NASA is yet to decide whether Boeing’s Starliner spacecraft will return to Earth crewed or uncrewed. Speaking at a media briefing on August 15, 2024 (AEST), the agency’s Space Operations Mission Associate Administrator Ken Bowersox said “major discussions” were underway concerning the matter.
Originally scheduled to dock at the International Space Station (ISS) for eight days after its arrival on June 6, Starliner has remained there ever since after experiencing a series of technical problems, stranding its two astronauts. The mission was a test flight to demonstrate Starliner’s ability to carry crew back and forth to the ISS and act as a competitor to SpaceX’s Dragon spacecraft.
Bowersox said NASA was still collecting data before an impending flight readiness meeting. “It’s a fairly major discussion to decide about whether or not we’re going to have crew on board Starliner’s return,” he said. “We’ve got time available before we bring Starliner home, and we want to use that time wisely.”
Helium leaks and problems with Starliner’s propulsion system have kept the spacecraft at the ISS. However, Bowersox said the issues were not enough to prevent using it as a contingency vehicle in should an emergency arise. “The risk is reasonable to put (the astronauts) on that vehicle in a contingency,” he said. However, Bowersox warned that if Starliner’s astronauts, Suni Williams and Butch Wilmore, cannot be ferried back to Earth onboard that spacecraft, they may have to spend eight months at the ISS before another spacecraft can carry them home. While saying there are “no sharp deadlines,” NASA expects to decide on whether the astronauts will return onboard Starliner by the end of August.
If the decision is no, the other spacecraft is likely to be a SpaceX-manufactured Dragon capsule, the very spacecraft Starliner was designed to compete against. Earlier this month, NASA flagged the likelihood of using a scheduled February 2025 SpaceX flight to get its astronauts home. That outcome would be a bitter blow to Boeing, which has spent billions to get Starliner this far and prove its viability.
However, the Starliner and Dragon spacesuits are not interchangeable, and if Williams and Wilmore travelled back to Earth on a SpaceX vehicle, they would have to do so unsuited. “You can’t have a Boeing suit in a SpaceX vehicle and a SpaceX suit in a Boeing vehicle,” Bowersox said.
NASA says it retains confidence in Starliner and Boeing’s space program. Asked if this would be the last time the agency used Starliner, Bowersox said the answer was in the data. “Our intent is to keep pressing to have two providers,” he said. “We’ve got two very good companies and we want to develop two strong and capable spacecraft. We think we still have a very good chance of doing that, but the answer is always in the data. That’s why we’re doing this mission. We’re going to analyse the data, and we’ll be driven in our next decisions by that data.”
“As astronauts, we embark on missions fully aware of the various scenarios and outcomes,” added NASA’s Chief Astronaut Joe Acaba. “The agency has taken the time to ensure we are not putting the crew at a higher risk than is necessary, and as astronauts, that’s always something worth waiting for.”
