Boeing’s new Starliner space capsule is on the launch pad at the Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida, next door to NASA’s Kennedy Space Center. The vehicle, on top of an Alabama built Atlas-V rocket, is scheduled for an early May blastoff to the International Space Station. This will be the first time astronauts have launched aboard an Atlas-V.
NASA is just a few days away from the crewed test launch of Boeing’s new spacecraft, called the Starliner. During the mission, news consumers may also hear the gumdrop shaped vehicle referred to as “Calypso.” Astronaut Commander Sunita Williams gave the spacecraft that name back in 2019, in honor of the ship of deep sea researcher Jacques Cousteau. Space veterans at NASA have exercised this prerogative in the past. Mercury astronaut Gus Grissom named his two-man Gemini the “Molly Brown,” after his one man capsule known as “Liberty Bell” sank in the ocean after splashdown. That name stuck. Astronaut Bill Shepherd commanded the first expedition of the International Space Station. He named the orbiting outside “Alpha.” That moniker faded from use after that first mission.
Alabama’s contribution to the maiden launch of the Boeing Starliner is the Atlas-V rocket that will carry the vehicle to orbit. The booster was built at the United Launch Alliance factory in Decatur. Up to now, the Atlas-V was used for unmanned satellites and robotic spacecraft. Perhaps the highest profile of this kind of mission recently, was NASA’s Osiris-Rex space probe. An Atlas-V launched the spacecraft on its way to the asteroid Bennu, where it gathered soil and rock samples for return to Earth. The blastoff was in 2016. Osiris-Rex just returned its cargo last year because of the distance.
Now, astronauts will be on board one of these rockets.
Astronaut Sunita Williams and pilot Butch Wilmore are scheduled to rendezvous with the International Space Station, and dock with a module on the outpost known as “Harmony.” NASA hired both Boeing and SpaceX to develop ways to bring crews to ISS, and return them safely. SpaceX’s Crew Dragon has flown successfully on a series of docking flights. This will be the first crewed mission for Starliner.
