CAPE CANAVERAL: Launch day is finally here: Boeing’s Starliner capsule blasted off Monday on its first crewed mission to the International Space Station — years after SpaceX reached the same milestone.
The flight, the final test before the Starliner enters regular service for NASA, is critical for the US space agency, whose reputation has suffered of late due to safety issues with some of its passenger jets.
The Starliner, first ordered by the US space agency a decade ago, has had a bumpy ride to the finish line with surprising setbacks and numerous delays – a saga Boeing is keen to end.
Astronauts Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams are scheduled to lift off from Cape Canaveral on Monday at 10:34 p.m. in the capsule. The Starliner will be launched into orbit by an Atlas V rocket manufactured by United Launch Alliance, a Boeing-Lockheed Martin joint venture. Wilmore and Williams, both Navy-trained space program veterans, have each been to the ISS twice, once on a space shuttle and then aboard a Russian Soyuz.
„It’s going to be like coming home,” Williams said. As for the Boeing spacecraft, Willmore said: “Everything is new. Everything is unique. ” “I don’t think any of us ever dreamed that we would be associated with the first flight of a brand new spacecraft.”
For NASA, the stakes are also high: Having a second option for human spaceflight in addition to SpaceX’s Dragon vehicles is „very important,” said Dana Weigel, manager of the agency’s International Space Station program.
Posted on May 5, 2024 at dawn
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