by Boeing’s address already delayed Starliner spacecraft sliding by at least four more days, from next Tuesday to May 25 because of ongoing work to resolve concerns about a small leak of helium in the capsule’s propulsion system, officials said Friday.
Mission commander Barry “Butch” Wilmore and co-pilot Sunita Williams aim to launch from Pad 41 at Florida’s Cape Canaveral Space Force Station at 3:09 p.m. EDT a week from Saturday, docking at the International Space Station next. day, May 26, at 4:12pm
Astronauts had hoped to take off for Starliner’s first piloted test flight on May 6, but the countdown is on called out due to a problem with an oxygen pressure relief valve in the upper stage of his Atlas 5’s Centaur rocket.
The Atlas 5, built by United Launch Alliance, was towed from the panel back to the company’s Vertical Integration Facility nearby, where the suspected valve was replaced and cleared for launch.
The unrelated helium leak in the Starliner’s propellant pressurization system was noted during the original countdown before launch, but remained within safe flight limits. After rolling the Atlas 5 and Starliner back to the VIF for oxygen valve replacement, managers decided to take a closer look at the helium issue.
The leak was detected in the plumbing making up the No. 1 helium manifold. 2 inside one of four “doghouse” assemblies spaced around the exterior of the Starliner’s drum-shaped service module. There are four Orbital Maneuvering and Attitude Control – OMAC – thrusters in each doghouse, and four reaction control system mini-maneuvering jets.
Pressurized helium gas is used to push propellants to the rocket motors in each doghouse, as well as four powerful launch abort engines that would only be fired in the event of a catastrophic problem with the Atlas 5 en route to orbit.
Engineers tightened bolts in a valve where the leak was found, pressurized the lines and then ran tests to determine if the leak was still present. Meanwhile, the launch was rescheduled for May 21.
But as it turned out, tests showed that the leak was still present. Mission managers considered a range of options to resolve the issue, but decided Friday to push forward toward a May 25 launch opportunity, pending additional data review and analysis to show the leak, which is currently stable and within acceptable limits. . on a flight.
“A pressure test … indicated that the leak in the flange is stable and would not pose a risk at that level during flight,” NASA said in a blog post. “The test also showed that the rest of the thruster system is effectively sealed around the entire service module.
“Boeing teams are working to develop operational procedures to ensure the system maintains adequate performance capability and appropriate redundancy during flight. As that work progresses, (mission managers) will take the next few days to review the details and procedures to make a final decision. before proceeding to the flight countdown.”
Wilmore and Williams, veteran Navy test pilots and astronauts with four flights to the station between them, flew back to the Johnson Space Center in Houston after the May 6 scrub to participate in additional flight simulations. They are expected to return to Florida next week.
The Starliner is one of two commercially developed crew ferry ships ordered by NASA after the shuttle program was discontinued in 2011. SpaceX won a contract worth $2.6 billion for the development of the shuttle program. the company’s Crew Dragon spacecraft and Boeing was awarded $4.2 billion to develop the Starliner.
NASA wanted spacecraft from different builders to ensure that the agency would still have a way to get astronauts to the space station even if one company’s ferry had a problem.
SpaceX launched its first two-man crew in 2020. Since then, the company has launched eight crewed rotation flights to the station sponsored by NASA, three commercial research missions to the laboratory and a two-man, two-woman trip, privately funded. to low-Earth orbit. In total, 50 people have flown to space aboard Crew Dragons.
Wilmore and Williams will be the first astronauts to fly aboard Starliner after a series of technical glitches including major software problems during an initial unmanned test flight in December 2019, and corroded propulsion system valves that delayed a second test mission unmanned in May 2022.
Engineers questioned parachute harness connectors and protective tape wrapped around wiring that created a short-circuit fire hazard. Work to correct those and other issues delayed the first pilot launch until this month.
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