NASA names astronauts for Boeing, SpaceX flights to ISS scheduled for 2019

NASA has named the astronauts chosen to fly on commercial spacecraft made by Boeing and SpaceX to and from the International Space Station, the research laboratory that orbits around Earth.

Their voyages are scheduled to begin next year, and they would be the first American astronauts to launch from United States soil since 2011. NASA retired its space shuttle fleet that year, and started sending astronauts to the ISS aboard the Russian Soyuz spacecraft, at a cost that has risen to $81 million per seat.

“What an exciting and amazing day,” Jim Bridenstine, NASA’s administrator, said at the announcement at