Boeing Starliner

[Beati Dogu]

Famous last words, but I'm sure it'll be fine. We'd have heard about it by now if they were having unacceptable issues with it.

The still plan to undock on Wed 26th June at 3:10am UK time, at the earliest.

Landing will be about 7 hours later on the 26th at White Sands Space Harbor in New Mexico.

Edited by Beati Dogu on Friday 21st June 23:44

[2fast748]

Beati Dogu said:

Famous last words, but I'm sure it'll be fine. We'd have heard about it by now if they were having unacceptable issues with it.

The still plan to undock on Wed 26th June at 3:10am UK time, at the earliest.

Landing will be about 7 hours later on the 26th at White Sands Space Harbor in New Mexico.

Edited by Beati Dogu on Friday 21st June 23:44

Famous last words indeed:

https://arstechnica.com/space/2024/06/nasa-indefin...

Hopefully "abundance of caution" is the overriding thought here and not something else.

[Beati Dogu]

There were rumours of a delay last night, but NASA is now making it official:

"NASA and Boeing leadership are adjusting the return to Earth of the Starliner Crew Flight Test spacecraft with agency astronauts Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams from the International Space Station. The move off Wednesday, June 26, deconflicts Starliner’s undocking and landing from a series of planned International Space Station spacewalks while allowing mission teams time to review propulsion system data.”

They point out that the first manned flight of Crew Dragon (Demo-2) was up there for two months. That was different though, I would suggest. First of all it was preplanned before they even left the ground and there were only 3 other people on the ISS at the time; So it made some sense to get the two astronauts to help with the backlog of work, as they would be there anyway. Now there are 7 plus the 2 who arrived on Starliner at the station.

Edited by Beati Dogu on Saturday 22 June 12:03

[MartG]

Even if they do manage to return it safely, Boeing will face a mountain of work to convince NASA it is safe to fly again

[Gargamel]

Don’t worry it’s ‘strategic’ - which ai think they intend to mean, it’s complicated and you wouldn’t understand.

‘We are strategically using the extra time to clear a path for some critical station activities while completing readiness for Butch and Suni’s return on Starliner and gaining valuable insight into the system upgrades we will want to make for post-certification missions," Stich said.

Hmm.

[MartG]

I wonder if it is possible to fly it back unmanned ?

That way if it does explode/burn up/smack into the desert at high speed at least it won't have killed anyone.

[Beati Dogu]

They've already flown two of the back safely, with no crew onboard.

Let's hope it doesn't crash land on habitation like Chinese rockets are prone to do:



All that lovely poisonous hypergolic fuel hosing everywhere.

Edited by Beati Dogu on Sunday 23 June 15:20

[London424]

Not sure I’d be too willing to return on that capsule right about now.

[48k]

I hope they packed plenty of spare undies

[Eric Mc]

The undies will arrive on an old reliable Progress.

[eharding]

Eric Mc said:

The undies will arrive on an old reliable Progress.

Whilst being tracked by the Keck Observatory.

[48k]

eharding said:

Eric Mc said:

The undies will arrive on an old reliable Progress.

Whilst being tracked by the Keck Observatory.

[Dog Star]

eharding said:

Whilst being tracked by the Keck Observatory.

Brilliant!

[Gargamel]

I understand Boing are now running ground tests in New Mexico to try to understand the various thruster failures, and a 90 day mission clock is more likely than 45 days.

Hopefully they can find a solution they are confident in from a safety point of view. Managing a bit of poor PR from a few leaks is one thing, losing the craft on re entry would be a disaster.

I can imagine these are difficult days for the teams.

[Dog Star]

Given they’ve had thrusters that have all failed in the relatively benign environments of assembly buildings, the planets surface and whatnot, I do wonder at the state of the thing after a couple of months in space.

I appreciate that there’s a degree of sensationalism about this perhaps, but I really am rather sceptical about this whole thing. I’m at the stage where I will be very surprised if they actually land it with astronauts aboard.

[48k]

Gargamel said:

I can imagine these are difficult days for the teams.

Indeed. Once you've done inside out, and back to front you're left with some very difficult decisions.

[eharding]

Dog Star said:

Given they’ve had thrusters that have all failed in the relatively benign environments of assembly buildings, the planets surface and whatnot, I do wonder at the state of the thing after a couple of months in space.

I've see speculation that the delays in bringing the Starliner back could in be in part because the failed thrusters will be destroyed when the service module is discarded before re-entry and burns up, so Boeing want the opportunity to try and diagnose the problems before the evidence is vapourised.

Of course, the longer they leave it up there, the more chance there is Starliner might drop another bllock.

Edited by eharding on Tuesday 2nd July 15:45

[Petrus1983]

Any news about the astronauts who aren't stuck in space? Another week of silence?

I'm not being lazy - I've seen this press conference happened -

https://www.nasa.gov/news-release/nasa-boeing-prov...

But not an update from it.

Edited by Petrus1983 on Tuesday 9th July 12:24

[MartG]

Petrus1983 said:

Any news about the astronauts who aren't stuck in space? Another week of silence?

I'm not being lazy - I've seen this press conference happened -

https://www.nasa.gov/news-release/nasa-boeing-prov...

But not an update from it.

Edited by Petrus1983 on Tuesday 9th July 12:24

Given the conference is scheduled for tomorrow, I'm not surprised at the lack of updates from it

[Gargamel]

I can't find any new information. Is it just parked there now.