Boeing's Starliner set for first crewed mission to ISS
After years of delay, Boeing Starliner spacecraft is ready to ferry 2 veteran astronauts on a final Test mission powered by an Atlas rocket. The capsule will take off from Cape Canaveral on Monday evening and will dock with the International Space Station 26 hours later. If I was a young astronaut and I was thinking about going to the moon, I think I’d put my hand up and say I want to fly Starliner. Boeing is trying to catch up to its rival SpaceX, which has brought 50 people to space on its Crew Dragon craft since 2020. Boeing, however, has trod a much more difficult road to human spaceflight. It first attempted to rendezvous with the ISS in 2019, but failed to complete its mission due to technical difficulties. Another attempted unmanned mission was successful at 2022, but also had issues nonetheless. NASA is optimistic about the current test. Do we expect it to go perfectly? This is the first human flight to the spacecraft. I’m sure we’ll find things out where That’s why we do this. Should the test flight be successful, it will pave the way for Boeing to begin regular service to the ISS for NASA’s Commercial Crew program. NASA ended its space shuttle program in 2011 and has since relied on Russia and SpaceX for transportation. Coordination between Russian and American space agencies has stalled as NASA has cut most ties since Russia’s full scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022.