Boeing Plans to Retest Starliner Flight
Boeing released on April 6 a statement about its upcoming projects. The company explained that it intends to send its Starliner astronaut spacecraft on a new uncrewed mission to the ISS. The announcement came after a few months ago, Boeing encountered issues with its last flight.
Back in December 2019, we witnessed how a series of software glitches and a problem with Starliner’s automated timer brought the tests to an end. The spacecraft failed to dock at the space station. It returned to Earth after only one week. The incident was followed by NASA’s statement in which it explained how Boeing had narrowly missed one vital thing in the botched test.
The space agency recommended analyzing the Boeing’s software verification process before engaging in any mission. So, that’s why NASA officials didn’t order a redo for a Starliner flight because they were still concerned about some safety issues. Also, NASA “didn’t think it would be sufficient” to eliminate all of the worries raised in the safety review, according to an agency official.
Boeing Might Retest Starliner Soon
Boeing and Elon Musk’s SpaceX, are separately developing space taxis to transport astronauts to the ISS. Such actions are realized under NASA’s effort to restore its human spaceflight program.
The space agency explained: “Flying another uncrewed flight will allow us to complete all flight test objectives and evaluate the performance of the second Starliner vehicle at no cost to the taxpayer.” It will be nice to witness another Starliner test flight, this time, a successful one.
The first Starliner test flight ended dramatically. Boeing said that the spaceship was facing an “off-nominal insertion,” but that Starliner was “in a safe and stable configuration.” NASA later release a statement and detailed all the process. The oddity resulted in the Starliner, thinking the time was different than it was in fact. The spacecraft’s failure represented another setback for Boeing.
Tiesha loves to share her passion for everything that’s beautiful in this world. Apart from writing on her beauty blog and running her own beauty channel on Youtube, she also enjoys traveling and photography. Tiesha covers various stories on the website.
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