Boeing's Starliner crewed test flight delayed indefinitely because of safety concerns
The first crewed flight test for Boeing's Starliner capsule, originally slated to fly to the International Space Station next month, is facing more hardware-related delays – this time indefinitely.
On Thursday, company and NASA officials announced newly discovered safety concerns will keep the capsule, developed under a multibillion-dollar contract with the agency, grounded through the summer at the very least. Mark Nappi, vice president of Boeing's Starliner program, said in a teleconference Thursday that new findings with a critical system on parachutes and the flammability of tape used to secure wiring harnesses throughout the spacecraft were discovered last week during a joint pre-flight review with NASA.
Nappi told reporters fabric links that join the parachutes to the lines of the spacecraft, called soft link joints, need to be replaced and possibly recertified to withstand heavier loads and stresses to ensure crew safety.
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"They were tested recently because of a discovery that we found during the review process where we believed that the data was recorded incorrectly," Nappi said. "We tested (the soft links), and sure enough, they did fail at the lower limit."
NASA's Steve Stich, manager of the Commercial Crew Program, called the review process comprehensive, saying, "Some of the things that we're seeing here were actually things that were done many years ago. The parachute system has not changed."
Stich said the issue was present for Starliner's uncrewed flight test to the ISS last year, but it wasn't until last week's detailed review ahead of flying a crew that the issue with the link joints was discovered. The capsule's first crewed flight, called the Crew Flight Test or CFT, is tasked with taking astronauts Barry Wilmore and Suni Williams on a short-duration mission to the ISS.
"I wouldn't go indict anything on NASA or the Boeing safety process because we have these late findings. It's just now we're getting to the reviews of some systems," Stich said. "I'm seeing us find things and make changes to the vehicle and do additional testing and engineering where we need to, and that's what's required to go fly safely."
The second problem found last week is more extensive since the tape used to protect Starliner's wiring harnesses from nicks or abrasions runs for hundreds of feet through several of the spacecraft's internal systems.
"There is a lot of tape on the wire harnesses," Nappi said. "We're looking at solutions that would provide for potentially another type of wrapping over the existing tape in the most vulnerable areas that reduces the risk of a fire hazard."
Alongside the new safety issues, Boeing teams also found a faulty valve that had to be replaced prior to loading propellants on the vehicle, which was slated to happen in the next few weeks to make a targeted July 21 liftoff of CFT aboard a United Launch Alliance Atlas V rocket.
Instead, Boeing teams are now standing down from all launch preparations.
This latest months-long delay comes after a decision last March to shuffle the Crew Flight Test to the summer to give NASA more time to certify 330 requirements for Starliner to fly humans. The same requirements applied to SpaceX's Dragon capsule, which NASA also selected to take astronauts to the ISS after the end of the space shuttle program in 2011. Both companies were selected for multibillion-dollar contracts nearly a decade ago; Boeing received $4.2 billion while SpaceX was awarded $2.6 billion for Crew Dragon.
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The investment paid off in SpaceX's case when the company first launched Crew Dragon with two astronauts in May 2020. Since then, the company has flown seven crewed missions to the space station for NASA, two private missions for Axiom Space, and one privately crewed mission to orbit.
Starliner has only launched twice on uncrewed demonstration missions, the first of which in late 2019 failed to reach a proper orbit and required an emergency landing.
"Our ultimate goal is to have one SpaceX and one Boeing flight per year to rotate our crews to station, and so we support Boeing," Stich said. "We're doing everything we can during the investigation of each of these issues and trying to get to flight as soon as we can when it's safe to do so."
According to Stich, the next opportunity to launch Boeing's mission won't be until later this fall, but that hinges on Boeing being able to rectify the issues in time to obtain certification from NASA to support crewed flight.
"You could say we're disappointed because it means a delay, but the team is proud that we're making the right choices," Nappi said. "Bottom line here: safety is always our top priority. It's always been that way with human spaceflight; that drives this decision."
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Contact Jamie Groh at JGroh@floridatoday.com and follow her on Twitter at @AlteredJamie.
This article originally appeared on Florida Today: Boeing's Starliner won't fly this summer because of safety concerns
