Tag: Commercial Crew
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Photos: Boeing’s Starliner spacecraft rolls out of factory
Credit: Stephen Clark/Spaceflight Now Boeing’s first Starliner spacecraft designed to fly to the International Space Station rolled out of a converted space shuttle hangar before dawn Thursday. The 16.5-foot-tall (5-meter) capsule emerged from its factory around 6 a.m. EST (1100 GMT) Thursday to begin a journey of several miles to United Launch Alliance’s Vertical Integration…
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Boeing’s first space-ready Starliner crew capsule meets its Atlas 5 launcher
EDITOR’S NOTE: Updated at 1:30 p.m. with confirmation of lift and mate inside the Vertical Integration Facility. Boeing’s first Starliner crew capsule. Credit: Boeing Boeing’s first Starliner crew capsule to fly in space departed its factory Thursday at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida for a trip to a launch pad a few miles away, where…
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SpaceX fires up Crew Dragon thrusters in key test after April explosion
Eight SuperDraco thrusters fired during a ground test Wednesday at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station. Credit: SpaceX SpaceX test-fired the Crew Dragon spacecraft’s eight SuperDraco abort engines Wednesday at Cape Canaveral, paving the way for a high-altitude rocket escape test and demonstrating engineers have apparently fixed the problem that triggered an explosion during a similar…
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Video: Crew Dragon tests abort thrusters at Cape Canaveral
SpaceX conducted a static fire test of the SuperDraco abort thrusters on the company’s Crew Dragon spacecraft Wednesday afternoon at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station. The test-firing occurred at approximately 3:08 p.m. EST (2008 GMT) Wednesday on a test stand at Landing Zone 1, the site where SpaceX lands Falcon 9 rocket boosters for reuse.…
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Photos: Centaur upper stage hoisted atop Atlas 5 rocket for Starliner launch
United Launch Alliance teams at Cape Canaveral hoisted a Centaur upper stage on top of an Atlas 5 rocket Friday at launch pad 41, completing the initial build-up of the launch vehicle slated to carry Boeing’s Starliner crew capsule into space in December on an unpiloted test flight to the International Space Station. The dual-engine…
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Next three-man Soyuz crew training to have space station to themselves
NASA astronaut Chris Cassidy prepares for a spacewalk training session at the Neutral Buoyancy Laboratory in Houston. Credit: NASA/James Blair The next three-man crew to launch on a Soyuz rocket — comprising two Russian cosmonauts and a veteran NASA astronaut — is training to have the International Space Station to themselves after their arrival at…
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Video: New view of Starliner pad abort test
Video credit: Boeing Boeing has released a new video of the company’s Nov. 4 abort test demonstrating the Starliner crew capsule’s ability to escape a launch pad emergency. Officials from Boeing and NASA briefed reporters Thursday on the initial results from the pad abort test, in which the abort engines pushed the spacecraft off…
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Boeing identifies cause of chute malfunction, preps for Starliner launch
Technicians prepare Boeing’s CST-100 Starliner spacecraft for fueling before its first unpiloted space mission. Credit: Boeing Boeing specialists working inside a former space shuttle hangar in Florida started fueling the company’s first spaceflight-ready Starliner capsule this week ahead of the ship’s rollout to its launch pad later this month. The fueling milestone is a major…
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Photos: Starliner crew capsule performs pad abort test
Boeing conducted a critical test of the launch abort system of the company’s Starliner crew capsule Nov. 4 at White Sands Missile Range in New Mexico. Four launch abort engines, augmented with thrust from smaller maneuvering jets, ignited at 7:15 a.m. MST (9:15 a.m. EST; 1415 GMT) to swiftly launch the 16.5-foot-tall (5-meter) crew capsule…
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ULA begins stacking unique Atlas 5 rocket for Starliner test flight
Ground crews hoisted the first stage of a United Launch Alliance Atlas 5 rocket vertical atop its mobile launch platform Monday at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, Florida, in preparation for a scheduled Dec. 17 launch with Boeing’s Starliner spacecraft. Credit: United Launch Alliance The stacking of a United Launch Alliance Atlas 5 rocket this…