NASA astronauts and officials said Wednesday that Boeing Co’s Starliner space capsule is ready for an uncrewed launch to the International Space Station this week, a long-delayed test mission meant to demonstrate the aerospace giant’s ability to safely fly humans in space.
Boeing’s CST-100 Starliner capsule, a gumdrop-shaped astronaut pod, has suffered a series of setbacks in recent years. In 2019, software failures thwarted its first attempt to dock with the space station. Fuel valve problems last year added nine months to the delay.
At 6:54 p.m. EDT (2254 GMT) on Thursday, Starliner will make another attempt to launch to the space station without any astronauts aboard, aiming to provide Boeing with much-needed success as the company works to recover from successive crises in its jetliner business and elsewhere in its space and defense unit.
“We wouldn’t be here right now if we weren’t confident that this would be a successful mission,” said Butch Wilmore, a NASA astronaut who is expected to fly on Starliner’s first crewed flight sometime in the future. “We’re ready. This spacecraft is fully functional.”
“The teams have been working really hard to get ready for this,” added Kathy Lueders, NASA’s space operations chief, underlining that the Starliner flight is a test mission. “We learned a lot from the first uncrewed demo (in 2019). We’re gonna learn a lot from the second one.”
Last year’s valve issues prompted Boeing to develop temporary fixes for this week’s mission, according to company officials, who added that longer-term fixes will be implemented after the mission.
According to Reuters, the issues have triggered a conflict with one of Boeing’s key suppliers for the Starliner.
Starliner will attempt to dock at the space station on Friday and will stay for four to five days before returning to Earth.
If everything goes as planned, Starliner could launch its first crew of astronauts this fall, though NASA officials warn that this could be delayed.
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