NASA announced Oct. 15 it will use SpaceX's Crew Dragon spacecraft for crew rotation missions to the International Space Station in 2025 as it considers whether Boeing's CST-100 Starliner needs an additional test flight before starting operational missions.

NASA said it will use Crew Dragon for both the Crew-10 and Crew-11 missions to the ISS. Crew-10 is scheduled for launch no earlier than February 2025 with NASA astronauts Anne McClain and Nichole Ayers, Japanese astronaut Takuya Onishi and Russian cosmonaut Kirill Peskov. NASA has not yet announced the crew for Crew-11.

The agency had hoped earlier this year that Boeing's Starliner would be certified in time for a mission in early 2025. However, issues with the Crew Flight Test mission that launched in June with veteran NASA astronauts Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams led NASA to conclude by July that the spacecraft would not be certified in time. That pushed back the Starliner-1 mission from February to August 2025 and required NASA to move up Crew-10.

NASA said in its statement that the timing and configuration of the next Starliner flight "will be determined based on Boeing's progress toward system certification." The agency left open the possibility of scheduling an inaugural Starliner flight in 2025.

The agency has not provided significant updates about its review of the Starliner Crew Flight Test mission since the uncrewed spacecraft landed Sept. 7 in New Mexico. During the review, agency officials had suggested they might proceed directly to the Starliner-1 mission despite some technical issues, such as thruster failures and helium leaks, during the test flight.

Pam Melroy, NASA deputy administrator, said at an Oct. 11 press conference that the Starliner review was still ongoing. "We're still looking at the data," she said, adding the agency was considering whether another test flight was needed. "We don't have a timeline for when that data review is going to be complete."

Another issue facing the commercial crew program is whether NASA and Roscosmos will continue to exchange seats on Soyuz and commercial crew vehicles. The practice of flying integrated crews, with NASA astronauts on Soyuz and Roscosmos cosmonauts on Crew Dragon, is intended to ensure both agencies maintain a presence on the station should either vehicle be grounded for an extended period.

NASA currently has no astronauts assigned to future Soyuz missions other than Loral O'Hara, who is scheduled to launch on the Soyuz MS-24 mission to the ISS in March 2024. Russian officials released in August crew manifests for the next two Soyuz missions, MS-25 and MS-26, that included only Roscosmos cosmonauts.

NASA Administrator Bill Nelson, speaking at an Oct. 3 press conference during the International Astronautical Congress, said he was confident NASA and Roscosmos would reach an agreement to extend the seat barter arrangement. "That will proceed in regular order," he said of those negotiations.