Boeing’s troubled Starliner returned to Earth on Saturday without the astronauts who flew aboard the craft to the International Space Station, after NASA deemed it too risky to bring them back on board.
After years of delays, Starliner lifted off in June for what was supposed to be a roughly weeklong test mission, a final check before its ability to carry crew to and from the orbiting laboratory could be certified.
However, unexpected propellant malfunctions and helium leaks during ascent thwarted those plans.
NASA decided it was safer to bring back astronauts Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams on rival SpaceX Crew Dragon, though they will have to wait until February 2025.
The rubber-drop-shaped capsule landed softly at the White Sands spaceport in New Mexico at 04:01 GMT, its descent slowed by parachutes and cushioned by airbags, after having departed the ISS about six hours earlier.
Ground crews reported hearing sonic booms as the spacecraft streaked across the night sky after enduring temperatures of 3,000 degrees Fahrenheit (1,650 degrees Celsius) during atmospheric reentry.
“NASA and Boeing have learned a tremendous amount about Starliner in the most extreme environment possible,” said Ken Bowersox, associate administrator for the agency’s space operations mission directorate.
“NASA looks forward to continuing to work with the Boeing team to move forward with Starliner certification for crew rotation missions to the space station,” he added.
After conducting extensive ground tests to simulate and overcome the technical problems encountered during Starliner’s ascent, Boeing promised — both publicly and behind closed doors — that it could bring astronauts home safely. NASA, however, disagreed.
The stakes are high for the century-old aerospace giant, with its reputation tarnished by safety issues surrounding its commercial jets and its long-term prospects for manned space missions hanging in the balance.
Pending certification decisions
Shortly after undocking, Starliner executed a powerful “boost burn” to quickly move away from the station and avoid any risk of collision, a maneuver that would have been unnecessary if the crew had been on board to take manual control if necessary.
Mission teams then conducted extensive checks of their thrusters in preparation for the critical “on-orbit burn” needed to guide the capsule into its reentry trajectory about 40 minutes before landing.
While Starliner was expected to successfully land, as in the two previous uncrewed tests, NASA will now carefully review all aspects of the mission’s performance before deciding on next steps.
More than a decade ago, NASA awarded Boeing and SpaceX multibillion-dollar contracts to develop spacecraft to ferry astronauts to and from the ISS after the end of the space shuttle program left the U.S. space agency dependent on Russian rockets.
Elon Musk’s SpaceX beat the mighty Boeing, which was initially considered the favourite, and has successfully flown dozens of astronauts since 2020.
The Starliner program, meanwhile, has faced numerous setbacks.
In 2019, during its first uncrewed test flight, a software glitch prevented the capsule from rendezvousing with the ISS. A second software problem, which could have caused a catastrophic collision between its modules, was detected and fixed just in time.
In 2021, with the rocket ready on the launch pad for a new attempt, blocked valves forced a new postponement.
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