WHO COULD'VE SEEN THIS COMING?
ISS Stranding
It seemingly took a small miracle for Boeing's Starliner to
limp to the International Space Station in one piece — but the company is far
from being out of the woods.
Yes, the plagued spacecraft managed to finally make it to
the orbital outpost, with NASA astronauts Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams on
board, earlier this month.
But the journey didn't go by without a hitch — officials
quickly discovered five different helium leaks affecting Starliner's thruster
system.
Last week, NASA announced that it was giving Boeing an extra
four days to figure out Wilmore and Williams' homecoming.
Now, the space agency has extended their stay for a second
time as Boeing engineers scramble to get a read on the capsule's status, CNN reports — yet another sign that the aerospace giant's cursed spacecraft is
still far from making regular visits to the ISS on NASA's behalf.
Long Way Home
The original plan was for Wilmore and Williams to stay on
board the station for around a week. NASA has since announced that the two
won't return until at least June 26, making their visit a minimum of three
weeks longer than anticipated.
During its launch earlier this month, engineers discovered
helium leaks affecting Starliner's thruster system, which helps it adjust its
orbit. A first attempt to dock to the ISS failed due to a thruster malfunction,
forcing it to hold its position around 850 feet from the space station.
At the time, officials had reassured the media that the
capsule had roughly ten times as much helium as it needed to maneuver through
space.
NASA remains optimistic. The agency's Commercial Crew
Program manager Steve Stich told reporters on Tuesday that there's no reason to
suggest that Starliner won't make it back in one piece, though "we really
want to work through the remainder of the data," as quoted by CNN.
But Starliner still has a lot to prove. Its return journey
will see it heat up considerably during reentry, only to slow its descent over
the New Mexico desert with a parachute system that Boeing was forced to
re-engineer due to safety concerns last year.
In short, Boeing's first crewed test flight has instilled
little confidence so far — and there's a lot that could still go wrong.