Bulletins and News Discussion from June 10th to June 16th, 2024 - Havana Derangement Syndrome - COTW: Cuba

Analysis from Russian space nerd telegram:

As you remember, space has become a topic close to us since last year, and therefore we want to talk about NASA’s epic with the Boeing Starliner as an example of an engineering approach

So. On June 5, 2024, Starliner was finally launched with a crew of 2 and successfully docked with the ISS on June 6. We suspect that Boeing’s joy knew no bounds; it was only the press that wrote that it flew on the third try. In fact, the Boeing spaceliner is plagued by quality problems comparable to those experienced by the company's aircraft. Having received an order to create spacecraft at the same time as SpaceX, Boeing was able to send its manned spacecraft 4 years later and has already lost more than $1 billion on its creation! But why does NASA continue to mess with Boeing and wait for its ship?

Reason 1. NASA is in trouble

Typically, NASA financed complex space missions using a fee + cost formula. That is, it paid contractors for the costs of creating space technology and paid extra for the actual product received. But as a result, the cost of space projects began to fly even further than its ships could reach. Therefore, in the 2000s, NASA switched to paying for the product. And it worked out great: SpaceX and Orbital Sciences made the cargo spacecraft, and NASA only paid for the launches.

Then NASA applied the same approach to manned spacecraft and quickly got the SpaceX Crew Dragon. But the Boeing Starliner project is stalling, having difficulty completing the necessary flights. But this doesn’t cost NASA anything, so the agency is waiting for Boeing to bring its equipment up to standard.

Reason 2. Uniqueness of Starliner

Boeing Starliner and SpaceX Crew Dragon are made according to the same mono-volume design, but they are somewhat different and not always in favor of Musk’s brainchild. Thus, the internal volume of the Boeing product is almost 1.5 cubic meters larger.

If you think that Musk is a genius and everything works out for him, then let us remind you of one feature - his spaceships land on water. They need to be found, caught, and brought to land. SpaceX planned to develop the Red Dragon spacecraft with a jet landing system on Mars. But she canceled the project - it is not so easy to develop a reliable and safe landing system. And the Boeing company coped with this - landing is carried out using traditional parachutes, and at the end air cylinders are inflated under the ship and soften the blow. When Starliner returns, we will find out whether such a scheme is safe for people.

Reason 3. Reservation

NASA got burned by the Space Shuttle project, which became prohibitively expensive - each launch cost about $500 million. SpaceX's Falcon 9 rocket was able to deliver approximately the same mass of cargo into orbit at almost 9 times less the cost.

Now SpaceX is showing an example of how to do space projects quickly and inexpensively, but NASA no longer wants to wait for the next supplier to start being stupid and raising prices, so it wants to have an alternative way to deliver astronauts into orbit - the Boeing Starliner. Finally, the manned SpaceX Dragon has not yet demonstrated proper reliability. This ship made only 14 flights. For comparison, the Space Shuttle exploded on its 25th flight. So the shortcomings of the system are not always immediately visible and it is better to have insurance.

This is how the Boeing Starliner became a manual for the engineering approach: competent financial incentives, unique characteristics and redundancy allow it to remain in the focus of NASA and claim the role of a full-fledged ship for delivering astronauts into orbit.

This last paragraph is the embodiment of everything wrong with neoliberal privatization.

Mission a success or failure?

Depends on whether NASA made Boeing included "landing safely" as a contractual milestone

not ready to come back to Earth

Relatable