NASA freezes Starliner missions

Would be clearer to say that its return to flight has been delayed to at least around a year from now.

For the fall/winter 2025 rotation they're going to plan with it being a Crew Dragon flight for now, subject to change depending on how Starliner's fixes go.

They also somewhat misleadingly say that NASA will also rely on Soyuz because of Starliner's unavailability, but that's just about the seat swap arrangement which helps to ensure that both the US and Russia can maintain a continuous presence if either side's vehicles have trouble. IIRC the agreement is expiring and NASA's interested in extending it, but Roscosmos hasn't agreed yet. I say misleading because I think they intended to extend that agreement regardless of Starliner's status.

> Would be clearer to say that its return to flight has been delayed to at least around a year from now

No. The ISS is decommissioned in 2030 and Boeing is losing money on the programme. It makes sense for nobody to continue this charade.

It is unhealthy to not have competition to SpaceX.

> unhealthy to not have competition to SpaceX

Agree. That’s why Starliner should be killed. To open those resources to someone who actually intends to compete with SpaceX.

Boeing is clearly a company in the death spiral stage of institutional decline. It happens to most institutions, unfortunately, and it will probably happen to spacex one day.

That’s why it’s critical to maintain a regulatory environment and supportive infrastructure so that scrappy innovative new competitors can rise up. To do that, the dead standing wood needs to be felled.

Despite Boeing doing an admirable job of falling down on its own, it would probably still be useful to not keep feeding the decay.