Can Boeing Catch Up with SpaceX?

For anyone who cares about the future of manned spaceflight, it’s been a dramatic week. On Wednesday, June 5, Boeing’s Starliner space capsule lifted off, with two veteran astronauts on board. The vehicle’s first crewed launch, after years of mishaps and delays, was a long overdue piece of good news in Boeing’s troubled quest to enter the private space business. Less than 24 hours later, as Starliner approached its rendezvous with the International Space Station (ISS), SpaceX launched a dramatic fourth unmanned test flight of its next-generation Starship spacecraft.