Boeing Starliner Spacecraft To Make Debut Flight To ISS

Boeing Starliner spacecraft is set to debut for the first time to the International Space Station. A couple of days from now, the Starliner will take off for a key mission carrying with its a dummy named Rosie. The Boeing Starliner is going to be a crucial part of NASA's crewed mission set to take off in 2020.

Boeing Starliner Set For Debut

The spacecraft will take off on Friday (December 20) morning, depending on the weather conditions. The Boeing Starliner will carry with it a sole passenger, who is a bandana-clad dummy, Rosie. The name was chosen after Rosie the Riveter, a campaign icon used during World War II to encourage and recruit women to munitions factory jobs.

The mission is expected to last eight days and would set the stage for future ISS missions for NASA. It would take off from the Cape Canaveral launchpad at 6:36 AM local time on an Atlas V rocket built by the United Launch Alliance and will reach the station 25 hours later.

As long as the test flights are accomplished without a hitch, NASA is aiming to start the flights next year. Once the spacecraft reaches ISS, it would remain docked for seven days before detaching and heading back home.

NASA Missions With SpaceX, Boeing

For a long time now, NASA relied on Russian spacecraft to transport crews to ISS. Now private players like Boeing, SpaceX, and others are manufacturing spacecraft for NASA missions since 2014 for multi-billion dollar contracts.

Coming to SpaceX, the Crew Dragon also undertook a similar type of mission successfully back in March. The difference between the SpaceX and Boeing is that the first lands in the ocean and the second lands in the desert, but they both depend on parachutes for a slow descent.

An estimate set in May 2019, both Boeing and SpaceX contracts valued at $4.3 billion and $2.5 billion, with each company awarded six round-trip missions to the ISS. However, neither SpaceX nor Boeing have confirmed to be ready for a crewed mission in 2020. So it's yet to be decided when the mission will take flight.