Boeing’s Starliner successfully docks with ISS
Despite several minor helium leaks and the failure of 6 of its 28 small attitude thrusters (four of which were reactivated during an improvised hot fire test during rendezvous operations), Boeing’s Starliner has successfully docked with ISS today.
Though now safely arrived at ISS, the hatch has not yet opened. The spacecraft carries NASA astronauts Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams, and will now spend about a week at the space station checking out its systems before undocking and returning to Earth.
All told, this docking is a success, though the various thruster issues are a concern that must be addressed by Boeing, especially because there were thruster issues as well during the previous unmanned demo flight.
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Despite several minor helium leaks and the failure of 6 of its 28 small attitude thrusters (four of which were reactivated during an improvised hot fire test during rendezvous operations), Boeing’s Starliner has successfully docked with ISS today.
Though now safely arrived at ISS, the hatch has not yet opened. The spacecraft carries NASA astronauts Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams, and will now spend about a week at the space station checking out its systems before undocking and returning to Earth.
All told, this docking is a success, though the various thruster issues are a concern that must be addressed by Boeing, especially because there were thruster issues as well during the previous unmanned demo flight.
The support of my readers through the years has given me the freedom and ability to analyze objectively the ongoing renaissance in space, as well as the cultural changes -- for good or ill -- that are happening across America. Four years ago, just before the 2020 election I wrote that Joe Biden's mental health was suspect. Only in this year has the propaganda mainstream media decided to recognize that basic fact.
Fourteen years ago I wrote that SLS and Orion were a bad ideas, a waste of money, would be years behind schedule, and better replaced by commercial private enterprise. Even today NASA and Congress refuse to recognize this reality.
In 2020 when the world panicked over COVID I wrote that the panic was unnecessary, that the virus was apparently simply a variation of the flu, that masks were not simply pointless but if worn incorrectly were a health threat, that the lockdowns were a disaster and did nothing to stop the spread of COVID. Only in the past year have some of our so-called experts in the health field have begun to recognize these facts.
Your help allows me to do this kind of intelligent analysis. I take no advertising or sponsors, so my reporting isn't influenced by donations by established space or drug companies. Instead, I rely entirely on donations and subscriptions from my readers, which gives me the freedom to write what I think, unencumbered by outside influences.
Please consider supporting my work here at Behind the Black.
You can support me either by giving a one-time contribution or a regular subscription. There are five ways of doing so:
1. Zelle: This is the only internet method that charges no fees. All you have to do is use the Zelle link at your internet bank and give my name and email address (zimmerman at nasw dot org). What you donate is what I get.
2. Patreon: Go to my website there and pick one of five monthly subscription amounts, or by making a one-time donation.
3. A Paypal Donation:
5. Donate by check, payable to Robert Zimmerman and mailed to
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You can also support me by buying one of my books, as noted in the boxes interspersed throughout the webpage or shown in the menu above. And if you buy the books through the ebookit links, I get a larger cut and I get it sooner.
If NASA were responsible, they would rule that the Starliner is a test capsule and that it should not store anything valuable (like carbon based life forms) on its way back. They should rent the Dragon to get this crew hope.
Jeff Foust teases out an awkward fact in the post-docking press conference: “Several of the thrusters that went offline today also failed on OFT-2 2 yrs ago.”
Eeegad.
https://x.com/jeff_foust/status/1798826420463861857
So, now machinery doesn’t fail, it goes ‘off-line’. Hmmm.
‘Sorry we couldn’t make that delivery date. The skillset to accomplish that was off-line.’
Nope.
Richard M,
Eeegad indeed. It’s a good thing we have Crew Dragon as a backup for Starliner.
I suspect most of the time between Starliner’s projected annual runs to ISS will find it up on the grease rack, access panels off and Boeing technicians furiously twisting wrenches and replacing parts.
Hello Dick,
It looks increasingly like this is a software issue – whereas the helium leaks are most certainly hardware issues.
That should be easier to fix; but software has been a constant struggle for the Starliner program for years now, and it is disappointing that (despite some good hires) they still seem to be struggling with this kind of thing. I wonder how much of this is caused by the radioactive relationship the Starliner division has with Aeroject Rocketdyne?
NASA and Boeing are going to have a full plate in the post-mission examination in trying to complete certification for this thing in time for an operational mission next year. There’s a lot of things still to fix.
Eric Berger had an interesting essay last month:
https://arstechnica.com/space/2024/05/the-surprise-is-not-that-boeing-lost-commercial-crew-but-that-it-finished-at-all/
It seems that some hardware trouble may be associated with Boeing’s relationship with Rocketdyne, but the software problems may be associated with Boeing’s relationship with itself.
Eric Berger had an interesting essay published yesterday about the ongoing crewed demo mission docked at the ISS:
https://arstechnica.com/space/2024/06/after-a-drama-filled-day-boeings-starliner-finally-finds-its-way/
The best quotes:
Now, with four separate leaks, Nappi (VP & Mgr of Boeing’s Commercial Crew Program) acknowledged that Boeing may not fully understand the root cause of the problem. “They’re very similar in the way that they’re behaving, so there’s a good reason to believe that they may be similar,” he said Thursday. The company has already begun investigating the issue with similar hardware on the ground.
[T]his is now the second consecutive mission in which a subset of these small thrusters failed to operate during a Starliner flight. During the vehicle’s previous mission, Orbital Flight Test-2 in May 2022, some of these same thrusters failed to operate when called upon during the approach to the station. Although two small software fixes were applied after that flight, they appear not to have addressed the issue.
“I think we’re missing something fundamental that’s going on inside the thrusters,” said Steve Stich, NASA’s commercial crew program manager on Thursday.
Things sound like they need much more sorting out before Starliner can fly crews with 6 months parked at the ISS.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gZ6qnYsZQLA&ab_channel=MoterWorld
After watching this I can see exactly why they are having trouble with the craft.
It looks like something out of 1965 with all those buttons switches and controllers
I am glad Dragon exists..
After watching this I can see exactly why they are having trouble with the craft.
It looks like something out of 1965 with all those buttons switches and controllers
I was thinking more like 1995. (Come on, give ’em some credit.) It looks like, well, a scaled down Dreamliner cockpit.
But clearly it’s a more conservative approach to controls. That is not unreasonable per se, but I was amazed to learn that the forward docking camera feeds can only be accessed through the Windows tablets (!), because the avionics screens can’t handle it. I would love to know the design history that produced that compromise.
Boeing also clearly did not give a d**n about aesthetics, which may not be surprising if your mindset is that your only intended customer is the U.S. government. Again, that’s not fatal per se, but it is nonetheless clear that SpaceX put some serious thought into ergonomic layout of the Dragon in a way that Boeing apparently did not. It’s simply much easier to get into and out of both your set and the capsule, in either microgravity or 1G, if you are in a Dragon.
OTOH, Starliner can fit a 5th passenger in if they really want to. I suppose that might end up counting for something.