NASA and Boeing leadership held a teleconference Thursday morning to give an update on the Boeing Crew Flight Test.
The event featured NASA Commercial Crew Program Manager Steve Stich and Boeing Commercial Crew Program Vice President and Program Manager Mark Nappi.
Stitch said mission managers were not ready to announce a return date for when astronauts Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams could come home.
“We don’t have a major announcement today relative to a return date. We’re making great progress, but we’re just not quite ready to do that,” Stich said.
Wilmore and Williams remain at the International Space Station, where they’ve been since June 6 after launching a day prior from the Space Coast atop a United Launch Alliance Atlas V.
Though the mission was originally expected to include just a week-long stay aboard the space station for Wilmore and Williams, multiple landing dates have since been called off as NASA and Boeing evaluate the capsule’s propulsion system, noting at least five instances of leaking helium used to pressurize the propulsion system’s fuel lines.
“We kept saying eight-day minimum mission. I think we all knew that it was gonna go longer than that,” Nappi said Thursday. “We didn’t spend a lot of time talking about how much longer, but I think it’s my regret that we didn’t just say we’re gonna stay up there until we get everything done that we wanna go do.”
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At a teleconference July 10, Stitch and Nappi reminded listeners that the propulsion system is designed to detach from Starliner and burn up upon reentry, stressing that Boeing and NASA thus have this one chance to study it in the hard-to-reach environment and are being advantageous in keeping the capsule attached to the space station in order to do more testing.
“What we’re doing is not unusual for a new spacecraft,” Stich said. “(...) Now that we have the ability to power the spacecraft from ISS, we have a nice opportunity to almost use the International Space Station as a temporary hangar to take our time and understand the spacecraft before we undock and return.”
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According to Stich, Wilmore and Williams have proven it’s possible to power up Starliner, close the hatch and have it ready to go in case of an emergency at the space station, recalling how the capsule was used as a safe haven on June 26 when there was a satellite breakup.
“I want to make it clear — Butch and Suni are not stranded in space,” Stich said during a teleconference in June. “Our plan is to continue to return them on Starliner and return them home at the right time. We’ll have a lot more work to do to get there for the final return, but they’re safe on the space station.”
From there, NASA issued a statement to say it would only be upon the completion of ground testing and associated data analysis that an agency-level review could clear the way for Starliner’s return to Earth.
Ground hot fire testing of a Starliner reaction control system thruster has since been completed in White Sands, New Mexico, and initial findings of the relevant data analytics were said ahead of time to be discussed during Thursday’s teleconference, according to NASA.
Next, Stich said Butch and Suni will be inside Starliner this weekend to fire up the thrusters as the capsule is docked to the space station.
A return date will not be announced until a review of the hot fire test, so now undocking and splashdown aren’t expected for at least a few more weeks.
Another popular question raised again during the teleconference was if SpaceX could bring Butch and Suni home.
In the update two weeks ago, Stich said using a Dragon capsule was out of the question.
Thursday, however, he sounds open to a backup plan if needed.
“NASA always has contingency options,” Stich said. “We kind of know what those are, but right now, we’re really focused on bringing Butch and Suni home on Starliner.”
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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