Boeing postpones Starliner launch after new glitch

Boeing engineers ruled out "a number of potential causes, including software," but were still working to understand the source of "unexpected valve position indications" in the propulsion system, Boeing said in a statement Tuesday evening.

The delay of Tuesday's uncrewed test flight throws into question the timing of Boeing's follow-on mission with a crew onboard, which Boeing has said would take place no earlier than December.

Boeing engineers detected the valve position problem during Tuesday's pre-launch preparations, while making checks after electrical storms in the region, Boeing said in a statement.

The Starliner capsule loaded with supplies had been due to blast off atop an Atlas V rocket flown by the United Launch Alliance, a partnership of Boeing and Lockheed Martin Corp , from Space Launch Complex-41 at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station.

The launch was originally planned for last Friday, but was postponed by NASA after the space station was briefly thrown out of control with seven crew members aboard, a mishap caused by the inadvertent reignition of jet thrusters on a newly docked Russian service module. Russia's space agency blamed a software glitch.

Boeing was powering down the spacecraft on Tuesday evening, and planned to roll the rocket and spacecraft back to the Vertical Integration Facility on Wednesday for further inspection and testing "to inform the next steps," Boeing said.

The Starliner capsule headlined Boeing's efforts against billionaire entrepreneur Elon Musk's SpaceX to be the first to return NASA astronauts to the space station from U.S. soil in nearly a decade.

But a series of software glitches during the December 2019 debut launch resulted in its failure to dock at the orbital laboratory outpost. SpaceX's Crew Dragon has gone on to launch three crewed space station missions since 2020, with a fourth scheduled as early as Oct. 31, according to NASA.

Boeing has spent a year and a half correcting issues flagged during NASA reviews, part of the U.S. space agency's strategy to ensure access to the sprawling international research satellite some 250 miles (400 km) above Earth.

The capsule had been loaded for the 24-hour trip to the station with a flight test dummy nicknamed "Rosie the Rocketeer," and about 760 pounds of cargo, Boeing said.