US astronauts on eight-day trip may be stuck on ISS until 2025

Two US astronauts who blasted into space for an eight-day mission in June may be stuck on the International Space Station (ISS) until next year if their Boeing Starliner cannot be repaired for their return home, Nasa has said.

- Lauren Aratani

Nasa officials said the astronauts, Butch Wilmore and Sunita Williams, who became the first crew to fly in the Starliner capsule, could return on SpaceX's Crew Dragon in February if the craft was still deemed unsafe.

The US space agency has been discussing potential plans with SpaceX to leave two seats empty on a forthcoming Crew Dragon launchitself delayed by a month on Tuesday - as Nasa and Boeing work out how to bring the astronauts home.

The astronauts' test mission, which began on 5 June, was initially expected to last about eight days. But it has been drawn out by problems with Starliner's propulsion system that have increasingly called into question the spacecraft's ability to safely return them to Earth.