Joey Roulette and Steve Gorman
(Reuters) – Boeing’s new Starliner capsule and its first two NASA crew members docked safely with the International Space Station on Thursday, passing a key test that proves the vessel’s flight worth and deepens the competition between Elon Musk and Boeing (NYSE:) . SpaceX.
The rendezvous was achieved despite the initial loss of several guidance-controlled jet thrusters, some of which suffered helium propulsion leaks, and NASA and Boeing said the mission should not be compromised.
The CST-100 Starliner, with veteran astronauts Barry “Butch” Wilmore and Sunita “Suni” Williams on board, arrived at the orbital platform after approximately 27 hours of flight after launch from Space Force Station Cape Canaveral in Florida.
The reusable bubble-shaped capsule, named “Calypso” by the crew, atop an Atlas (NYSE:) V rocket delivered and flown Wednesday by Boeing-Lockheed Martin’s United Launch Alliance joint venture. lifted into space.
Both vehicles automatically docked with the ISS at 1:34 PM EDT (1734 GMT) while in orbit about 250 miles (400 km) over the southern Indian Ocean, with both vehicles covering the globe at about 17,500 miles (28,160 km). They flew at the same time. ) per hour.
The spacecraft’s final approach to docking with the ISS was shown in a NASA webcast a short interval after Wilmore manually piloted the capsule.
“I’m glad to be connected to the great city in the sky,” Wilmore radioed to mission control in Houston shortly after docking.
Upon arrival, Willmore, 58, and Williams, 61, spent about two hours performing a series of standard procedures, including checking for airlock leaks and pressurizing the passageway between the capsule and the ISS before opening the entrance hatch. .
NASA’s live video feed showed smiling new arrivals in blue flight suits floating headfirst through a padded passageway, one after the other, in zero gravity. Williams was first.
“We are so happy to be in space,” she said at a brief welcome ceremony held shortly afterwards.
They were greeted warmly with hugs and handshakes by the seven crew members currently stationed at the outpost – four fellow American astronauts and three Russian cosmonauts.
According to the plan, Wilmore and Williams would remain on the station for about eight days, then re-enter Earth’s atmosphere aboard the Starliner and make the return flight using parachutes and airbags, landing in the American desert southwest. This is NASA’s first manned mission.
Thursday was a busy day for the U.S. space program as SpaceX’s next-generation Starship rocket survived its hypersonic return from space and achieved a groundbreaking landing demonstration in the Indian Ocean on its fourth test flight.
During the Starliner’s voyage to the ISS, a helium leak was detected in its propulsion system, damaging some of the 28 thrusters the capsule uses for precise maneuvers in space. But the spacecraft still has enough operating thrusters to compensate for the losses, according to NASA and Boeing. Additional thrusters were disabled by mission control shortly before final approach.
Years of technical problems
Wednesday’s Starliner launch follows years of technical problems, various delays and the first successful 2022 test mission to the orbiting laboratory without astronauts on board.
The Starliner’s first two crewed launch attempts were foiled by last-minute glitches, including a helium leak discovered in the capsule’s propulsion system, which officials later determined were not serious enough to warrant mechanical repairs.
NASA and Boeing officials at the time pointed to faulty seals in the thruster components that did not keep the helium inside.
Boeing contracted with NASA to build the Starliner to compete with SpaceX’s Crew Dragon capsule. SpaceX’s Crew Dragon capsule has been the U.S. space agency’s only vehicle to send ISS crews into orbit from U.S. soil since 2020. The current mission marks the Starliner’s first test flight with astronauts on board, a requirement before NASA can certify the capsule for routine astronaut missions.
The two NASA veterans selected to crew for the pivotal flight previously logged 500 days in space. Wilmore, 61, a retired Navy captain and fighter pilot, and Williams, 58, a former Navy helicopter test pilot, have more than a year of flying experience. 30 different aircraft.
Getting the Starliner to this point has been a difficult process for Boeing under a $4.2 billion fixed-price contract with NASA, which wants to duplicate two different U.S. boarding passes to the ISS.
Starliner is years behind schedule and more than $1.5 billion over budget. Meanwhile, Boeing’s commercial aircraft manufacturing operations have been rocked by a series of crises involving its 737 MAX jetliner.
