NASA turned to American companies for astronaut trips after the space shuttles were retired. Elon Musk’s SpaceX has made nine taxi rides for NASA since 2020, while Boeing has only made a pair of unoccupied test flights.
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Published on May 4, 2024 • 4 minute reading
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CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. — After years of delays and setbacks, Boeing is finally ready to send astronauts to the International Space Station for NASA.
It is the first flight of Boeing’s Starliner capsule with a crew on board, a pair of NASA pilots who will check out the spacecraft during the test drive and a weeklong stay at the space station.
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NASA turned to American companies for astronaut trips after the space shuttles were retired. Elon Musk’s SpaceX has made nine taxi rides for NASA since 2020, while Boeing has only made a pair of unoccupied test flights.
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Boeing program manager Mark Nappi wishes Starliner was more advanced. “There’s no doubt about that, but we’re already here.”
The company’s long-awaited astronaut demonstration is scheduled to take off Monday night.
If this test goes well, NASA will alternate between Boeing and SpaceX to fly astronauts to and from the space station.
A look at the newest voyage and its test cruise:
THE CAPSULE
White with black and blue trim, Boeing’s Starliner capsule measures about 3 meters high and 4.5 meters in diameter. It can hold up to seven people, although NASA crews will normally be four. The company opted for the name Starliner nearly a decade ago, a variation on the name of Boeing’s first Stratoliner and the current Dreamliner.
There was no one aboard the two previous test flights of Boeing’s Starliner. The first, in 2019, suffered software problems so severe that its empty capsule could not reach the station until the second attempt in 2022. Then, last summer, weak parachutes and flammable tape emerged that needed to be repaired or removed.
THE GANG
Veteran NASA astronauts Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams are retired Navy captains who spent months aboard the space station years ago. They joined the test flight after the original crew pulled out as delays piled up. Wilmore, 61, is a former fighter pilot from Mount Juliet, Tennessee, and Williams, 58, is a helicopter pilot from Needham, Massachusetts. The duo have been involved in the development of the capsule and insist that Starliner is ready for prime time, otherwise they would. Do not fasten your seatbelt for the launch.
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“We’re not going to bury our heads in the sand,” Williams told The Associated Press. “Of course, Boeing has had its problems. But we are the QA (quality assurance). “Our eyes are on the spaceship.”
THE TEST FLIGHT
Starliner will lift off on United Launch Alliance’s Atlas V rocket from Cape Canaveral Space Force Station. It will be the first time astronauts have traveled on an Atlas since NASA’s Project Mercury, beginning with John Glenn when he became the first American to orbit Earth in 1962. Sixty-two years later, this will be the 100th launch of the Atlas V, which is used to hoist satellites and spacecraft.
“We are very careful with each mission. “We are super, dumb, dumb careful” about human missions, said Tory Bruno, chief executive of ULA, a joint venture of Boeing and Lockheed Martin.
Starliner should reach the space station in about 26 hours. The seven residents of the station will be attentive to the arrival of the capsule. The arrival of a new vehicle is “a big problem. You leave nothing to chance,” NASA astronaut Michael Barratt told the AP from orbit. Starliner will remain docked for eight days, undergoing checks before landing in New Mexico or elsewhere in the American West.
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STARLINER VS. CONTINUE
Both companies’ capsules are designed to be self-contained and reusable. This Starliner is the same one that made the first test flight in 2019. Unlike SpaceX’s Dragons, the Starliner has traditional hand controls and switches along with touch screens and, according to astronauts, looks more like the Orion capsules of the NASA for lunar missions. Wilmore and Williams will briefly take manual control to squeeze the systems on their way to the space station.
NASA gave Boeing, a longtime space contractor, more than $4 billion to develop the capsule, while SpaceX received $2.6 billion. SpaceX was already in the station delivery business and simply remodeled its cargo crew capsule. While SpaceX uses the boss’s Teslas to ferry astronauts to the launch pad, Boeing will use a more traditional “astrovan” equipped with a video screen Wilmore says will play Top Gun: Maverick.
One big difference at the end of the flight: Starliner lands on the ground with padded airbags, while Dragon launches into the sea.
THE FUTURE
Boeing has committed to six Starliner trips for NASA after this one, which will take the company to the station’s planned end in 2030. Boeing’s Nappi is reluctant to talk about other potential customers until this maiden flight with crew. But the company has said a fifth seat will be available for private customers. SpaceX regularly sells seats to tycoons and even countries eager to bring their citizens to the station for a couple of weeks.
Coming soon: Sierra Space’s mini shuttle, Dream Chaser, which will deliver cargo to the station later this year or next, before accepting passengers.
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