Boeing and NASA Target December for Second Try at Uncrewed Orbital Demonstration Flight
upstart writes in with an IRC submission:
Boeing and NASA target December for second try at uncrewed orbital demonstration flight - TechCrunch:
NASA and Boeing have provided some updates around their Commercial Crew plans, which aim to get Boeing's CST-100 spacecraft certified for regular human flight. The CST-100 and Boeing's Commercial Crew aspirations hit a snag last year with a first attempt of an uncrewed orbital flight test, which did not go to plan thanks to a couple of software errors that led to an early mission ending, and a failure to reach the International Space Station as intended.
In a blog post on Friday, NASA said that it and partner Boeing were aiming to fly the re-do of that uncrewed test no earlier than December 2020. This will involve flying the fully reusable Starliner CST-100 without anyone on board, in a live, fully automated simulation of how a launch with crew would go, including a rendezvous and docking with the ISS on orbit, and a return trip and controlled landing and capsule recovery.
[...] Provided OFT-2 goes as intended for Boeing, Starliner could be ferrying its first passengers for a crewed demonstration launch as early as June 2021, with plans for a first operational mission now set for December 2021. All these dates are subject to change, of course.
Read more of this story at SoylentNews.