Christian Davenport, The Washington Post Published 4:30 pm PDT, Sunday, July 22, 2018 The spacecraft Boeing plans to use to fly NASA astronauts to the International Space Station suffered a significant setback when, during a test of its emergency abort system in June, officials discovered a propellant leak, the company confirmed. In a statement to The Washington Post, Boeing said it has “been conducting a thorough investigation with assistance from our NASA and industry partners. We are confident we found the cause and are moving forward with corrective action.” The leak is likely to delay its launch schedule and is another setback for a program that has faced a number of problems. The trouble also comes as Vice President Mike Pence is expected to announce the crews for the first missions during a ceremony in early August at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida. Along with SpaceX, Boeing is under contract from NASA to fly astronauts to the space station. The “Commercial Program” would restore NASA’s ability to fly humans from the United States – a capability that was lost when the Space Shuttle was retired in 2011. Since then, the space agency has had to rely on Russia to fly… Read full this story
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