Boeing's new Starliner spacecraft lifted off in early June with its first astronauts, Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams, and has since docked with the Space Station (ISS).
It was originally scheduled to return the astronauts to Earth eight days later, but problems detected with its propulsion system led NASA to question its reliability. And consider a radical emergency solution: bringing the crew back in a few months aboard another vehicle, namely a regular SpaceX mission.
“He's doing really well”
A decision-making committee is expected to meet “late next week” or “early next week,” Ken Bowersox, NASA's associate administrator, said Wednesday. A decision should be made in the last week of August, “if not before,” he added.
If it is decided that the Starliner is not safe enough, then the ship would return empty.
A SpaceX mission, called Crew-9, would lift off in late September carrying just two astronauts instead of four. As planned, it will remain docked with the ISS until it returns to Earth in February with the two Boeing castaways.
Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams would therefore spend eight months on the ISS instead of eight days. “I talked to them yesterday and they are doing very well,” said Joe Acaba, chief astronaut at NASA.
These two space veterans knew this was the first manned test flight of this craft and that the mission “carried some risks,” he recalled.
Humiliation
During the journey to the ISS, the spacecraft noticed several helium leaks and several thrusters failed at some point during the flight. However, these must be used during the dizzying descent to Earth.
“Our primary concern is to have a successful thrust” that allows the spacecraft to leave orbit, Ken Bowersox said. If the two astronauts were indeed rescued by SpaceX, it would represent a major blow – even a humiliation – for Boeing.
The Starliner development program has already suffered several setbacks and this first crewed mission took off years late.