Earth is on the receiving end of intense solar activity this weekend — a burst of “space weather.”  NOAA’s Space Weather Prediction Center issues warnings on a five-point scale because satellites and the terrestrial electric grid are vulnerable to outages from the high radiation levels. G5 is the highest and NOAA issued a G5 alert this evening. The radiation can also pose a danger to astronauts on the International Space Station, but NASA is not concerned for now. Separately, NASA confirmed that the rescheduled launch of the Starliner Crew Flight Test is still on track for May 17, but the two crew members are returning to Houston instead of remaining at Kennedy Space Center.

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The launch of Boeing’s Starliner Crew Flight Test has slipped to at least May 17. The United Launch Alliance, which builds and operates the Atlas V rocket, determined that the malfunctioning valve that scrubbed last night’s attempt needs to be replaced. That means rolling the rocket back to ULA’s Vertical Integration Facility. NASA astronauts Butch Wilmore and Suni Willams will remain in quarantine in crew quarters at Kennedy Space Center awaiting the next chance for a “go for launch.”

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The first crewed spaceflight of Boeing’s Starliner was scrubbed tonight because of unexpected behavior in an oxygen relief valve on the rocket’s upper stage. NASA astronauts Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams were settling into their seats inside the spacecraft when the United Launch Alliance decided “out of an abundance of caution” to cancel the launch for tonight. ULA engineers will be working overnight to determine the status of the valve before deciding when they can try again.

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Here are links to all the articles published on SpacePolicyOnline.com over the last week, April 29-May 5, 2024, including our “What’s Happening in Space Policy” for this coming week. Click on each title to read the entire article.

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Here is SpacePolicyOnline.com’s list of space policy events for the week of May 5-11, 2024 and any insight we can offer about them. The House and Senate are in session this week.

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Following a Flight Readiness Review today, Boeing and NASA officials confirmed Starliner is ready for launch on Monday with two NASA astronauts aboard. Starliner has flown twice already without a crew. The first time revealed so many problems that Boeing decided to launch it empty a second time to ensure everything worked as expected. That flight was a success and although the path from then until now has been rather bumpy, the head of Boeing’s commercial crew program said today there are “zero constraints” to launch.

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China is hoping to achieve another lunar exploration first by landing a spacecraft on the far side of the Moon and bringing samples back to Earth. Chang’e-6, named for China’s mythological goddess of the Moon, launched from Hainan Island this morning and will return in about 53 days if all goes according to plan. The spacecraft also carries scientific experiments from European and Pakistani partners.

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NASA Administrator Bill Nelson pleaded with members of the House Science, Space, and Technology Committee today to pass a pending domestic supplemental appropriations bill that includes money to build a deorbit vehicle for the International Space Station. The supplemental also includes money to repair antennas in Guam damaged by a hurricane last year. He argued this is emergency funding that should be considered separately from NASA’s regular budget request and also revealed that the estimated cost of the deorbit vehicle has grown to $1.5 billion over six years. …

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The three-man Shenzhou-17 crew is back on Earth after 188 days on the Tiangong-3 space station. Their replacements on Shenzhou-18 arrived last week initiating another crew exchange. The three-module space station has been permanently occupied with crews rotating on roughly 6-month schedules since 2022. …

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House and Senate committee leaders announced just after midnight that they have reached agreement on a new FAA reauthorization bill. The vast majority of the bill does not deal with space activities, but one provision would extend the so-called “learning period” for another few months. The language prevents the FAA from promulgating new commercial human spaceflight regulations and will expire on May 11 if this bill does not pass by then.

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