Boeing's Starliner rolls out to pad for June 1 astronaut launch (photos)

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It was Starliner's second trip to the launch pad in less than a month.

a brown and white rocket carrying a white space capsule rolls out of an assembly building toward the launch pad
A United Launch Alliance Atlas V rocket with Boeing's Starliner rolls from the Vertical Integration Facility to the launch pad at Space Launch Complex-41 at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station, Florida on May 30, 2024. (Image credit: ULA)

Boeing's Starliner capsule is back at the launch pad.

Starliner and its rocket ride, a United Launch Alliance (ULA) Atlas V, rolled out to the pad at Florida's Cape Canaveral Space Force Station today (May 30) ahead of a planned Saturday (June 1) liftoff.

That launch, at 12:25 p.m. EDT (1625 GMT), will kick off Crew Flight Test (CFT), the first-ever astronaut mission for Starliner and the venerable Atlas V.

Related: 'It's so complicated:' Boeing Starliner teams diagnosing helium leak ahead of June 1 astronaut launch

The May 30 rollout was Starliner's second trip to the pad in less than a month. (Image credit: ULA)

It was the second trip to the pad in less than a month for the Starliner-Atlas V stack. The duo first made the trip on May 4, ahead of a planned May 6 launch. 

That attempt, however, was scrubbed about two hours before liftoff when team members noticed a misbehaving valve in the Atlas V's Centaur upper stage. ULA decided to replace the valve, which required rolling the rocket off the pad and back into a nearby assembly facility.

That process pushed CFT's targeted launch back to May 17. The date shifted further to the right, however, after a slight helium leak was detected in one of the reaction-control thrusters in Starliner's service module.

Boeing, NASA and ULA ultimately determined that the helium leak is a minor issue and, after a flight readiness review on Wednesday (May 29), cleared CFT for its June 1 liftoff.

Starliner and the Atlas V at the pad on May 30, 2024. (Image credit: ULA)
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The mission will send NASA astronauts Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams to the International Space Station (ISS) for about seven days. If all goes well, Starliner will be certified to fly operational, six-month crewed missions to and from the orbiting lab for NASA. 

Boeing has a contract to do just that, as does SpaceX. Elon Musk's company flew its version of CFT, known as Demo-2, back in 2020 and is now in the middle of its eighth operational crewed mission to the ISS.

CFT will be the third liftoff for Starliner to date. The capsule first launched in December 2019, on an uncrewed test mission to the ISS that failed to reach its destination. Starliner succeeded on its second try, an uncrewed flight to the orbiting lab in May 2022.

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Mike Wall
Mike Wall
Senior Space Writer

Michael Wall is a Senior Space Writer with Space.com and joined the team in 2010. He primarily covers exoplanets, spaceflight and military space, but has been known to dabble in the space art beat. His book about the search for alien life, "Out There," was published on Nov. 13, 2018. Before becoming a science writer, Michael worked as a herpetologist and wildlife biologist. He has a Ph.D. in evolutionary biology from the University of Sydney, Australia, a bachelor's degree from the University of Arizona, and a graduate certificate in science writing from the University of California, Santa Cruz. To find out what his latest project is, you can follow Michael on Twitter.

6 Comments Comment from the forums
  • DSyno
    So it's failed 1 out of 2 tries, and now they're putting humans in it?
    Reply
  • Cisventure Astronot
    DSyno said:
    So it's failed 1 out of 2 tries, and now they're putting humans in it?

    To be fair, they supposedly ironed out the issues. And it's probably had many more simulated "tries".

    But… you're not wrong. If it were my decision, I'd use it for cargo to test it for one or two launches. I'd pay Boeing for the extra launches to help them recoup their losses from the troublesome R&D.

    Then again, NASA might not have the money right now… It's a tricky situation.
    Reply
  • SX_Junkie
    Boeing had quite a number of thruster issues as they were attempting to align Strainer for the only docking they accomplished. I agree...the wiser approach would have been to have them do a couple cargo missions before putting humans aboard. Problem is that they only have enough Atlas Vs to complete the minimum contract required crew rotations.
    Reply
  • Cisventure Astronot
    SX_Junkie said:
    Problem is that they only have enough Atlas Vs to complete the minimum contract required crew rotations.

    Wikipedia says that it could fly on the Falcon 9 or Vulcan Centaur. Adding missions would force Boeing to think about using Starliner beyond what they're currently required to do, and either lower the cost (Falcon 9) or human rate Vulcan Centaur.
    Reply
  • DrRaviSharma
    Just because Boeing does not have Atlas rockets or because NASA can not pay for cargo flights are no excuses to put human astronauts at more than acceptable risk due to unproven (yet not operational) space mission.
    Combination of mission hardware and systems includes LV + Capsule.
    These could have been tested separately.
    Are we seeing a Logical mistake and hope it is not as serious cover up as was Columbia by suppressing information that we proved could have saved most astronauts.

    Here the story is slightly different as these are ace test pilot astronauts, but we should exhaust most robotic testing before we put astronauts in missions.

    Let us now compare with Artemis! The situation is also not rosy as they are trying to patch together Shuttle engines and have enough only for a few missions and depend upon new engines at least for future missions. Thus ULA is also a slightly risky path.

    Perhaps we should give Starship a chance to succeed and use Falcon and Starship combinations in clever ways than to keep reusing some mothballed hardware which has at best sub-optimal provenance!

    FINALLY GODSPEED TO SUNI Williams AND BUTCH Wilmore!

    Ravi
    (Dr. Ravi Sharma, Ph.D. USA)
    NASA Apollo Achievement Award
    ISRO Distinguished Service Awards
    Former MTS NASA HQ MSEB Apollo
    Former Scientific Secretary ISRO HQ
    Ontolog Board of Trustees
    Particle and Space Physics
    Senior Enterprise Architect
    SAE Fuel Cell Tech Committee voting member for 20 years.
    http://www.linkedin.com/in/drravisharma
    Reply
  • Cisventure Astronot
    DrRaviSharma said:
    Just because Boeing does not have Atlas rockets or because NASA can not pay for cargo flights are no excuses to put human astronauts at more than acceptable risk due to unproven (yet not operational) space mission.

    The issue is that NASA and Boeing decide what's "more than acceptable risk" and "unproven" (It did have a successful test).
    Reply