Starliner’s stay at ISS extended several days
NASA revealed yesterday that it has extended the time that Boeing’s Starliner capsule will remained docked at ISS several days, with undocking now set for June 18, 2024.
New station visitors Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams, both veteran NASA astronauts, learned on Sunday they will orbit Earth until June 18 before returning home aboard Boeing’s Starliner spacecraft. The extra days in space will allow teams more time to checkout Starliner’s systems and free up the Expedition crew’s schedule for more spacewalk preparations.
I also suspect that Boeing engineers wanted more time to analyze the data on Starliner’s attitude thrusters and why several failed to work on the flight up to the station. Once the spacecraft undocks with Wilmore and Williams, it will be esssential for those thrusters to work reliably to get both home safely. The capsule can return home even with some of the spacecraft’s 28 attitude thrusters non-functioning, but if a failure occurs at an unexpected moment the results could still be bad.
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NASA revealed yesterday that it has extended the time that Boeing’s Starliner capsule will remained docked at ISS several days, with undocking now set for June 18, 2024.
New station visitors Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams, both veteran NASA astronauts, learned on Sunday they will orbit Earth until June 18 before returning home aboard Boeing’s Starliner spacecraft. The extra days in space will allow teams more time to checkout Starliner’s systems and free up the Expedition crew’s schedule for more spacewalk preparations.
I also suspect that Boeing engineers wanted more time to analyze the data on Starliner’s attitude thrusters and why several failed to work on the flight up to the station. Once the spacecraft undocks with Wilmore and Williams, it will be esssential for those thrusters to work reliably to get both home safely. The capsule can return home even with some of the spacecraft’s 28 attitude thrusters non-functioning, but if a failure occurs at an unexpected moment the results could still be bad.
Readers!
Please consider supporting my work here at Behind the Black. Your support allows 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. 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. Only now does it appear that Washington might finally 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.
You can support me either by giving a one-time contribution or a regular subscription. There are four 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 or subscription:
4. Donate by check, payable to Robert Zimmerman and mailed to
Behind The Black
c/o Robert Zimmerman
P.O.Box 1262
Cortaro, AZ 85652
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.
Too bad they can’t Uber up a Dragon capsule for the trip home!
I do not think a Dragon-based rescue mission will happen.. but oh, would it be horribly embarrassing.
Truthfully, I hope they resolve it. I would like to see it work, not to mention risk their lives unnecessarily.
How long has it been since a space disaster? I think we may be approaching, if not within, the “who was Sally Ride?” era.
Hopefully, there is not too much pressure on the engineers and their managers to prevent them from making a good decision.
a failure occurs at an unexpected moment the results could still be bad
“Imagine a Twinkie[tm] entering Earth’s thermosphere at 10 km/s, as its rockets give out and every surrounding molecule of sugar is bombarded with 4000 K plasma . . .”
We must have the capability to land a crew on land. The oceans are expensive to fully secure. So Starliner is a needed stop gap until the alternatives are ready. Nice to see all due caution. Also no such thing in probability as being due for an accident; outside of magical thinking. If they had to get use a Dragon to get back no big deal. Might even help Boeing stock price long term
I woke up this morning (6/12) to find an article on “Space News” that says a 5th “small” helium leak has been discovered aboard Starliner. Boeing spokesperson says there is no concern because there is 70 hours worth of helium remaining aboard and only 7 hours worth of helium is needed for undocking and reentry.
For some reason, I am not reassured.
Mark Sizer asked: “How long has it been since a space disaster?”
The Soviets had their disasters in space early in their space program, but the Americans have had even worse disasters more recently. However, the good news is that the ISS is a good harbor to ride out a problem with any spacecraft. ISS had become the backup for the Space Shuttle, in its last decade of operation.
I don’t see this as a life-threatening problem, despite it shrining new leaks, but when you buy (or in this case rent) a new car, you expect it to work much better than Starliner is doing.
They may desire examining the systems on orbit, because this behavior was not happening on the ground.
Is Starliner the Fisker Ocean of spacecraft?
It basically works but it’s not quite a finished product…
I don’t think Consumer Reports will be testing Starliner but here’s their take on the Ocean:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pVF4I6weZdA