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Hello and receive back to TechCrunch Space . NASA leadership have made their conclusion : Starliner will be come back to Earth — empty . More on that below .

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Story of the week

After months of data analysis and internal weighing , NASA leaders herald on Saturday that Starliner will be come back to Earth in September , without a work party . Meanwhile , astronauts Butch Wilmore and Sunita Williams will remain on - board the International Space Station until February 2025 , when they will return on SpaceX ’s Dragon spacecraft as part of the Crew-9 deputation .

“ Spaceflight is speculative , even at its safest and most routine , ” allege NASA Administrator Bill Nelson . “ A test flight , by nature , is neither safe , nor routine . The decision to keep Butch and Suni aboard the International Space Station and bring in Boeing ’s Starliner home uncrewed is the result of our commitment to condom : our core value and our North Star . ”

Launchers to come

As the world-wide appetency for orbital launches continue to produce , the contender among newfangled and old blank space company to build handsome and better launching vehicles is firing up . ICYMI , here ’s my overview of the medium- , heavy- and first-rate - heavy aerodynamic lift rocket landscape , from vehicles that are currently operational to those projectile yet to flee .

This week in space history

NASA ’s investigation Voyager 2 made its closest encounter to Saturn on August 26 , 1981 , at a reach of just 63,000 miles . Voyager 2 is such a cool mission : The little probe did flybys of Jupiter , Saturn , Uranus and Neptune , and became the 2d space vehicle to enter interstellar space , or the space between stars . By the metre it concluded observations in the Saturn system on September 28 , the ballistic capsule had transmitted 16,000 image of the planet and the surrounding space .