NASA announced Monday that it will purchase two additional crewed flights on Boeing's Starliner spacecraft and provide $359 million to help Boeing rebuild overheated thrusters and certify United Launch Alliance's Vulcan rocket for human missions. The decision confirms earlier reporting and secures NASA a path to low-Earth orbit after SpaceX's Crew Dragon is retired, likely by 2030.
Boeing's Starliner program has struggled for years, with failed uncrewed test flights in 2019 and 2022 and a near-catastrophic thruster issue during its first crewed test in 2024. The company has absorbed more than $2 billion in losses on the program, and NASA has already paid $5.1 billion under the fixed-price Commercial Crew contract. The new funding suggests NASA concluded that abandoning the investment would be worse than continuing.
NASA Administrator Jared Isaacman said future demand will be only two seats every six to nine months, and he appeared reluctant to fund a new crew competition. Boeing, for its part, is "incredibly excited" about the partnership, but it will likely hold a monopoly on crew transportation for a time. The company has agreed to a price of about $90 million per seat for Starliner-2 through Starliner-6, yet it declined to commit to seat prices in the 2030s, citing the uncertified Vulcan rocket and spacecraft.