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Boeing (NYSE:BA) was forced to postpone the first crewed mission of its Starliner spacecraft on Friday due to a technical issue as the aircraft maker continues to trail Elon Musk-led space exploration company SpaceX (SPACE) in the U.S. space race.
Boeing (BA) and NASA announced Friday evening that the team working on the liftoff scheduled for May 21 found a small helium leak in the spacecraft’s service module. The mission has been pushed back by four days to May 25.
“The additional time allows teams to further assess a small helium leak in the Boeing Starliner spacecraft’s service module traced to a flange on a single reaction control system thruster,” Boeing (BA) said.
The company has faced multiple delays with the program, named Crew Flight Test. An earlier delay this week was due to a technical issue with its Atlas 5 rocket, built by Boeing’s (BA) and Lockheed Martin’s (NYSE:LMT) joint venture, United Launch Alliance.
A program equivalent to the Demo-2 mission of SpaceX (SPACE) in May 2020, Crew Flight Test, plans to send NASA astronauts Sunita Williams and Butch Wilmore for roughly a week-long stay at the International Space Station.
Elon Musk, CEO of SpaceX (SPACE) and electric vehicle maker Tesla (TSLA), said this week that his company is “probably 3 to 5 weeks” away from the next launch of Starship, the biggest and most powerful rocket it has ever built.
