<p>The first crewed flight of Boeing's space capsule Starliner is scheduled for February 2023, the company and NASA announced Thursday, as the United States seeks to secure a second way for its astronauts to reach the International Space Station.</p>.<p>Since 2020, American astronauts have traveled to the ISS aboard SpaceX's vessels but the US space agency wants to widen its options.</p>.<p>After a series of hiccups in its space program that led to serious delays, including a 2019 flight that did not reach the ISS, Boeing finally managed to send the gumdrop-shaped capsule to the station in May -- without a crew.</p>.<p>This time, the aerospace giant will send the Starliner up with humans aboard, to earn NASA's green light to begin regular missions -- at an expected pace of one per year.</p>.<p>"Currently, we're targeting a launch date as early as February of 2023," Steve Stich, the manager of NASA's Commercial Crew Program, told reporters.</p>.<p>"We're in good shape to execute these plans to be ready for that flight in February," added Mark Nappi, the Starliner program manager at Boeing.</p>.<p>The test flight -- aptly named CFT, or Crew flight test -- will carry US astronauts Barry Wilmore and Sunita Williams.</p>.<p>They are expected to be docked for eight days at the ISS, where they will conduct a series of experiments, said ISS program manager Joel Montalbano.</p>.<p>"Our agency goal is to get two US commercial providers up and running as soon as we can."</p>.<p>Boeing had hoped to conduct this test flight before the end of the year, but a few glitches experienced in the uncrewed May flight led to necessary adjustments to the vessel.</p>.<p>An issue was detected in the propulsion system: two thrusters responsible for placing Starliner in a stable orbit failed, though officials insisted there was plenty of redundancy built into the system to overcome the problem.</p>.<p>Boeing's teams later determined that "debris-related conditions" were to blame, Nappi said, adding that the origin of said debris was still unknown.</p>.<p>Some filters were removed to fix a pressure problem, and flight software was updated to avoid a data overload.</p>.<p>Boeing and SpaceX were awarded contracts in 2014, shortly after the end of the space shuttle program, during a time when the United States was left reliant on Russian Soyuz rockets for rides to the ISS.</p>.<p>Elon Musk's SpaceX filled the void first, providing space "taxi" service since a successful test mission for its Dragon capsule in 2020.</p>
<p>The first crewed flight of Boeing's space capsule Starliner is scheduled for February 2023, the company and NASA announced Thursday, as the United States seeks to secure a second way for its astronauts to reach the International Space Station.</p>.<p>Since 2020, American astronauts have traveled to the ISS aboard SpaceX's vessels but the US space agency wants to widen its options.</p>.<p>After a series of hiccups in its space program that led to serious delays, including a 2019 flight that did not reach the ISS, Boeing finally managed to send the gumdrop-shaped capsule to the station in May -- without a crew.</p>.<p>This time, the aerospace giant will send the Starliner up with humans aboard, to earn NASA's green light to begin regular missions -- at an expected pace of one per year.</p>.<p>"Currently, we're targeting a launch date as early as February of 2023," Steve Stich, the manager of NASA's Commercial Crew Program, told reporters.</p>.<p>"We're in good shape to execute these plans to be ready for that flight in February," added Mark Nappi, the Starliner program manager at Boeing.</p>.<p>The test flight -- aptly named CFT, or Crew flight test -- will carry US astronauts Barry Wilmore and Sunita Williams.</p>.<p>They are expected to be docked for eight days at the ISS, where they will conduct a series of experiments, said ISS program manager Joel Montalbano.</p>.<p>"Our agency goal is to get two US commercial providers up and running as soon as we can."</p>.<p>Boeing had hoped to conduct this test flight before the end of the year, but a few glitches experienced in the uncrewed May flight led to necessary adjustments to the vessel.</p>.<p>An issue was detected in the propulsion system: two thrusters responsible for placing Starliner in a stable orbit failed, though officials insisted there was plenty of redundancy built into the system to overcome the problem.</p>.<p>Boeing's teams later determined that "debris-related conditions" were to blame, Nappi said, adding that the origin of said debris was still unknown.</p>.<p>Some filters were removed to fix a pressure problem, and flight software was updated to avoid a data overload.</p>.<p>Boeing and SpaceX were awarded contracts in 2014, shortly after the end of the space shuttle program, during a time when the United States was left reliant on Russian Soyuz rockets for rides to the ISS.</p>.<p>Elon Musk's SpaceX filled the void first, providing space "taxi" service since a successful test mission for its Dragon capsule in 2020.</p>