Meet the NASA astronauts who will be the first to board the Boeing spacecraft

Two NASA astronauts are set to become the first in history to be launched into space aboard a Boeing spacecraft.

Astronauts Barry “Butch” Wilmore and Sunita Williams are scheduled to pilot the company’s Starliner capsule on its first crewed test flight to the International Space Station on May 6.

They arrived Thursday at the agency’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida, where they will both remain until launch.

“This is where the rubber meets the road, where we’re going to leave this planet, and that’s really cool,” Williams said at a post-arrival news conference.

The long-delayed mission will be crucial in demonstrating that Boeing’s spacecraft can safely transport a crew to and from low-Earth orbit. If successful, it will be an important step for the company, which eventually plans to join the ranks of SpaceX in conducting routine flights to and from the space station for NASA.

The test flight will be closely watched because software glitches and problems with the Starliner’s fuel valves have already set the mission back years. Boeing’s separate aviation arm has also been under intense scrutiny after a panel exploded on one of its 737 Max 9 planes mid-flight earlier this year, raising questions about quality control practices at the company.

Wilmore said the delays leading up to this launch were necessary to ensure the Starliner capsule was prepared to carry people into space.

“We wouldn’t be here if we weren’t ready,” he said. “We are ready. The spacecraft is ready and the teams are ready.”

Officials from NASA, Boeing and United Launch Alliance, which makes the Atlas V rocket on which the Starliner capsule will launch, met on Thursday and signed off on the May 6 liftoff attempt.

Then, on Friday, the astronauts completed a full dress rehearsal for launch day. They will now spend the next week working on last-minute preparations and training exercises, according to NASA.

If the crew successfully reaches the International Space Station, the astronauts will spend about a week there before returning to Earth.

Wilmore and Williams are veteran astronauts and former U.S. Navy test pilots. NASA selected the pair in 2022 for Boeing’s first crewed test flight.

Wilmore, the mission commander, completed two previous space flights, logging 178 days in space. A Tennessee native, he piloted the space shuttle Atlantis to the space station in 2009, and also launched to the orbiting outpost aboard a Russian Soyuz spacecraft in 2014 as a member of the space station’s Expedition 41 crew.

Williams, the mission’s pilot, has already completed two stints aboard the International Space Station, totaling 322 days in space.

She grew up in Needham, Massachusetts, and first flew to the ISS on the space shuttle Discovery, where she stayed for about six months. In 2012, Williams returned to space, this time in a Russian-built Soyuz spacecraft. His second stay on the space station lasted about four months.