WASHINGTON, DC : The next attempt of the first manned launch of the Indian-origin piloted capsule of Boeing’s Starliner to the International Space Station is now planned on June 5, the US National Aeronautics and Space Administration said on Monday.
The launch comes after the inaugural test flight launch attempt was scrubbed on Saturday, and is next planned from Space Launch Complex-41 at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida.
The Starliner mission, which will carry NASA astronauts, Sunita ‘Suni’ Williams and Barry-Butch’ Wilmore about a week-long mission to the orbiting space station, was cancelled on June 2 several minutes before liftoff.
Saturday’s scrubbing marked the sixth time the launch was called off due to technical issues.
“NASA, Boeing, and ULA (United Launch Alliance) are forgoing a Crew Flight Test launch attempt on June 2, to give the team additional time to assess a ground support equipment issue,” NASA said today.
“The next available launch opportunities are Wednesday, June 5, and Thursday, June 6,” the US space agency said.
NASA astronauts Williams and Wilmore, who will be the first to launch aboard Boeing’s Starliner spacecraft, remain in quarantine at the space agency’s Kennedy Space Centre and will take part in pilot proficiency and other training activities leading up to launch.
Saturday’s launch was aborted as a ground system computer triggered an automatic abort command that shut down the launch sequence.
Technicians and engineers with ULA (United Launch Alliance) worked overnight to assess the ground support equipment at the launch pad that encountered issues during the countdown and identified an issue with a single ground power supply within one of the three redundant chassis that provides power to a subset of computer cards controlling various system functions.
The chassis containing the faulty ground power unit was removed, visually inspected, and replaced with a spare chassis. No signs of physical damage were observed, the space agency said.
Once launched, the Starliner is expected to arrive at the space station after a flight of about 24 hours and dock with the orbiting research outpost some 402 km above Earth.
The mission, dubbed the Crew Flight Test, will be a stepping stone to getting NASA clearance deeming Boeing’s spacecraft ready for regular operations.
The launch is part of NASA’s “commercial crew programme”, which selected Boeing and SpaceX to develop spacecraft to carry astronauts to the International Space Station after NASA retired its Space Shuttle Program in the year 2011. Boeing received over USD 4 billion in US federal funds to develop the Starliner, while SpaceX received about USD 2.6 billion.
While the Elon Musk-owned SpaceX company’s Crew Dragon has performed 12 crewed missions to the ISS since its first launch on May 30, 2020, Boeing’s Starliner has been faced with multiple setbacks.
Mission managers of the Starliner’s debut human flight called off the mission on May 7, just two hours before the scheduled launch due to a valve glitch in the Atlas 5 rocket’s upper stage. Boeing said in a statement that the valve was successfully replaced on May 11 and tested to confirm it was working properly.
Later on May 14, NASA announced that the CFT mission scheduled for May 17 had been pushed to no later than May 21 due to what it described as a “small helium leak” in the spacecraft’s service module.
On May 17 the space agency said that the launch was further pushed back to May 25. For NASA astronaut Sunita Williams, this Starliner mission will mark her third mission in space.
Incidentally, Sunita was the one who gave the name Calypso to the Starliner capsule. (ANI)