NASA, Boeing postpone first Starliner astronaut mission to 2023

NASA and Boeing are now targeting early 2023 for the first crewed flight of Boeing's long-delayed Starliner spacecraft, officials said during a joint press conference, Report informs referring to CNN.

Launch officials say the mission could take off as early as February, according to Steve Stich, the manager for NASA's Commercial Crew Program.

Starliner had been slated to get astronauts off the ground by the end of 2022. But continued work on several major issues that were identified on an uncrewed test flight of Starliner in May pushed the schedule back.

Starliner is already years behind schedule. It's intended to serve the same purpose as SpaceX's Crew Dragon capsule, which has been ferrying astronauts to and from the International Space Station since May 2020.

The issues that officials identified during Starliner's uncrewed test flight included hangups with a few of the spacecraft's thrusters that did not power on as intended and software problems.

None of those issues had a major impact on the test mission, however, and the vehicle was still able to complete its multi-day journey to the ISS and return safely back to Earth.

Officials have, however, deemed those problems serious enough to require fixes before allowing crew on board the vehicle.