Boeing’s first manned spacecraft arrived at the ISS, but with setbacks

The first manned space mission of the Boeing company arrived on Thursday at the International Space Station (ISS) with two NASA astronauts on board after taking off from Florida on Wednesday after almost a year of delays due to technical problems.

The capsule, manned by astronauts Barry ‘Butch’ Wilmore and Sunita ‘Suni’ Williams, and with a load of 345 kilos, arrived at the ISS on Thursday around 17:34 GMT and began its process of docking with this orbital laboratory. , NASA reported.

The mission will allow Boeing to obtain the necessary certifications to operate as a second provider of cargo and crew transportation to the ISS, as SpaceX already does after million-dollar contracts that both private firms have signed with NASA.

Starliner took flight on Wednesday at 10:52 local time (14:52 GMT), from a platform at the Cape Canaveral Space Force Station (Florida).

About five minutes later, the Atlas V booster rocket from the United Launch Alliance (ULA) company separated from the capsule, which subsequently continued the journey on its own until reaching the orbit that took it to the ISS.

NASA indicated that the spacecraft will be fitted into the Harmony module of the ISS and will remain in this orbital laboratory for a week before embarking on its return, scheduled for June 14.

During the trip, Wilmore and Williams carried out a series of tests on the ship, and if possible they will also do so while it is docked with the space station.

The astronauts successfully performed Starliner manual piloting demonstrations and completed a sleep period, according to NASA.

Mission teams also identified three helium leaks on the spacecraft. One of them was previously discussed before the flight along with a management plan, and the other two are new since the spacecraft reached orbit.

The CFT (Crew Flight Test) mission took off after overcoming a series of problems in recent weeks, related both to the Atlas V rocket, which thus made its first launch for a manned mission, as well as a small leak of helium in the ship.

NASA and Boeing had planned the mission for May 6, but about two hours before launch they discovered an anomaly in a liquid oxygen tank on the Atlas V.

This, however, was not the first postponement. The first manned mission of the Starliner (which in May 2022 successfully completed an uncrewed trip to the ISS) should have taken off in July 2023, but a month before the managers announced the indefinite postponement of takeoff in order to solve the ship’s parachute.

If the mission is successfully completed, NASA will complete the certification process towards the end of this year and, in that case, Boeing plans to make its first operational trip to the ISS in February 2025.

Elon Musk’s SpaceX, for its part, since May 2020, has carried out 13 manned space trips in its Dragon capsule, including four for commercial clients, and twelve of which have been to the ISS. In all of them it has transported 50 people, including astronauts, cosmonauts and private citizens.