NASA Astronaut Backs Out From Flight To Space For Daughter’s Wedding

• NASA astronaut Chris Ferguson announced his decision to step down from the scheduled flight of Boeing’s Starliner capsule earlier this month. 
• He shared on twitter his reason for stepping down was because of a very important family event by next year. 
• As confirmed by Nasa’s spokesperson, Chris’ reason for declining from the starliner program was due to his daughter’s wedding.

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Boeing’s first astronaut flight commander canceled his scheduled test flight to the International Space Station so he could attend a very important family event by next year. 

Since the first test flight last december in which they encountered software issues, it has been the second crew switch — first was NASA astronaut Eric Boe who had to step out for health reasons, and then Chris Ferguson who announced earlier this month his decision to step aside as well — for the Boeing’s Starliner capsule.

Chris posted a video on Twitter saying it was a tough decision, but “next year is very important for my family, which I simply cannot risk missing.”

“I’m not going anywhere. I’m just not going into space next year,” he added. He also emphasized that he will still be working with the team for the Starliner program. 

The last time Chris has flown to space was in 2011 and he has been in the International Space Station for three times. Only this time, he chose to attend a very important family event — his daughter’s wedding as confirmed by a Boeing’s spokesperson. He is replaced by Butch Wilmore who has been training for it as well. 

Their scheduled flight is hopefully by June 2021 should the crewless Starliner test flight  by either this December or January be successful. 

Meanwhile, SpaceX’s first crew mission returned to Earth back in August and they are planning to launch the second flight this month.

Source: TODAY