NASA has decided it’s too risky to bring two astronauts back to Earth in Boeing’s troubled new capsule. They’ll have to wait until February for a ride home with SpaceX.
NASA update a few weeks back said all 27 thrusters passed multiple hot fire simulations of the return mission. That overall things looked fine. And they still felt safety factor of riding home on Dragon was better.
Kinda neat that there are multiple options now. NASA mission leaders felt the same a while back. Even if Starliner seems fine to come home why take even that slight bit of risk.
Boeing engineers tested the thrusters and managed to replicate the issue. They found that there issue was caused by a bulging of a Teflon valve.
However they don’t understand the root cause of why the Teflon is bulging.
So Boeing said it’s safe for the astronauts to return on Starliner but they also said that they fixed the thruster issues they had on the previous flight.
Not all NASA is confident that the Starliner is safe enough.
IIRC, the whole thing is a bit of misconception in the popular imagination. It’ll reenter just fine if it manages the right maneuvers. The risk is hitting the ISS on the way out.
Listening to NASA’s official press releases isn’t exactly what I’d call being a keyboard warrior. I don’t think there’s anything wrong with using the most authoritative source as your primary world view, in most cases.
Honestly… who would dare to risk reentry in that piece of shit.
NASA update a few weeks back said all 27 thrusters passed multiple hot fire simulations of the return mission. That overall things looked fine. And they still felt safety factor of riding home on Dragon was better.
Kinda neat that there are multiple options now. NASA mission leaders felt the same a while back. Even if Starliner seems fine to come home why take even that slight bit of risk.
This is not what I’ve read.
Boeing engineers tested the thrusters and managed to replicate the issue. They found that there issue was caused by a bulging of a Teflon valve.
However they don’t understand the root cause of why the Teflon is bulging.
So Boeing said it’s safe for the astronauts to return on Starliner but they also said that they fixed the thruster issues they had on the previous flight.
Not all NASA is confident that the Starliner is safe enough.
IIRC, the whole thing is a bit of misconception in the popular imagination. It’ll reenter just fine if it manages the right maneuvers. The risk is hitting the ISS on the way out.
And actually making those maneuvers. If the seals bulge again and disable a thruster, they might be unable to control their flight.
The 1 thruster experiencing that worst case isn’t needed. The 27 others all tested high 90% range through multiple hot fires a couple weeks back.
Was this update. About five minutes of update starting at this timestamp.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wLNeIx7AwVE&t=2m12s
Keyboard warriors of the internet.
I saw comments mentioning how it was a minor annoyance and they’d be back home in the same craft same week or something close.
Kids, this is why you take anything from the internet with healthy dose of skepticism.
Listening to NASA’s official press releases isn’t exactly what I’d call being a keyboard warrior. I don’t think there’s anything wrong with using the most authoritative source as your primary world view, in most cases.