In a high-stakes test, Boeing will launch NASA astronauts to space for the first time

MicroWave@lemmy.world to News@lemmy.world – 167 points – In a high-stakes test, Boeing will launch NASA astronauts to space for the first time
nbcnews.com

After years of delays and setbacks, Boeing plans to launch two veteran astronauts to the International Space Station on Monday night aboard its Starliner spacecraft.

After years of delays, Boeing is finally set to launch two NASA astronauts to the International Space Station on its Starliner spacecraft.

The capsule is scheduled to lift off Monday at 10:34 p.m. ET, atop an Atlas V rocket at Florida’s Cape Canaveral Space Force Station. Astronauts Barry “Butch” Wilmore and Sunita Williams will pilot the Starliner on its inaugural crewed flight — a crucial final test before NASA can authorize Boeing to conduct routine flights to and from the space station for the agency.

The stakes are high. This will be Boeing’s first launch with humans aboard its spaceship, and it comes after years of delays, technical setbacks and significant budget overruns. If successful, the flight will enable Boeing to challenge the dominance held by Elon Musk’s SpaceX, which has been ferrying NASA astronauts to and from the orbiting outpost since 2020.

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In an odd coincidence, the first crew of the Boeing space probe will consist of 10 whistleblowers.

Don’t worry Lord Titus we have plenty of whistleblowers.

How many whistleblowers died to get those 2 ready for launch?

Everytime someone asks that question, someone else dies

We know it will fail but the question is how. Will the door fall off? Will the oxygen supply explode? Will all the astronauts misteriously commit suicide after it turns out they are whistleblowers? Who knows?

Fall out a window from 200 miles up?

I mean, what could possibly go wrong?

Probably not much. The capsule has already been tested and flown to ISS without a crew. This is finally the first crewed test. It was supposed to happen I think last year. But NASA tore down the capsule one more time and asked Boeing to change out some wiring harness shielding just to be extra careful about high oxygen environment fire potential.

ULA's Atlas rocket which is taking the capsule up has been successful in every launch as far as I've paid attention back to 2007 when it first started being used. Including I believe all of the Mars rover missions.

I get all the hurr durr Boeing jokes are going to happen. But that's commercial airline Boeing. Not MIC/NASA Boeing. And ULA has a fantastic track record. I'm going to be sad if Blue Origin really does end up buying them out.

This is probably the best take in this thread IMO. Yes haha Boeing, but those are two totally different departments and NASA isn't about to let something lift off with loose bolts on it. I expect this will perform without issues and the only reason it's even newsworthy right now is because Boeing has been newsworthy recently due to unrelated issues.

Sadly the launch was scrubbed. Because ULA noticed something they didn't like with a valve on the 2nd stage of their rocket.

Hopefully something ULA can fix without having to take the whole stack apart.

This is the last flight of an Atlas V, too. Kind of odd to launch Starliner on this when they're going to need to start testing over for the replacement rocket - Vulcan Centaur.

I don't know a lot about either program, but it seems pretty reasonable to test one new system with other stuff that's well-understood and reliable, rather than stacking multiple new tests atop one another

I only work in dumbass terrestrial systems administration, and even we do that (mostly because I pitch a fit when they try to test more than one thing at a time)

Not all that odd for NASA, unfortunately. They're always beholden to bureaucratic and political bullshit that forces this sort of thing on them.

They’re still going to launch the 6 operational starliner flights on Atlas V’s, and Amazon has bought several of them for their Kuiper satellite constellation.

Personally I doubt starliner is going to keep flying once the 6 ISS missions are over, regardless of launch vehicle.

Its a perfect excuse to create more jobs.

Efficiency is antithetical to the goals of a jobs program.

And Boeing is known for quality. Wishing the best to everyone on that mission.

Astronauts Barry “Butch” Wilmore and Sunita Williams will pilot the Starliner on its inaugural crewed flight

Ah, the ones who failed the psych exam.

Is this just a joke?

I don't know, is it? Would you get on a rocket designed by Boeing?

  • crew capsule

Rocket, capsule, whatever. That's not really the point. Boeing made something that could very easily kill them specifically because it was made by Boeing, not because of the risks of space travel.

Yes. But it might be worth separating because the rocket has superb reliability record and ULA folks don't deserve being smeared with Boeing shit. 😂

Ah. Well they were designed by Lockmart and have had only one major failure AFAIK, so the rocket party is probably fine. Ought to check the door seals on the capsule, though.

Gotta be ...... especially if the chances of your exterior door blowing out at any time is greater than 20% .... in space!

RIP

Did they sort out the QC problems?

No but they did sort out the whistleblower problem - twice!

Wouldn’t catch me alive on that thing.

Dead…. Well, it might be cool to have ashes scattered in space or something, and I’d be past caring at that point anyhow.

Hopefully, if the door blows off, everyone is wearing their seatbelt. Those astronaut must know they're doomed, no?

Loving that the nosecone looks like R2D2.

Unfortunately all communications between mission control and the pod must be made in beeps and whistles