NASA and Boeing announced yesterday that they will postpone the first manned space flight with Boeing’s Starliner spacecraft to at least July 21 this summer. However, NASA and Boeing warn that tests of the spacecraft’s parachutes may cause the two astronauts, Sunita Williams and Barry “Butch” Wilmore, to delay their trip to the ISS with Starliner. Earlier, it was said that the spacecraft’s first manned flight to the ISS would take place next month.
Boeing began developing the CST-100 spacecraft in 2010, and in 2015 it was named Starliner. Originally, the plan was for the spacecraft to begin operation in 2017, but this has been delayed several times. Starliner made its first unmanned test flight to the ISS in May last year.
Boeing’s Starliner and SpaceX’s Crew Dragon are the two spacecraft that NASA selected in 2014 to transport astronauts between the International Space Station (ISS) and Earth. SpaceX’s Crew Dragon made its first manned flight to the ISS in November 2020. Since then, SpaceX has made over 20 flights to the ISS, seven of which have been manned.
