Live coverage: International crew lands in Kazakhstan

A 154-foot-long solid rocket booster will be ignited for two minutes Tuesday at a remote test site in Utah, wrapping up a series of five ground firings to prove the motor’s readiness for flight on NASA’s Space Launch System.

Members of NASA’s independent panel of aerospace safety advisors raised concerns last week about quality control problems that “seemingly have plagued” Boeing’s Starliner crew capsule program, while urging NASA to closely monitor SpaceX’s plans to reuse Crew Dragon spaceships on astronaut flights to the International Space Station.

Former Johnson Space Center Director Christopher Columbus Kraft Jr., the man who created the iconic role of NASA flight director during the Mercury and Gemini programs and whose no-nonsense, uncompromising management style defined control room operations and discipline through the Apollo years and beyond, died Monday. He was 95.