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Two NASA astronauts were on their way to the International Space Station on Wednesday after the Boeing astronauts pioneering Starliner capsule finally made its very entertaining first manned flight from Cape Canaveral.
The visually stunning liftoff, against a mostly clear and blue Florida sky, came seven years after the spacecraft’s original target date, five years after unmanned test flight failureand after a more recent series of technical delays that I saw aborted launch attempts twice.
Veteran astronauts Butch Wilmore and Sonny Williams reached orbit 12 minutes after liftoff at 10:52 a.m. ET. They are due to board the ISS on Thursday, and if the eight- to 10-day mission is successful, the Starliner will give NASA a second option for carrying people to low-Earth orbit after SpaceX’s Dragon capsule.
“This is a truly historic day,” said Jim Free, NASA’s associate administrator.
“Right now we have one provider that gives us that access to the space station. This will give us a second provider… if we have a problem with either of those, we have ways to get our crews to and from the station, which helps maintain the pace we’ve had for 23 years of humans in low Earth orbit. “
The launch also welcomed Boeing. Although space operations are conducted independently of its aviation wing, executives will be pleased to have the company’s name attached to some good news after a recent string of safety and quality issues.
“The whole company has rallied around us. I get emotional talking about it,” Aaron Kraftcheck, Starliner’s senior manager for flight software, design and development, told reporters in April.
NASA has ordered six more rotary flights of astronauts to the space station from Boeing as part of its commercial crew program. Each capsule can be flown up to 10 times, Boeing says, with a six-month turnaround between each mission.
The high-tech Starliner capsule, officially named CST-100 (Space Crew Transport), is designed to completely transform the way astronauts fly in space. Its autonomous flight, navigation and course correction systems make Williams and Wilmore effectively passenger-only, although they can step in to take over manually if necessary.
The innovation includes a weld-free design that reduces the risk of structural damage and interior space similar to a mid-range SUV. The Starliner can carry up to seven people, but will be configured for four astronauts and cargo for space station flights.
Both of today’s crew have extensive spaceflight experience, having spent more than 500 days in orbit between them on previous space shuttle and ISS missions. With Wednesday’s launch from the Cape Canaveral Space Force Station aboard a United Launch Alliance Atlas V rocket, Williams became the first woman to fly in an orbital test vehicle.
“Butch and Sunny bring a lot to the table in helping us as a team get to a place where we are ready to fly. They’ve been a very integral part of the process for years, and it all culminated in this,” Leroy Cain, manager of mission integration and operations for Boeing’s Commercial Crew Program and former NASA flight director, told NASA Television.
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Kane was flight director during the 2002 space shuttle Columbia disaster that killed seven astronauts, and said safety was a top priority.
“Space exploration is not for the faint of heart. It has the highest highs and the lowest lows. It is very unforgivable [and] margins are small. I expect this to be a very successful flight. I think we will learn some things, we learn every time we fly. And that’s part of the beauty of this business, part of the reason we were so drawn to space exploration.
Wilmore, in a brief speech from the Starliner cockpit just before launch, paid tribute to the hundreds of NASA and Boeing employees who worked on the mission and the 450 suppliers from 37 countries who contributed.
“[They are] people who use their gifts and talents for the common good are passionate,” he said.
“We all know that when the going gets tough, and it often does, the tough gets going, and Sunny and I are honored to share this dream of spaceflight with each and every one of you.”
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