A couple of houseguests recently had their stay extended by a few more days, which is a good thing because the International Space Station is comparatively comfortable.
NASA informed the staff of the Boeing Starliner’s first manned flight check, objective captain Barry Wilmore and captain Suni Williams, this week that there would be another four-day delay in returning home to Earth, which is currently scheduled for June 26. According to NASA Commercial Crew Program Manager Steve Stich, the agency needs” a little more time to look at the information” behind ongoing hydrogen leaks in Starliner’s moving jets and “do some research, and make sure we’re actually ready to come home.”
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” I would not characterize]the delay ] as frustration”, he added. ” I may describe it as learning”.
Oh, there must be at least a little disappointment. Let me break down everything that happened before and during the Boeing Crew Flight Test ( Boe-CFT ) in a quick, dirty manner. So much, that is.
- May 6: The Atlas V build vehicle’s valve malfunctioned, and the launch vehicle was scrubbed.
- May 21: A Starliner moving jet was discovered to have a helium leak.
- May 26: NASA is” secure” with the hole.
- June 1: Due to a computer issue with the Atlas V, start was scrubbed once more.
- June 6: Following a successful launch ( finally! ) four jets failed in circle, causing a one-hour pause in landing with the ISS. The team is set to be on ISS for about a year, until June 13- ish.
- June 11: NASA reveals four more gas leakage.
- June 12: Starliner’s return flight was delayed until June 18 due to a scheduled spacecraft, which was later called off after people reported some kind of” astronaut pain”. I’m not trying to make up this.
- Due to NASA’s desire to spend more time studying Starliner jet issues, the return flight was delayed until June 14 once more.
- June 18: The return flight is delayed once more until June 26 so NASA may have even more time to study those subjects.
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Did I lose something? It’s simple to lose track despite taking several of these sections and taking a lot of information.  ,
A heat shield that burned off in surprising ways during parole, a complex issue with the sails used for landing, and a potential fire hazard were all the things that happened a few years after the second unmanned aircraft check. Thankfully, Boeing just needed a second unmanned trip because the first one was a complete failure when a software glitch caused an error in orbit, which made the company require a second one.
Consider, Boe- CFT is just a guarded check meant to copper out any lines. However, there have been so many that Stich claimed NASA has n’t “looked too far ahead of Starliner- 1, the first operational ( as opposed to test ) flight that has n’t yet been scheduled. ” We’ve got to get handle the gas leaks. We wo n’t go fly on a similar mission because of the helium leaks.
But when Wilmore and Williams are finally brought back to Earth, Starliner may be grounded until NASA is satisfied that Boeing has the leaking fixed, and by that time, NASA did give explorers into space with carrier columns.  ,
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It seems like only two weeks ago]Steve,  , it was only two weeks ago , —Editor ] that I jokingly asked whether this Starliner mission was cursed. Now I’m convinced that there there’s a surprise coven of angry past Boeing employees with a Starliner voodoo doll, a stack of needles, a cauldron, several frog and salamander parts, and an ancient book of spells devoted to orbital spacecraft.
