Wilmore and Williams — retired Navy captains and former space station residents — stressed repeatedly before the launch that they had full confidence in...
NASA astronauts Butch Wilmore, right and Suni Williams wait for liftoff inside the Boeing Starliner capsule at Space Launch Complex 41 Wednesday, June 5, 2024, in Cape Canaveral, Fla. The two astronauts are scheduled to liftoff on the Boeing Starliner capsule for a trip to the international space station. A pair of NASA test pilots blasted off aboard Boeing’s Starliner capsule for the International Space Station, the first to fly the new spacecraft.
“I know it’s been a long road to get here,” NASA’s commercial crew program manager Steve Stich said before the weekend delay.Boeing was hired alongside Elon Musk’s SpaceX a decade ago to ferry NASA’s astronauts to and from the space station. The space agency wanted two competing U.S. companies for the job in the wake of the space shuttles’ retirement, paying $4.2 billion to Boeing and just over half that to SpaceX, which refashioned the capsule it was using to deliver station supplies.
SpaceX launched astronauts into orbit in 2020, becoming the first private business to achieve what only three countries — Russia, the U.S. and China — had mastered. It has taken nine crews to the space station for NASA and three private groups for a Houston company that charters flights. The liftoff from Cape Canaveral Space Force Station was the 100th of an Atlas V for rocket maker United Launch Alliance. It was the first ride for astronauts on an Atlas rocket since John Glenn’s Mercury era more than 60 years ago; the rocket usually launches satellites and other spacecraft.Despite the Atlas V’s perfect record, the human presence cranked up the tension for the scores of NASA and Boeing employees gathered at Cape Canaveral and Mission Control in Houston.
If the mission goes well, NASA will alternate between SpaceX and Boeing for taxi flights, beginning next year. The backup pilot for this test flight, Mike Fincke, will strap in for Starliner’s next trip.“When you have a new spacecraft, you need to learn all about it and this has been a great exercise,” Fincke told reporters late last week.The Associated Press Health and Science Department receives support from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute’s Science and Educational Media Group.
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