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The Boeing Starliner’s return to earth from the International Space Station has been pushed back another four days to June 26, Steve Stich, NASA’s commercial crew program manager, said during a news conference on Tuesday, according to Reuters and the Orlando Sentinel.
Two astronauts Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams had launched from Cape Canaveral on June 5 and were able to dock with the ISS, but encountered four helium leaks and five failures of its 28 maneuvering thrusters, Reuters reported.
Stich said that the delay would “give our team a little bit more time to look at the data, do some analysis and make sure we’re really ready to come home,” Reuters reported.
“We look at that as an opportunity and in this case, a privilege to stay on station and do more work,” Boeing’s commercial crew program lead Mark Nappi said, according to the Sentinel. “We’ve always said this is a test flight. We’re going to learn some things. So here we are.”
He said more investigation was necessary into why components related to the helium leaks weren’t working as designed and why some thrusters shut down during docking.
The flight — originally scheduled for eight-days — is the first human spaceflight of the commercial capsule, the Sentinel reported, known as a crew flight test.
Completing the test would enable NASA and Boeing to receive full certification of the Starliner, allowing it to alternate with SpaceX on regular missions carrying astronauts to the ISS, according to the Sentinel.
Boeing is contracted to fly six missions with the Startliner-1, starting as early as next February, but is already four years behind SpaceX, which has been flying astronauts from the U.S. since May 2020. Overall, SpaceX’s fleet has flown to space 13 times carrying 50 passengers.
The eventual return flight to earth is scheduled to take about six hours, targeting a desert site in Utah or New Mexico, according to Reuters.