Name: SpaceX Completing a Boeing Mission: NASA’s Backup Plan, Explained | WSJ
Uploaded: 2024-08-26T11:24:48.000Z
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Two NASA astronauts, Sunita Williams and Barry Wilmore, who traveled to the International Space Station on an eight-day mission, could now end up staying there for over eight months because of problems with Boeing's Starliner spacecraft.

To add insult to injury, NASA announced that the crew will return to Earth on a spacecraft from Boeing's competitor, SpaceX, in February of 2025.

Adverbs of degree

There's just a lot of uncertainty about what happens to the Starliner program.

You know, this might not look good right now, but we don't know the end of it yet.

Here's a breakdown of Boeing's Starliner saga and what it could mean for the aerospace giant.

Boeing has faced a lot of technical challenges with developing this vehicle all the way back to, you know, 2019.

One ignition and liftoff of Starliner and Atlas V.

When Starliner did finally take off on June 5th, more technical problems disrupted the flight.

There are two main kind of buckets of problems that came up during Starliner's flight to the International Space Station.

One relates to thrusters that are used to maneuver the spacecraft.

A handful of them temporarily failed as the vehicle was docking, you know, with the space station.

And then the second bucket of problems are helium leaks.

Helium is used to pressurize the propulsion system, and NASA and Boeing discovered several leaks on board that system, you know, during the flight.

The crew did manage to arrive at the International Space Station safely.

And followed shortly behind by Commander of Starliner, Butch Wilmore.

But Starliner's problems raised concerns at NASA.

The agency talked about returning Starliner as early as June 14th, but NASA delayed the return several times.

On August 7th, NASA said that the return date could be pushed to February 2025.

And how much risk does Starliner pose to the astronauts, Barry Wilmore, Sunita Williams?

I'm not sure that NASA has had to make a call, make a decision, in the face of uncertainty about a human spaceflight program with humans on orbit and human lives potentially at stake in a really long time.

In early August, NASA said it was considering tapping SpaceX to ferry the astronauts back home.

SpaceX didn't respond to a request for comment.

Boeing has said, just sort of simply put, that Starliner is ready to go.

And the data supports using Starliner to take the two astronauts back to Earth.

NASA has been in this kind of intense, one leader there recently called it vigorous debate about the risks that Starliner may pose to the two astronauts if it is used to ferry them back to Earth.

Long before this current Starliner mission, the spacecraft's development was dogged by problems.

Boeing has been working on Starliner for more than a decade, and the program has been beset with delays.

Starliner was born at the end of NASA's space shuttle program in 2011.

Shortly after that, the agency hired Boeing and SpaceX to each independently develop spacecrafts to ferry astronauts to and from the space station.

NASA wanted to have two different American companies to basically back each other up.

If something happens with one company, the other could be right there to continue the flights, continue the missions, continue the science.

That's what we found with the space shuttle way back when, when we had the first accident.

So having a second option is really important.

And we're seeing it now, because even though we're having some issues and delays with the Starliner, we're still able to at least carry on the operations of the space station by using the Crew Dragon.

Boeing's struggles with Starliner contrast sharply with the development of SpaceX's Crew Dragon.

SpaceX has now flown nine different missions for NASA.

That includes their test flight, you know, a few years ago.

Boeing has flown, you know, call it half of one.

I mean, they've taken astronauts up to the space station, no easy feat, but have not, you know, brought them back yet.

I think right now it's a tough time for Boeing, there's no doubt about it.

Maybe it makes it a little harder, at least the optics of it, because the perception now is that, you know, SpaceX is running things splendidly, you know, they're having a lot of success.

And I think it's, the game's not over yet.

When NASA selected Boeing and SpaceX to develop the Starliner and Crew Dragon spacecrafts, the agency signed fixed price agreements with each contractor.

The company and NASA agree to a number, and then it's up to the company to come up with a way to stay under that number.

The idea is you're incentivizing your contractor to, you know, perform well so they can make some money.

Boeing has struggled financially with Starliner.

They've disclosed more than $1.4 billion in charges or losses related to the program.

And there's some real questions about whether the company is going to ever, you know, see any return from years and years of investment.

That NASA has now turned to SpaceX to complete the mission is a tough outcome for Boeing, which has deep ties to NASA that date to the Apollo moon landings.

If you look back at executive commentary from Boeing, you know, years ago, folks there thought that they would be first, that Boeing would beat SpaceX to transport NASA astronauts to and from the International Space Station.

And it obviously has not worked out the way they, many executives and leaders at Boeing thought it would.

It kind of signals a changing of the guard in the space industry.

You know, it's not all roses, you know, you have ups and downs, that's the way life is.

And I think from the experience I've had as an astronaut, I think it's really the mark of a good team to be able to recover from that.

And how do you recover from that adversity?

So I think it's an opportunity for Boeing.

They'd much rather have brought them home in eight days, okay, next, you know, and move on.

We'll be happy to go back home when it's our time to go back home.

 But you can't do this on Earth, so this is, this makes it special.