NASA decides to keep two astronauts in space until February, rejects return in troubled Boeing capsule

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. (AP) - NASA ruled Saturday that it's too risky to bring two astronauts back to Earth in Boeing's troubled new capsule and that they'll have to wait until next year for a trip home with SpaceX. The pair's week-long test flight will now take more than eight months.

Experienced pilots have been stranded on the International Space Station since early June. Their journey to the space station was complicated by a cascade of nasty nozzle failures and a helium leak in the new capsule, so they ended up in a holding pattern while engineers conducted tests and discussed what to do about the return trip.

After nearly three months, a decision finally came down from the highest levels of NASA on Saturday. Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams will return in a SpaceX spacecraft in February. Their empty Starliner capsule will undock in early September and attempt to return to autopilot and land in the New Mexico desert.

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