliner flight will continue to review the resulting data.

Please enable Javascript to view this content

In all, five of the Starliner’s 28 reaction control thrusters failed on final approach, though four of them eventually began working again. The reaction control thrusters will play a vital role during the Starliner’s reentry into Earth’s atmosphere by helping to maintain proper orientation of the crew capsule.

NASA has now decided to keep the Starliner at the orbital outpost for several more days and is targeting no earlier than 10:10 p.m. ET on Tuesday, June 25, for the undocking of the Starliner spacecraft.

Assuming NASA sticks to its latest departure schedule, Williams and Wilmore will land at about 4:51 a.m. ET on Wednesday, June 26, in the desert grounds of White Sands Space Harbor in New Mexico. The homecoming will mark the first time an American capsule has touched down on land with astronauts aboard, with previous landings having taken place on water.

This is the second time for the Starliner to rendezvous with the space station, though its first visit, in 2022, was without any astronauts on board.

Trevor Mogg
Contributing Editor
Not so many moons ago, Trevor moved from one tea-loving island nation that drives on the left (Britain) to another (Japan)…
This astronaut took an astonishing number of photos during his 2024 mission
Matthew Dominick in the Cupola on space station.

If Matthew Dominick ever offers to show you his travel photos, just confirm with him first that he’s edited them down from the half a million pictures that he took during his trip into space.

Yes, that’s how many images the NASA astronaut captured during his six-month stay aboard the International Space Station (ISS), which ended in October.

Read more
2025 could be a big year in the endeavor to replace the space station
Vast Space's Haven-2 space station.

Vast Unveils Final Design for Haven-1, the World’s First Commercial Space Station

Humans have been living and working aboard the International Space Station (ISS) since 2000, but like every piece of aging machinery, the orbital outpost has a limited lifespan.

Read more
ISS astronauts enjoy a microgravity holiday with Brussels sprouts and more
ISS astronauts celebrating the holidays.

Holiday celebrations for astronauts aboard the International Space Station (ISS) are pretty similar to how they are on Earth, except for two main factors: the absence of gravity, and a food selection that doesn’t quite match what many earthlings will be enjoying back on terra firma.

As is customary, the current ISS crew of seven inhabitants has been sharing some festive photos from the orbital outpost about 250 miles above Earth.

Read more