Have you ever had an eight-day road trip turn into an eight-month excursion? Nope? Well, consider yourself fortunate that you’re not one of the astronauts currently stranded in space.
The two astronauts, Suni Williams and Butch Wilmore, who blasted to the International Space Station (ISS) in a Boeing Starliner are now set to remain there until 2025 due to issues with Boeing’s spacecraft. NASA made the long-awaited decision on Saturday, citing safety concerns.
As Mashable’s science and space reporter Elisha Sauers covered in detail, the space agency needed to decide about this time in August because port space — effectively parking for space crafts — is limited and NASA also needs to ensure the health of the astronauts. The concerns with the Starliner centered on issues with its propulsion system. Thrusters malfunctioned when the Starliner docked and engineers apparently haven’t devised a sufficient fix or explanation. Those thrusters are important when landing the capsule, considering they keep it pointed in the correct direction.
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The new plan dictates that Williams and Wilmore will return to Earth in February aboard a SpaceX capsule. The planned eight-day test run of the Starliner will, in turn, become an eight-month stay on the ISS. The Starliner will be sent back without any crew.
People’s lives are involved and, it seems, NASA decided it was best to play it safe.
“We have had mistakes in the past,” said NASA Administrator Bill Nelson. “We have lost two space shuttles as a result of there not being a culture in which information can come forward.”
The decision is yet another blow to Boeing’s reputation, which has had too many bad headlines to count of late. The safety concerns have only mounted since the tragic Boeing 737 Max crashes in 2018-19 that killed 346 people. Its space program also experiencing problems certainly isn’t ideal — not for the company and certainly not for the astronauts stranded in space.