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Boeing and NASA have announced that they are planning to launch and fly (Orbital Flight Test-2, OFT-2) the Starliner spacecraft on July 30, to the International Space Station.

The flight will be unmanned. According to Boeing, it recently completed the end-to-end testing of Starliner flight software with a five-day shipping simulation.

The Starliner has so far looked unlucky: Boeing had tested a test flight in December 2019, but the boat did not arrive at the station as planned, due to a series of technical problems. There were further delays as Boeing tried to catch up with NASA's post-flight requirements, and there were technical and meteorological issues. Also, as Space.com wrote, Boeing had to wait while NASA tried to find an available "window" for launching a spacecraft to the International Space Station.

Both Boeing and SpaceX have contracts with NASA. SpaceX has launched two manned missions to the station with a Crew Dragon capsule and a Falcon 9 rocket.

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