Boeing's Starliner leaves space station for Earth – without its astronauts | Space

Boeing's Starliner space capsule departed the International Space Station on Friday – months after its original departure date and without the two astronauts it carried when it launched in early June.

According to NASA, the Starliner autonomously departed its docking port at the ISS shortly after 6 p.m. ET to begin the approximately six-hour journey home to a landing zone at White Sands Space Harbor in the New Mexico desert. Coverage of the liftoff will be streamed live.

NASA astronauts Suni Williams and Butch Wilmore were supposed to fly back to Earth on the Starliner in June, a week after launch. But engine failures and helium leaks marred their flight to the space station. Instead, they will stay on the ISS for the rest of the year and return in February aboard the SpaceX Dragon spacecraft.

NASA ultimately decided it was too risky to bring Williams and Wilmore back on the Starliner, so the capsule contains their empty seats and blue spacesuits, as well as some old station equipment.

Boeing's first astronaut flight caps a journey full of delays and setbacks. After NASA's space shuttles were retired more than a decade ago, NASA contracted Boeing and SpaceX to provide orbital taxi service. Boeing encountered so many problems during its first uncrewed test flight in 2019 that the flight had to be repeated. The repeat in 2022 uncovered even more defects and repair costs totaled more than $1.5 billion.

Starliner finally launched into space on June 5 from Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida, after problems with unsuccessful launches on May 6 and June 1 and previous delays, including reports of helium leaks in the service module.

During the first launch attempt, a problem was found with a valve on the second stage, the top of the rocket. During the second attempt, a computer triggered an automatic shutdown three minutes and 50 seconds before liftoff. This was later attributed to a single failure in the ground power supply to one of the launch control computers.

Even after the successful launch, problems with helium leaks continued. As the Starliner approached the ISS, two leaks were discovered, but NASA noted that the spacecraft remained stable.

What began as an eight-day mission dragged on for three months after leaks and faulty engines raised safety concerns.

However, NASA and Boeing officials insisted that the astronauts were not stranded and that the technical difficulties did not pose a threat to the mission.

“We'll come home when we're ready,” said Steve Stich, NASA's commercial crew program manager, at a press conference in July.