Boeing postpones «damned» Starliner mission — valve repaired, but there was a «small helium leak»

Starliner launch a week ago stopped due to a faulty oxygen valveHowever, it turned out that the spacecraft had other problems.

On Tuesday, Boeing announced that the first flight of the Starliner with the crew was postponed to May 21 — the mission was supposed to start on May 6, but it was stopped due to an anomaly with the oxygen valve of the Atlas V rocket from the United Launch Alliance (ULA). Eventually, the team replaced it, but experts found another problem with a «small helium leak».

Boeing’s goal is to become the second private company to provide crew transportation to and from the ISS (the contract with NASA is valued at $4.3 billion), along with SpaceX. Elon Musk’s company first reached the station in 2020 with its Dragon capsule, effectively ending nearly a decade of US dependence on Russian space rockets.

Initially, the first test flight of the Starliner without a crew was planned for 2015, but was eventually postponed for 4 years. Eventually, when the launch took place, software malfunctions caused the engines to restart — the ship used too much fuel, so it never reached the ISS. The second attempt, originally scheduled for August 2021 but launched only in May 2022, was generally successful — although there were some questions about the performance of certain engines and the Starliner’s cooling system.

Eventually, when the Atlas V with the manned Starliner reaches orbit, the spacecraft will fire its own engines and should reach the space station in 24 hours. Astronauts Butch Wilmot and Suni Williams will spend about a week there, while the ship will remain docked to the ISS. After that, they will return home aboard the Starliner, which is expected to parachute into one of several designated locations in the southwestern United States.

Source: Gizmodo