NASA astronauts will have to wait another day to board the Boeing Starliner. A problem with the Atlas V rocket on Monday night halted the planned launch to send them into space.
Engineers will work through the night to assess whether the two astronauts, Butch Wilmore and Sunita Williams, can return to the launch pad on Tuesday, or if repairs are needed that could delay the flight for at least several days.
It further delayed the ride for NASA astronauts to the International Space Station and the first crewed flight of Starliner, which has suffered a series of costly delays over the past several years.
About three hours before the scheduled launch time of 10:34 a.m., just as the astronauts arrived at the launch pad, a valve that regulates the pressure in the oxygen tank on the rocket’s second stage began beeping at a rate of about 40 times per second. Crews on the launch pad described to air traffic controllers what they heard as an “unusually audible” sound.
Tory Bruno, CEO of United Launch Alliance, the company that built and launched the Atlas V rocket, said the behavior had been observed during some other Atlas V launches before, and opening and closing the valve usually stopped the sound.
But to launch astronauts, ULA had stipulated that nothing could be done to change the rocket’s position while the astronauts were there, including opening and closing valves. It’s not a risky move, but it would have added more uncertainty.
