Starliner reaches proper orbit despite thruster problems
Unbelievable: During the post-launch press conference last night Boeing officials revealed that, though the final burn to get Boeing’s Starliner capsule into orbit using its own thrusters succeeded, the thrusters did not function as planned.
Boeing Vice President Mark Nappi said a Starliner thruster failed after firing for one second as the spacecraft made a burn to enter orbit after separating from its Atlas V launch vehicle. The flight software switched to a second thruster, which fired for 25 seconds before shutting down prematurely. A third thruster took over and completed the firing, Nappi said.
The thrusters were made by Aerojet Rocketdyne, which also made the valves that did not work in the previous launch attempt in the summer of 2021. Whether the two problems are related is not known at this time.
A NASA official also noted that a cooling unit on the spacecraft operated “sluggishly during ascent,” but began working correctly once in orbit.
Right now NASA and Boeing are planning to proceed with the docking on ISS tonight at 7:10 pm (Eastern). It appears that though two thrusters have failed, they have ten more thrusters that can be used for further maneuvers throughout the mission. Furthermore, these thrusters are not used during the actual rendezvous and docking.
The live stream of the docking goes live at 3:30 pm (Eastern), and is embedded below. Until then enjoy NASA propaganda, some of it might be of interest.
Update: NASA has cut off coverage of the docking on the channel I had embedded previously. I have now embedded an active live feed.
Now available in hardback and paperback as well as ebook!
From the press release: In this ground-breaking new history of early America, historian Robert Zimmerman not only exposes the lie behind The New York Times 1619 Project that falsely claims slavery is central to the history of the United States, he also provides profound lessons about the nature of human societies, lessons important for Americans today as well as for all future settlers on Mars and elsewhere in space.
Conscious Choice: The origins of slavery in America and why it matters today and for our future in outer space, is a riveting page-turning story that documents how slavery slowly became pervasive in the southern British colonies of North America, colonies founded by a people and culture that not only did not allow slavery but in every way were hostile to the practice.
Conscious Choice does more however. In telling the tragic history of the Virginia colony and the rise of slavery there, Zimmerman lays out the proper path for creating healthy societies in places like the Moon and Mars.
“Zimmerman’s ground-breaking history provides every future generation the basic framework for establishing new societies on other worlds. We would be wise to heed what he says.” —Robert Zubrin, founder of founder of the Mars Society.
All editions are available at Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and all book vendors, with the ebook priced at $5.99 before discount. The ebook can also be purchased direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit, in which case you don't support the big tech companies and I get a bigger cut much sooner.
Autographed printed copies are also available at discount directly from me (hardback $24.95; paperback $14.95; Shipping cost for either: $5.00). Just email me at zimmerman @ nasw dot org.
Unbelievable: During the post-launch press conference last night Boeing officials revealed that, though the final burn to get Boeing’s Starliner capsule into orbit using its own thrusters succeeded, the thrusters did not function as planned.
Boeing Vice President Mark Nappi said a Starliner thruster failed after firing for one second as the spacecraft made a burn to enter orbit after separating from its Atlas V launch vehicle. The flight software switched to a second thruster, which fired for 25 seconds before shutting down prematurely. A third thruster took over and completed the firing, Nappi said.
The thrusters were made by Aerojet Rocketdyne, which also made the valves that did not work in the previous launch attempt in the summer of 2021. Whether the two problems are related is not known at this time.
A NASA official also noted that a cooling unit on the spacecraft operated “sluggishly during ascent,” but began working correctly once in orbit.
Right now NASA and Boeing are planning to proceed with the docking on ISS tonight at 7:10 pm (Eastern). It appears that though two thrusters have failed, they have ten more thrusters that can be used for further maneuvers throughout the mission. Furthermore, these thrusters are not used during the actual rendezvous and docking.
The live stream of the docking goes live at 3:30 pm (Eastern), and is embedded below. Until then enjoy NASA propaganda, some of it might be of interest.
Update: NASA has cut off coverage of the docking on the channel I had embedded previously. I have now embedded an active live feed.
Now available in hardback and paperback as well as ebook!
From the press release: In this ground-breaking new history of early America, historian Robert Zimmerman not only exposes the lie behind The New York Times 1619 Project that falsely claims slavery is central to the history of the United States, he also provides profound lessons about the nature of human societies, lessons important for Americans today as well as for all future settlers on Mars and elsewhere in space.
Conscious Choice: The origins of slavery in America and why it matters today and for our future in outer space, is a riveting page-turning story that documents how slavery slowly became pervasive in the southern British colonies of North America, colonies founded by a people and culture that not only did not allow slavery but in every way were hostile to the practice.
Conscious Choice does more however. In telling the tragic history of the Virginia colony and the rise of slavery there, Zimmerman lays out the proper path for creating healthy societies in places like the Moon and Mars.
“Zimmerman’s ground-breaking history provides every future generation the basic framework for establishing new societies on other worlds. We would be wise to heed what he says.” —Robert Zubrin, founder of founder of the Mars Society.
All editions are available at Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and all book vendors, with the ebook priced at $5.99 before discount. The ebook can also be purchased direct from my ebook publisher, ebookit, in which case you don't support the big tech companies and I get a bigger cut much sooner.
Autographed printed copies are also available at discount directly from me (hardback $24.95; paperback $14.95; Shipping cost for either: $5.00). Just email me at zimmerman @ nasw dot org.
I know they are shooting for a manned mission for Starliner sometime at the end of this year, but these problems may delay it to next year. We are only hearing about these two issues, but I am sure there will be a laundry list of small items, and fine tuning of the spacecraft. This is typical of any engineering project.
During the launch they interviewed Astronauts Barry Wilmore and Michael Fincke. Sunita Williams was at one of the launch stations during the broadcast. One thing that was mentioned is that the manned Starliner flight will have three astronauts: a commander, pilot, and mission specialist. I was surprised to hear there will be a mission specialist. They only had a commander and pilot for the Dragon Demo mission.
Mission Specialist = Mechanic riding shotgun.
I was wondering why Starliner was equipped with so many engines and thrusters, compared to other designs.
Now we know. Spares.
Given the thrusters are proven unreliable the crew would be wise to put on their best faulty spacesuits when the spacecraft is docking.
I’d like to know if any of the Dragon missions have had thruster units fail, and then gone to backups, which also failed? It might have happened, but I don’t recall hearing about it. If indeed this is unprecedented, how can NASA / Boeing justify continuing?
” If indeed this is unprecedented, how can NASA / Boeing justify continuing?”
You’ll have to check with the Department of Redundancy Department.
Ray,
I think the unmanned Dragon 2 had an issue with one or more of it’s RCS thruster(s), but it was compensated for by the others.
As for Starliner, when I first heard about the failure of the two thrusters, I thought it was just two RCS thrusters as well, but these are the OMACS (I had to look this up TLA on NASA site- Orbital Maneuvering and Attitude Control System). So those four protrusions on the service module are the OMACS, each has three thrusters facing aft, and those were used to get into the final orbit. Two of the three thrusters failed in one OMAC and they shut down the third thruster and the OMAC opposite of that one to balance it. The other two OMACS along with the RCS thrusters compensated for the other two being off.
Reading more, it looks like they can use two to get by and they will have use those OMACS again for re-entry. So the OMACS have forward thrusters as well, three aft and three forward, for a total of twenty four. They might use the forward ones to help.
I wish the Boeing Starliner Team the best of luck.
Curious if we are approaching the point where we can call the spacecraft operators ‘crew’, rather than astronauts? No one would mistake a weekend pilot out for a jaunt for professional aircrew, and maybe that distinction is being made.
It’s not back on earth (in one piece) yet.