Boeing Starliner to return on September 6 but minus Sunita, Wilmore
The space agency said the decision to get the spacecraft to return without the crew was taken at a “tense” meeting between NASA and Boeing officials
The Boeing Starliner is set to return in autonomous mode on September 6 but without Indian-origin NASA astronaut Sunita Williams and her colleague Barry “Butch” Wilmore.
The Starliner is expected to land about six hours after it undocks.
Sunita and Wilmore flew on the Starliner to the International Space Station (ISS) on June 5 and were expected to return on the Boeing spacecraft.
Propulsion issues
But what was supposed to be an eight-day mission has dragged on and on since June 6, with the NASA announcing in August that the two astronauts would return to Earth in February 2025.
Scientists have blamed the major glitch in propulsion on the Starliner, embarrassing for bothBoeing and NASA.
The space agency has confirmed that the decision to get the spacecraft to return without the crew was taken at a “tense” meeting between NASA and Boeing officials.
Risky spaceflights
NASA officials are clear they don’t want to take any more risk with the Starliner, as far as the astronauts are concerned. Boeing, however, claims that it can return the Starliner with or without the crew.
Media reports quoted NASA chief Senator Bill Nelson, also a former astronaut, as saying: "Spaceflight is risky, even at its safest and most routine. A test flight, by nature, is neither safe nor routine.
“The decision to keep Butch and Suni (Sunita) aboard the International Space Station and bring Boeing's Starliner home without crew is the result of our commitment to safety — our core value and our North Star."
NASA wants no more risks
NASA, having burnt its fingers after the twin accidents of the Challenger and Columbia space shuttles, does not want to take any risks.
According to data released by Boeing, the Starliner has a height of 5 metres with both the crew module and service module, a diameter of 4.6 metres and weighs 13,000 kg at lift-off.
Space X and Crew Dragon
The service modules are made for each mission as they get jettisoned in space.
Space X delivered the Crew Dragon at an estimated cost of $2.6 billion and has been ferrying astronauts since 2020. Sunita and Wilmore are expected to return to Earth aboard the Crew Dragon.