On August 6, the US National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) postponed SpaceX's flight carrying astronauts to the International Space Station (ISS) due to problems related to Boeing's Starliner spacecraft.

After launching two NASA astronauts to the ISS in early June, the Starliner spacecraft has been grounded for the past two months due to thruster problems and a helium leak during its flight. It is currently unclear when the spacecraft will be able to return to Earth.

The flight is scheduled to carry the next group of four ISS crew members, known as Crew-9, in mid-August, to replace the current group of four (Crew-8) on the space station.

However, due to the Starliner incident with two more astronauts “stranded”, NASA had to come up with another plan to bring them back to Earth.

According to NASA, the Crew-9 flight, scheduled to take off as early as September 24, could bring back the two stranded astronauts and only the two Crew-8 members, giving Boeing more time to fix Starliner problems.

In the event that Starliner's safety issues are not resolved, the spacecraft could return to Earth unmanned.

NASA plans to hold a press conference on August 7 to update information about Crew-9 and the Starliner spacecraft.