Boeing postpones Starliner test flight indefinitely

The test flight of Boeing’s Starline spacecraft has been postponed indefinitely after a problem with valves in the vehicle’s propulsion system. NASA and Boeing will announce this this week.

“This is clearly a disappointing day,” Kathy Lueders, NASA’s chief of human spaceflight, told a press conference, also writing. Space.com. “But I want to emphasize that this is another example of why these demo missions are so incredibly important to us.” The Starliner will now make a test flight once NASA and Boeing “are ready.”

According to NASA and Boeing, the problems were in valves from the Starliner propulsion system. The two companies would have discovered that thirteen of these valves did not open, so that the test flight had to be postponed, writes CNBC. Boeing vice president John Vollmer says he is working with the manufacturer of these valves, Aerojet Rocketdyne, to identify the cause and fix the problems.

The Boeing Starliner was scheduled to launch to the ISS earlier this month on a United Launch Alliance Atlas V rocket. That mission would have been a repeat of a failed test flight from 2019, in which the vehicle spent two days in orbit, but failed to reach the ISS due to problems with the flight control system because it was in the wrong orbit. ended up. The Starliner then landed by parachute in New Mexico.

The most recent launch was originally scheduled for July 30, but was postponed due to a problem with an ISS Nauka module that tilted the space station. Subsequently, the launch was delayed again due to a propulsion problem. The company initially spoke of a new launch attempt in August, but has now announced that this will not work. No concrete time frame for another launch is being reported, but NASA says the launch “definitely” won’t happen until after another NASA mission in October. So it will be at least another two months before NASA and Boeing can perform the test flight again.