NASA will decide this weekend whether Boeing's new capsule is safe enough to return two astronauts from the International Space Station, where they've been waiting since June.
NASA said Thursday it will decide this weekend whether Boeing’s new capsule is safe enough to return two astronauts from the International Space Station, where they’ve been waiting since June.
Administrator Bill Nelson and other top officials will meet Saturday. An announcement is expected from Houston once the meeting ends.
Astronauts Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams launched aboard Boeing’s Starliner on June 5. The test flight quickly encountered thruster failures and helium leaks so serious that NASA kept the capsule parked at the station as engineers debated what to do.
SpaceX could retrieve the astronauts, but that would keep them up there until next February. They were supposed to return after a week or so at the station.
That's why you always pack more underwear than you think you will need.
Come to think of it, how do astronauts do laundry?
Edit: I looked it up. They don't. Dirty laundry is ejected into space to burn up on re-entry. So these poor travelers probably did not pack for an 8 month trip.
This is a great idea for a porn plot: several young, fit people in an enclosed space with nothing to do, cause they finished their assigned tasks weeks ago. Lots of positions that aren't physically possible in earths gravity.
And they just ejected their last set of clothes.
"This meant Wilmore and Williams were forced to ration their clean clothes. Thankfully, a resupply mission earlier this month gave them a few extra pairs of scrubs." Source
Imagine how worried their families must be this whole time. I can't imagine "my family member has been stuck in space for months" is a type of stress that many people would relate to.
I actually was sitting here thinking about it from the astronauts' perspective.... I'm sure their mental fortitude is more robust than the average human, but could you imagine being indefinitely stranded in a Pringles can whipping around the planet once every 90 minutes with zero ability to do anything to extricate yourself from the situation? The thought makes my skin crawl... but I don't fly for the same reasons lol
What is gained by taking the responsibility away from them, and handing it to some other person? I could maybe see it if I trusted that other person to be more qualified, but if they are NASA administration, then I don’t.
They should certainly have an input, but their desire to get home quickly might really bias them into taking unnecessary risks. I'm not sure I agree with giving them the final call.
It may sound callous, but the downsides also aren't completely theirs. The death of two astronauts would impact NASA as a whole, and to an extent even the whole US. For NASA it may very well be worth making two people wait another 6 months if it means showing the public that safety comes first.
And what if the two astronauts don't agree? Can they allow 1 to descend solo while the other waits?
I mean I won't say you're wrong in the abstract or don't have a point, but NASA management's consistent history of making dogshit decisions as regards safety is also a highly relevant factor here.
Generally in civilian aviation, if you're on the one on the plane, you get to make the decisions, because ultimately it's your ass on the line. In emergency situations nobody gets to override you and say you have to do it this other way instead even if you don't like it. Even if NASA management makes a perfect decision based on the information available to them at the time, and something goes wrong and the astronauts die, that's still a bothersome outcome to me. Like, it's their life. Let them have the responsibility. Hopefully there's one overall probably-right answer, and management and the astronauts would both evaluate the same information and come to the same conclusion anyway, but even so I still feel like it'd be a better situation if it was the astronauts deciding about their own life and death. Then if something does go wrong, everyone's hands are clean and there's no second guessing.
How many of them were involved in overriding the engineers as regarded launching the Challenger?
(I would recommend "Riding Rockets" as a pretty good book to read for a general overview of the safety culture in NASA management and the reasons I don't trust them to make this decision. Honestly, for all I know, things have changed radically since then -- but given that NASA management were the ones that sent them up on a Boeing spacecraft in the first place when years ago I was already able to see that Boeing was no longer capable of doing safe engineering of even civilian commercial air travel, I kind of doubt it.)
That's how Apollo 1 blew up. They took advice from the astronauts. The astronauts wanted a door that was hard to open for the ocean and flammable plastic webbing to hold onto. They used 02 because it was cheap. Then they blew up encased in a molten tomb.
Administrator Bill Nelson and other top officials will meet Saturday. An announcement is expected from Houston once the meeting ends.
Engineers are evaluating a new computer model for the Starliner thrusters and how they might perform as the capsule descends out of orbit for a touchdown in the U.S. Western desert. The results, including updated risk analyses, will factor into the final decision, NASA said.
The article makes a specific point about “top officials” being the ones at the meeting, and makes a distinction between those engineers and “NASA” who is the one making the decision.
They won't. I think that's why this is happening on a Saturday- stock markets are closed so it won't instantly tank Boeing's stock price.
Look back at the last few space disasters that killed people- Challenger and Columbia. In both cases it was the same- someone in NASA tried to sound the alarm but they didn't listen because of organizational culture or whatever. Thus the people at the top of NASA could say with a straight face 'we didn't know, we will change culture to listen to the little guy who thinks there's a problem'. And so, we all forgave them for making us watch heroes die on live TV.
This is different. The alarm has been sounded and it's been sounding for months. Everyone at all levels of NASA, Boeing, and for that matter the general public know that Starliner has a very serious thruster problem. There's no excuses here, no 'promise to fix culture' or new procedure that could forgive an accident. If Butch and Suni blow up on live TV there'll be no excuses anyone for anyone to make because the decision is being made with everyone fully informed. The public at large will know it happened because NASA trusted 'don't bolt the doors on Boeing' with the lives of American heroes. The American people will demand that heads roll at both NASA and Boeing and it may well happen too. We don't like watching real heroes die on live TV.
So look at Starliner right now. The thrusters have problems that make them overheat and shut off when commanded to fire and, as of when I last checked, Boeing isn't even sure what's wrong.
Point is- if Starliner crashes with Americans on board, NASA won't just be burning credibility. They'll be burning themselves, Boeing, and the entire manned space program.
So I predict the flight readiness review before the press conference is just a formality, that the decision has already been made to bring our people back on Crew Dragon. And I'm sure someone from Boeing will be all thumbs up over an 'overabundance of caution'.
Well, of course, but there can be some serious pressure put on them. Staying on board literally causes changes to future missions and a host of other things NASA had plans for.
My take on this is maybe a little calloused and mean but why is NASA involved in that decision? They hired contractors to take over the launch this part of their program. One of the contractors has an equipment problem snd that is on them to overcome in a safe manner. I don't want the Boeing astronauts to get hurt but this isn't NASA's risk to accept or mitigate.