It seems like a lie, but More than 15 years have passed since Boeing began work on the Starliner project, a reusable spacecraft designed to transport crews to space stations such as the ISS. These types of projects, due to their complexity, always have development times measured in years, so in principle this should not surprise us, but the truth is that since the end of the last decade it has been accumulating delays and problems that at some point came to question its viability.

The most obvious example of these delays is that initially Its first manned flight was scheduled for sometime in 2017.but finally It took place only a few weeks ago, on June 5, after several delays, for example at the beginning of the month. Previously, its last flight occurred in May 2022, when the Starliner (unmanned) was able to fly to the International Space Station, dock with the station, and then make a return flight and land safely on our planet.

When everything was ready, on June 5, the Starliner carried astronauts Barry Wilmore and Sunita Williams to the ISS on a flight lasting just over 24 hours, but There were a few problems along the way, such as certain helium leaks and the failure of five thrusters on approach to the International Space Station (which are critical due to the precision required when approaching and docking with the station). After resetting the systems (yes, I’m not kidding, turning off the power), four of the five nozzles were functioning properly, allowing the operation to be completed safely.

The Starliner docked at the International Space Station and flew over the Mediterranean Sea. Image: NASA.

This test flight, necessary for the ship to receive NASA certification, was scheduled to last just over a week, as the astronauts were scheduled to return on June 14. However, due to problems encountered during the outbound flight The return of the Starliner and its crew to Earth was delayed until further ordersand some voices suggest that it could take more than a month, although this is pure speculation with the information currently available.

The situation is undoubtedly complicated, as Wilmore and Williams depend on the Starliner to return to Earth, but with very good judgment, Neither NASA nor Boeing want to expose them to more risks than absolutely necessary, so before planning the return, its engineering teams focus on identifying the causes of already identified problems and their solutions, and we can also understand this by analyzing the data from the outgoing flight to identify other potential problems that may not have yet emerged. And both NASA and Boeing have a lot at stake, so the ship’s reliability, much less the safety of its crew, can’t be called into question by an accident on the return flight.

It’s not the first time, recently that the ship is stuck on the International Space Station. As you may recall, the Soyuz responsible for the Soyuz MS-22 mission got stuck on the International Space Station in late 2022, in this case after being hit by a micrometeorite or some space debris object that caused a loss of liquid coolant. After several months, another Soyuz was finally used so the crew could safely return to Earth and the damaged empty ship could successfully return to our aircraft.

More information and images: NASA