Boeing opens commercial spacecraft plant at NASA center

PanARMENIAN.Net - Boeing Co took the wraps off an assembly plant on Friday, September 4, for its first line of commercial spaceships, which NASA plans to use to fly crews to the International Space Station, officials said, according to Reuters.

"This is a point in history that reflects a new era in human spaceflight," Boeing Chief Executive Dennis Muilenburg said at a grand opening ceremony at the Kennedy Space Center.

Boeing's newly named CST-100 Starliner spaceships will be prepared for flight in a processing hangar once used by NASA's space shuttles. The capsule's debut test flight is targeted for 2017.

Starliners will fly from nearby Cape Canaveral Air Force Station aboard Atlas 5 rockets, which are built and flown by United Launch Alliance, a partnership of Lockheed Martin and Boeing.

NASA is paying up to $4.2 billion for a Starliner test flight and up to six missions to the station. The U.S. space agency has a similar contract with privately owned SpaceX, which intends to accomplish the work for $2.6 billion.

Muilenburg declined to say how much of its own money Boeing is putting into the project, but said its ultimate success will depend on customers beyond NASA.