Two NASA astronauts who flew to the International Space Station (ISS) in June aboard Boeing’s faulty Starliner capsule would need to return to Earth on a Space Exploration Technologies (SpaceX) vehicle early next year, NASA officials said on Saturday, deeming issues with Starliner’s propulsion system too risky to carry its first crew home as planned.
Veteran NASA astronauts Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams, both former military test pilots, became the first crew to ride Starliner on June 5 when they were launched to the ISS for what was expected to be an eight-day test mission.
However, Starliner’s propulsion system experienced a series of glitches in the first 24 hours of its flight to the ISS that has so far kept the astronauts on the station for 79 days as Boeing scrambled to investigate the issues.
Photo: EPA-EFE / NASA
NASA officials told reporters during a news conference in Houston that Wilmore and Williams are safe and prepared to stay even longer.
They would use their extra time to conduct science experiments alongside the station’s other seven astronauts, NASA said.
In a rare reshuffling of NASA’s astronaut operations, the two astronauts are expected to return in February next year on a SpaceX Crew Dragon spacecraft due to launch next month as part of a routine astronaut rotation mission. Two of the Crew Dragon’s four astronaut seats would be kept empty for Wilmore and Williams.
The agency’s decision, tapping Boeing’s top space rival to return the astronauts, is one of NASA’s most consequential in years. Boeing had hoped its Starliner test mission would redeem the troubled program after years of development problems and more than US$1.6 billion in budget overruns since 2016.
Five of Starliner’s 28 thrusters failed during flight and it sprang several leaks of helium, which is used to pressurize the thrusters. It was still able to dock with the station, a football field-sized laboratory that has housed rotating crews of astronauts for over two decades.
Starliner would undock from the ISS without a crew in “early September,” NASA said in a statement.
The spacecraft would attempt to return to Earth autonomously, forgoing a core test objective of having a crew present and in control for the return trip.
“I know this is not the decision we had hoped for, but we stand ready to carry out the action’s necessary to support NASA’s decision,” Boeing’s Starliner chief Mark Nappi told employees in an e-mail.
“The focus remains first and foremost on ensuring the safety of the crew and spacecraft,” Nappi said.
Several senior NASA officials and Boeing representatives made the decision during a Saturday morning meeting in Houston.
Agency officials unanimously voted for Crew Dragon to bring the astronauts home, NASA Associate Administrator for Space Operations Ken Bowersox said.
Boeing voted for Starliner, which it said was safe.
Nelson told reporters at the news conference in Houston that he discussed the agency’s decision with Boeing’s new CEO Kelly Ortberg and was confident Boeing would continue its Starliner program.
Nelson said he was “100 percent” certain the spacecraft would fly another crew.
Boeing struggled for years to develop Starliner, a gumdrop-shaped capsule designed to compete with Crew Dragon as a second US option for transporting astronauts to and from Earth’s orbit. The company is also struggling with quality issues on production of commercial planes, its most important products.
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