NASA's Starliner Comeback: Uncrewed Flight in December, Astronauts in 2028

NASA has unveiled a long-awaited road map to bring Boeing's troubled Starliner spacecraft back to flight, announcing that the capsule will launch to the International Space Station as early as December without a crew — and that astronauts could be back on board by 2028. The plan, revealed Monday by NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman, marks the first detailed return-to-flight schedule since the 2024 test flight that left two American astronauts stranded in orbit for nine months.

Boeing's Starliner rolls out to the launch pad ahead of its June 2024 crewed test flight. (Photo: Space.com)

The Announcement

At a news conference on September 28, Isaacman said Starliner's next flight — dubbed Starliner-1 — will be an uncrewed engineering evaluation mission carrying cargo to the ISS. The flight will launch no earlier than December 2026, with some reporting placing the window between December and January 2027.

The purpose, Isaacman said, is to “validate the recent remediation effort” — to prove in orbit that the fixes Boeing has spent more than two years implementing actually work. NASA will gather the flight data, continue implementing the remaining changes recommended by the Program Investigation Team report, and then, Isaacman said, “plan for a crewed Starliner Two mission in 2028.”

NASA also named the astronaut who will command that first crewed return: Warren “Woody” Hoburg, a veteran of one long-duration ISS mission. The remaining crew members have not yet been announced.

Speaking at the briefing, Hoburg was bluntly optimistic. “Bottom line: We’re on the right path,” he said. He also paid tribute to Starliner’s original test pilots, Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams, who are now both retired, calling them “American heroes” and adding that he is “deeply humbled to follow in their 

Starliner approaching the International Space Station during its uncrewed OFT-2 test flight. (Photo: Boeing)

What Went Wrong

The road map matters because Starliner’s history has been one of repeated, high-profile failure. The capsule’s first uncrewed Orbital Flight Test in December 2019 ended up in the wrong orbit. A second attempt, OFT-2, flew in May 2022. The first crewed flight — the Crew Flight Test of June 2024 — was the worst chapter of all.

Astronauts Suni Williams and Butch Wilmore lifted off for what was supposed to be an eight-to-14-day shakedown mission. In orbit, the spacecraft suffered helium leaks and five of its 28 reaction control system thrusters failed. NASA ultimately judged the spacecraft unsafe for the return trip. Starliner came home uncrewed in September 2024, while Williams and Wilmore were transferred to the station’s crew rotation and spent another six months in orbit, finally returning aboard a SpaceX Crew Dragon in March 2025 — nearly nine months after launch.

In February 2026, NASA retroactively classified the Starliner Crew Flight Test as a Type A mishap — the agency’s most severe category, the same classification given to the deadly Challenger and Columbia space shuttle disasters.

Root Causes — Finally Found

At the briefing, NASA and Boeing said they now understand exactly what went wrong, down to the chemical level. According to Dana Weigel, NASA’s manager for the Low Earth Orbit Program, the helium leaks were traced to the seal material in the helium system, which broke down after long exposure to the nitrogen tetroxide oxidizer. Boeing has changed the seal material and selected seals at the larger end of the tolerance range.

The thruster problems had a separate cause: corrosion from leftover hydrazine reacting with carbon dioxide in the air while the hardware sat on the ground. Boeing has added procedures to flush the thrusters and keep them purged, and — in a sweeping hardware change — is replacing the valves on all 12 crew module thrusters on each of its two spacecraft. That work is already underway.

Other upgrades include new batteries, a redesign of the parachute joints, and a higher-frequency data recorder. But one problem cannot be patched with the current hardware: the service module thruster’s valve poppet, which Weigel said must be redesigned for the crewed vehicle before astronauts fly again. That redesign, she acknowledged, “will take some time.”

“On the mechanical side, we’re not able to address that with the current design. That’s what’s driving the need to do a modification to the poppet,” Weigel said. She stressed that the December flight alone will not clear Starliner to carry crew — everyone must be confident every problem is resolved first.

John Mulholland, Boeing’s vice president and program manager for Commercial Crew, said the company has treated the investigation as a reset. “It’s been a renewed focus for the company to make sure safety is first,” he said.

What This Means

The stakes of the December flight go well beyond one company’s reputation. NASA has always wanted two American spacecraft capable of flying astronauts to and from orbit, so it is not dependent on a single provider. Elon Musk’s SpaceX became the first private company to send astronauts to orbit in 2020 and has been the only other US spacecraft to fly NASA crews to the ISS since then. Now, according to reports, SpaceX plans to end production of its reusable Crew Dragon capsules, which makes a working Starliner more important, not less.

The price tag reflects that ambition. CNN reports NASA expects to pay an additional $359 million for Starliner’s upgrades and the certification of a new rocket to carry it.

That rocket question is its own challenge. Starliner has always launched on United Launch Alliance's Atlas V — a rocket that is being retired. NASA said it is working with Boeing and ULA to certify the new Vulcan Centaur rocket for crewed missions. Reports indicate Starliner-1 through Starliner-4 will still fly on Atlas V, with the planned fifth and sixth Starliner flights switching to Vulcan.

Isaacman said NASA intends to exercise options for those fifth and sixth Starliner ISS flights — a strong vote of confidence that the program has a future beyond the comeback test.

Starliner lifts off on its June 2024 crew flight test, the mission that left two astronauts at the ISS for nine months. (Photo: SpaceNews)

What Happens Next

The near-term calendar is clear. If all goes to plan, an uncrewed Starliner will dock with the International Space Station this December or in January 2027, carrying cargo and a heavy load of engineering data. NASA and Boeing will spend the months afterward validating every system against the flight results.

Only then can the calendar turn to astronauts. Officials said the earliest a crewed Starliner could fly is mid-2028, with Hoburg in command of Starliner-2 and up to five more crewed Starliner missions envisioned after that. With the ISS slated for decommissioning in the early 2030s, the window for Starliner to prove itself as a working crew taxi is finite — but, for the first time in years, it is open.