Boeing Starliner astronauts might get a ride home from SpaceX — in 2025

👍Maximum Derek👍@discuss.tchncs.de to News@lemmy.world – 189 points – Boeing Starliner astronauts might get a ride home from SpaceX — in 2025
theverge.com

Originally set to return in mid-June, Barry Wilmore and Sunita Williams may be on the station until February, 2025.

During a press conference today, NASA representatives confirmed they have a contingency plan to bring astronauts Barry Wilmore and Sunita Williams home from the International Space Station (ISS) early next year. If they’re unable to leave sooner aboard the Boeing Starliner spacecraft that brought them there

Tests conducted at NASA’s White Sands Test Facility pointed to deformed Teflon seals being a potential cause of the Starliner’s thrusters failing, but the agency isn’t expected to make a final decision on whether or not Williams and Wilmore will return using Boeing’s spacecraft until mid-August.

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TFW you spend the R&D money on hitmen

More like when you spend the QA money on hitmen.

When the marketing department has some extra funds, so they rescue their competitor.

I doubt they spent all that much money murking whatshisname. The R&D money goes to the parasites known as executives and shareholders

Gotta research dividends!

Edit:
Maybe Boeing made a simple mistake and invested in Relaxation & Dividends, instead of Research & Development.

TIL the pensioners who are part of CALPERS are parasites.

Speaking of parasites, you may want to have that brain slug removed.

It’s easy to hate on Boeing. Yea, they done f-ed up a few times and upper management made some very poor decisions, but there are 10s of thousands of people who work there and it’s a good manufacturing job in a country that used to pride itself on manufacturing. We can’t all be service workers, and I’d venture that, given the way you present yourself online, you’re probably not someone who is resting on their laurels either.

Now, back to stocks. It’s also quite simple to throw a slick quip about how the big bad shareholder bogeyman is ruining our country, but, unless you’re among the minority in this country, you likely own some stock in some company, somehow. The shareholders are us.

But therein gives us a lot of power. Many shares are voting shares. We could, if we all chose to, enact the corporate change we wish to see. And coincidentally enough, there are people precisely doing that kind of good work. Look up the philosophy behind ESG, it is becoming a thing. Or certified B corps. Likewise, many countries require unions to have a seat on their board; unfortunately for now, the US isn’t one of them, but that could change.

Or, ya know, we could just be dismissive and scapegoat our problems. That’s life, we get to choose our own adventure.

Next you are going to tell us that we can save the planet by recycling harder...

Not sure if you are delusional or just trolling

I take it you don’t recycle then eh? Paper and cans just aren’t worth your time.

It’s all the corporations fault, we’re totally not complicit in the degradation process as well.

And y’all call me deluded…

I do recycle and do what I can... I just hold no delusions that I'll save the planet by doing that while corporations literally pollute per day 100x over what I can recycle in a lifetime.

If 1000 of us were to die tomorrow, dropping out pollution to zero, I would not make up for a single Kardashian private flight to spare her from 40 mins traffic

But you and me and sunzu up there and the rest of us combined on this thread do make a difference. You matter.

Don’t allow perfect to be the enemy of the good.

Which is why I do recycle and do other stuff... But we cannot reverse the damage, we cannot even slow it down by ourselves. We must be realistic about that

It's like washing your hands after pooping, it's not going to cure cancer but it definitely would prevent some bouts of illness for yourself and others

Or perhaps it’s like wastewater treatment, where we collectively realized we all poop and somehow we need to clean up the waste to still have clean water.

In that case, what's the proper solution?

A treatment plant or putting a cork up all butts?

That's exactly the point and not the one I think you think you are making.

Of course if we all reduce, reuse, recycle we can help... But we will never stop the damage, let along reverse it, if we do not hold corporations to account

Um WE'RE recycling. It's the recyclers that are not recycling. Consumers are often called on to save the planet when only corporations can do it. They are the ones causing the damage, they should be the ones fixing it. Some things are just too big for citizens to handle, that's what governments are supposed to be for. And because governments are just corporations in disguise they should handle this problem. You know what happens when I stop eating red meat to save the planet? I get no red meat and the planet dies anyway. Producing red meat should be legislated into becoming more environmentally friendly instead of blaming the consumer for eating food. You can follow this logic with pretty much any industry.

Also, from your post further up, I doubt anyone is actually blaming the guy installing parts on Boeing planes for Boeing's problems. Slamming Boeing for the crap they do falls fully on the shoulders of the people controlling it, you know, the ones profiting from it.

But totally not stranded... -NASA, probably

No because there's always the possibility to use one of the extra Soyuz from the station.

Yes and no. One of the problems right now is each of the three capsule designs uses a different pressure suit, with different hookups, and each relies on a custom fitted seat liner to absorb some of the shock of landing / splashdown, so if you’re planning on landing on a different ship then you launched on, they need to send up a new seat liner & space suit.

This was half a problem even with the shuttle. You still needed a different spacesuit, but because it landed gently on a runway, it didn’t require custom seats.

Ah come on. Don't tell us it's the square plug into the round receptacle issue all over again (Apollo 13 style)?

Technically not stranded is still stranded when NASA won't give them permission to leave.

Did they ask for permission to leave?

How do I know? Why should they need to? They have families. Obviously they would rather be with them.

Would they honestly rather be with their families and are asking to leave? How do you know these details?

Because it's their families? Are you serious? They don't want to be with their partners and kids?

Should we call CPS?

But they are in space doing science. Some people like their jobs and their families can understand that this is temporary

This is also potentially the last mission for both of them. I'd be surprised if they're upset. Astronauts are a different breed.

They're more likely to be having a good time than not. They knew from the start the mission plan included an option for a longer stay. Sunni also once held the record for ISS mission length for female astronauts.

Yeah but did they say that? Or are you projecting how you feel onto them?

Why do they need to say that they want to spend time with their partners and kids? Again, are you serious?

What if they want to spend a once in a lifetime opportunity on an international space station doing research for a year? Are you serious?

All I can think is you are single with no children. Because suggesting they don't want to spend time with their kids makes them terrible parents and I hope you aren't one if you feel that way.

I feel that way even with a partner and kids who has worked on an extended business trip for the SLS program alongside NASA employees.

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The industry gossip/theory going around is that there’s a software issue in Starliner that makes it incapable of autonomously returning to Earth. This is probably NASA’s way of telling Boeing to fix it to a satisfactory degree of confidence before a given deadline, or else.

Arguably that alone is enough reason to completely abandon Starliner as an option for the return trip.

It's only an issue in that the logic isn't currently turned on. The capsule can do it just fine. It just wasn't the point of this mission.

NASA update earlier today said Boeing can turn the ability on if needed. Will just need time for update and then testing to make sure it's all good to go.

It seems like there is disagreement within NASA whether it is safe for the astronauts to return on Starliner or not.

Boeing engineers did test on the ground to try to replicate the issue that is occuring on the thrusters. They found thqt the issue isndue to a Teflon seals bulging but they don't understand precisely why is the seal buldging and when it occurs.

However they feel confident enough that the problem would not happen on the way back to earth. Some people are NASA are not as confident as they are and would like to know the precise cause of the bulging.

About the software: there is a capability in the software for the capsule to undock autonomously.

However it would means resurrecting parameters that have not been used and updated since 2022, there is some reconfiguration needed and testing to make sure it still does what is needed despite the different hardware and software change that happened since then.

It is really not looking good for Boeing right now and I don't know if the Starliner program will survive this accident.

https://arstechnica.com/space/2024/08/nasa-official-acknowledges-internal-disagreement-on-safety-of-starliner-return/2/

Just sit right back

And you'll hear a tale

A tale of a fateful trip,

That started from a tropic port,

Aboard this tiny ship.

The mate was a mighty sailin' lass.

The Skipper brave and sure,

Two passengers set sail that day,

For an eight day tour,

A eight day tour.

I started reading this to Fresh Prince, and I got pretty far before I realized it should be Gilligan.

We can take you to the ISS, bringing you back is... Complicated

I get that being trapped in a tube that is essentially a tiny little bubble of habitable area in the vast, hostile, emptiness of space can already be super claustrophobia inducing and they are vetted and trained for that. But it seems once you are up there and you realize the world's leaders in space, and the people that sent you can't figure out how to get you home, that would trigger that panic in anyone. If there is an emergency you have no escape and there is no rescue coming.

If there is an emergency you have no escape and there is no rescue coming.

In the case of emergency they will jump into the Starliner and go. And they’ll probably be fine.

If Scott Manley is to be trusted (and I think he is), what’s likely happening is that the probability of failure has gotten higher than the mission parameters. Still very low, but higher than what was planned.

How much food and water do they even have?

The space station has tons of stockpile of consumables like that, and are still being regularly restocked by cargo ships (unmanned).

Can't they send one of those with a shuttle for them to fly back? Is that just prohibitively more expensive? They can be autopiloted up, right?

Pretty sure cargo dragon is just a stripped down crew dragon to make more space for cargo.
Or maybe, crew dragon is a cargo dragon fitted for passengers... Seeing as cargo dragon flew with cargo and docked to the ISS in 2012 (crew dragon was 2020).

Pretty sure crew dragon has all the auto/remote to fully launch and then dock to the ISS.
Cargo dragon is auto/remote docked. Doesn't even need canadarm. So would make sense that crew dragon is as well

You could equally fit 2 additional seats in a crew dragon, which was designed for 7 people from the beginning

Not anymore, it was designed for 7 people in 2 seat rows using propulsive landing.

During development they switched to parachute instead of propulsive landing, since parachute can be rougher they had to lean the seat more back for the astronauts to be able to handle more G's.

In this lean back position there is not enough space for a second row of seats anymore

Plenty. Cygnus capsule that docked a few days ago was a scheduled resupply too.

Aren't the stranded astronauts older? I am concerned about the long term damage to their bodies.

Uh oh astronauts... SpaceX "might have" gone to Mars starting in 2017 was it? They "might have"done a lot of things they they never actually done... Save that oxygen, astronauts.

They have 8 incident-free crew missions under their belt. Sit your ass down, the adults are talking.

Sorry, what? Couldn't hear you, the volume you see... https://youtu.be/4TxkE_oYrjU?feature=shared

Fucking lol.

EDIT: Hoo boy, you didn't even look at what you linked, did you? My point was that SpaceX has completed 8 crewed missions. The video is just half an hour of Thunderfoot's inane rambling about launch costs. Not a single word about whether or not SpaceX has completed any crewed missions, ISS or otherwise. That's the point I'm challenging you to disprove here. Go ahead. Show your work. I'm looking forward to it.

Part 1, keep watching... and singing along!

Yeah, you got nothing.

Didn't like what you saw, huh? Bummer bud... Keep packing for Mars though, huh?

Thunderfoot's psychotic obsession with Musk and the complete denial of reality happening before his eyes it necessitates has destroyed any credibility as a scientist he ever had. The authority of a food chemist on matters of rocket science is questionable in the first place. Your blind, unquestioning acceptance of whatever drivel escapes his frothing mouth is no less pathetic.

And with that, I'm going to toast to the memory of the brain cells I've lost over the course of this "conversation". Hoping for anything even resembling a reasoned argument from you is clearly a fool's errand.

Can you hear the people laughing through your screen? Laughing at your violent, frantic, sweaty flailing to establish a false narrative before they have a chance to click the link and see for themselves just how full of Mars dust you are? Look at all the effort going into your desperation out of fear that daddy might not see you for the temporarily embarrassed millionaire you dream to be...

Worship.

NASA did a study recently that micro-gravity and zero-g causes corneal eye damage causing astronauts to lose eyesight over long durations in space.

Is the possibility of these astronauts going blind permanently due to Boing Boing ?

I think it is time to put this shitty "aerospace" company into the ground.

Scott Kelley did 340 days in space without too much long term damage that I am aware of (his was the first long term test) so I wouldn't anticipate damage much worse than what he got. If we can get them out in under a year and if they get don't have an emergency and if they don't have any underlying medical conditions that get exacerbated and if our single test can be used to predict their outcomes.

We really fucked up. Either trusting Boeing or not having a contingency plan I guess.

It's certainly not great for their eyes, but a number of people have been up for longer in one go. I think Frank Rubio currently holds the record at ~14 months.