An Atlas 5 rocket transporting astronauts for the first time in six decades was ready for an explosion on Monday night to give a boost Boeing’s long-delayed Starliner crew ferry launched into orbit for its first piloted test flight to the International Space Station.
The Starliner is years behind schedule and over a billion dollars over budget. It’s Boeing’s answer to SpaceX’s Crew Dragon, an already operational spacecraft that has carried 50 astronauts, cosmonauts and civilians into orbit in 13 flights, 12 of them to the space station.
NASA funded the development of both spacecraft to ensure that the agency could launch crews to the outpost even if a company’s ferry ship were grounded for whatever reason.
Astronauts ready for launch
Although it took Boeing longer than expected to get their ship ready for crew flights, all systems were scheduled to launch from pad 41 at the Cape Canaveral Space Force Station at 10:34 PM EDT.
A mission commander will be at the wheel Barry ‘Butch’ Wilmore and Sunita Williamsboth experienced Navy test pilots and active-duty NASA astronauts with four previous spaceflights to their credit, 11 spacewalks between them and a combined 500 days in orbit.
Like SpaceX’s Crew Dragon, the Starliner is equipped with a “full-envelope” abort system capable of quickly propelling the capsule away from its booster in the event of a major failure at any point from launch pad to orbit .
But if all goes well, Atlas 5’s Centaur upper stage will launch the Starliner into a preliminary orbit 15 minutes after launch. The astronauts will then monitor two high-speed thrusters to fine-tune the ship’s trajectory before taking turns testing the spacecraft’s computer-aided manual control system.
As with any other space station rendezvous, the Starliner will approach the laboratory from behind and below, loop to a point directly in front of the outpost, and then proceed to the Harmony module outport on Wednesday at 12:46 p.m. to moor.
During the final approach, Wilmore and Williams will retest the capsule’s manual controls so that future crews can adjust the spacecraft’s trajectory or orientation as needed if necessary.
The Starliner is also equipped with a fully manual backup system that allows the crew to control the ship’s thrusters directly using a joystick-style hand controller, bypassing the spacecraft’s flight computers. Wilmore and Williams will test that system after leaving the station around May 15 to begin the journey back to Earth.
If the Starliner test flight goes well, NASA managers plan to certify it for routine crew rotational flights, and launch a Crew Dragon and a Starliner each year to bring long-duration crew members to the station for missions of six months.
“An absolutely crucial milestone”
Jim Free, NASA’s associate administrator for space operations, called the Starliner Crew Flight test, or CFT, “an absolutely critical milestone.”
“Let me remind everyone again that this is a new spacecraft,” he told reporters last week. “We certainly have some unknowns in this mission, we may encounter things we don’t expect. But our job now is to remain vigilant and continue to look for problems.”
While he said he was confident the Starliner could handle the task, Free said he didn’t want to “get too far ahead” as the crew has yet to complete a successful mission. But “if we do,” he added, “and if we certify Starliner, the United States will have two unique human space transports that provide critical redundancy for access to the ISS.”
But it hasn’t been easy.
In the wake of the Space Shuttle’s 2011 retirement, NASA awarded two Commercial Crew Program contracts in 2014, one to SpaceX worth $2.6 billion and the other to Boeing for $4.2 billion, to continue development to encourage independent spacecraft that can transport astronauts to and from space. the International Space Station.
The target date for the first piloted CCP flights was 2017. Congressional funding shortfalls and technical issues delayed development, including an explosion during a ground test that destroyed a SpaceX Crew Dragon.
But the California rocket maker eventually began pilot flights in May 2020, successfully launching two NASA astronauts on a Crew Dragon test flight to the space station.
Since then, SpaceX has launched eight operational crewed rotational flights to the station, and three research missions to the laboratory, funded by Houston-based Axiom space and a purely commercialA journey of two men and two women to low Earth orbit, paid for by billionaire pilot and businessman Jared Isaacman. A total of 50 people flew to orbit aboard Crew Dragons.
For Boeing’s Starliner it was a different story.
During an initial unmanned test flight in December 2019, a software glitch prevented the ship’s flight computer from loading the correct launch time of its counterpart aboard Atlas 5.
As a result, a required on-orbit burn did not occur on time and due to unrelated communications issues, flight controllers were unable to regain control in time to proceed with a space station rendezvous.
The software issues were resolved after the Starliner landed, along with a number of other issues uncovered during a post-flight review. Boeing opted to conduct a second test flight at its own expense, but the company encountered stuck propulsion system valves in the Starliner’s service module. Engineers were unable to resolve the problem and the capsule was removed from the Atlas 5 and returned to the processing facility for troubleshooting.
Engineers ultimately attributed the problem to moisture, believed to be from high humidity and heavy rain after coasting on the pad, which chemically reacted with thruster propellant to form corrosion. The corrosion prevented the valves from opening on command.
To pave the way for launch the following May, the valves in a new service module were replaced and the system was modified to prevent water ingress onto the launch pad. The second Starliner test flight in May 2022 was a success, docking with the space station as planned and returning to Earth with a precise landing.
But in the aftermath of the flight, engineers discovered new problems: problems with the parachute harness connectors and concerns about protective tape wrapped around the wiring that could catch fire if short-circuited.
The work to resolve these issues resulted in the first crewed flight being moved from 2023 to 2024. Ultimately, Boeing spent more than $1 billion of its own money to pay for the additional test flight and corrective actions.
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