After long delays, the Starliner capsule and Boeing crew launch into space

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. – The third time was the charm.

Boeing’s long-delayed Starliner space capsule lifted off from the Cape Canaveral Space Force Station with two NASA astronauts on board and reached orbit about twelve minutes later. The crew will spend the next 25 hours racing to catch up with the International Space Station.

The mission marks the first time the commercially built capsule will carry people, with a scheduled docking with the station around 12:15 p.m. ET on Thursday, with astronauts Barry “Butch” Wilmore as commander and Sunita “Suni” Williams as mission pilot.

It was Starliner’s third launch attempt. On Saturday the countdown was stopped with less than four minutes to go. A problem with the flight computers that control the launch was the cause. Launch provider ULA has replaced a power supply on the system and released it for Wednesday’s launch. It followed a launch attempt last month that was aborted due to a malfunctioning valve on the Atlas V rocket’s Centaur.

While solving that problem, Boeing discovered another problem: a helium leak. The gas is used in Starliner’s propulsion system. After reviewing the data, NASA was confident that Boeing could successfully fly the mission.

Now that all these issues have been resolved and Starliner is on its way to the space station, it looks like this third attempt is indeed the charm. Now launched, Wilmore and Williams are taking Starliner on its maiden flight, putting the vehicle through its paces ahead of operational missions for NASA. After the Space Shuttle was retired in 2011, NASA partnered with two commercial companies – Boeing and SpaceX – to transport astronauts to and from the space station.

But Boeing has lagged behind its commercial counterpart SpaceX, which has already flown nine missions for NASA and another four private flights. An unmanned Starliner mission in 2019 failed to reach the station, partly due to a faulty flight computer code. A re-flight of the launch in 2022 was deemed a success by NASA and Boeing, but problems were later discovered in the capsule’s parachute systems.

An analysis also found that the tape used to manage the hundreds of feet of cabling in the spacecraft was flammable. Boeing resolved these issues and received permission from NASA to launch the crew

But that first attempt to launch this crewed mission last month was scrapped due to a problem with the rocket that gave Starliner its big boost into space.

NASA astronauts Butch Wilmore (L) and Suni Williams, dressed in Boeing space suits, as they leave the operations and checkout building for the launch pad at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida on Wednesday. It is the third trip to space for both of them.

MIGUEL J. RODRIGUEZ CARRILLO/AFP via Getty Images/AFP

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MIGUEL J. RODRIGUEZ CARRILLO/AFP via Getty Images/AFP

Willmore and Williams will test key Starliner systems as it docks with the space station, including life support and communications. While the spacecraft can essentially fly itself, the duo will test the vehicle’s manual controls as it approaches the orbiting outpost.

The crew will spend about a week aboard the station with a planned landing under a canopy of parachutes in the southwestern US. Teams from NASA and Boeing will sift through the data from this flight before certifying the vehicle for an operational mission. NASA plans to split astronaut flights between Boeing and SpaceX, with trips to the ISS occurring approximately every six months.