NASA Officially Classifies Boeing Starliner Failure As A Maximum-Level Type A Mishap - Jalopnik:
NASA has officially categorized the 2024 failure of the Boeing Starliner spacecraft, which stranded astronauts Suni Williams and Butch Wilmore on the International Space Station (ISS) for nine months, as a Type A mishap. This is NASA-speak for the maximum level of failure a mission can reach, defined as an incident that causes over $2 million in damage, results in the loss of a vehicle or at least control over it, or any fatalities, per the BBC. This designation signifies that the space agency now views the mission as a disaster, even if the astronauts regained enough control at the last minute to prevent the worst-case scenario.
[...] Who's to blame here? Citing the full 312-page report, Isaacman found plenty to go around. Basically, NASA wanted a second option for launching people into space beyond SpaceX, and it wanted it so bad that it simply swept problems under the rug. "As development progressed, design compromises and inadequate hardware qualifications extended beyond NASA's complete understanding," said Isaacman in a very polite way. Multiple test flights failed in various ways, but before these technical faults were understood, NASA just greenlit the following flights anyway. Oops.
There were organizational problems as well: NASA more or less trusted Boeing, which once upon a time had a sterling reputation, to sort out its engineering problems. Isaacman stated that the agency didn't want to damage that reputation. Safe to say it's pretty well shot now, and this Type A classification isn't going to help. Meanwhile, Boeing was also not giving sufficient scrutiny to its own subcontractors. So nobody was overseeing anybody enough. Who could imagine this would go poorly?
But rest assured: it gets worse. CNN quotes one NASA insider as saying, "There was yelling at meetings," and another as saying, "There are some people that just don't like each other very much." Isaacman himself admitted that "disagreements over crew return options deteriorated into unprofessional conduct while the crew remained on orbit." Welcome to the world's premiere space exploration agency.
Despite it all, NASA doesn't want to give up on Boeing, and the Starliner project is moving ahead in a reduced capacity. But Isaacman made it clear that there would be much stricter oversight going forward, and no launches would be approved until technical fixes were verified and implemented. The desire to diversify off of SpaceX alone is still there.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by spiraldancing on Friday February 27, @07:23AM (6 children)
That's my big takeaway from this. Honestly no surprises, at all, from the report about what went wrong--and kept right on going wrong--with Starliner.
I do find it encouraging that Isaacman--a close business associate of Elon Musk--did not use the opportunity to kill the Boeing contract and force NASA into an "all eggs in one basket" deal with SpaceX.
Lets go exploring.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by khallow on Friday February 27, @03:41PM (1 child)
The thorough incompetence of Old Space (Boeing among others) is what makes this an "all eggs in one basket" situation. There have been multiple attempts to replace the Space Shuttle over the decades with vast sums spent on the process (well over $100 billion in today's dollars). SpaceX is the only one that succeeded at a minute fraction of that cost. My take is that NASA can and probably will continue to throw billions at stuff like Starliner, but it won't generate a different basket for those eggs in the process. They need an efficient competitor not a plump parasite. Basket case != egg basket.
(Score: 2) by spiraldancing on Sunday March 01, @06:35AM
Not disagreeing, exactly, but I do still like that NASA is challenging Boeing to adapt to a new way of building/planning (that is, an actual competitive contract, as opposed to the historic cost-plus system), and I continue to hope that Boeing will get their act together and remember how to build stuff. Not optimistic, mind you, but hopeful (they are different).
But really, if NASA wants multiple routes to get humans into space, they should be throwing money at (sigh, frickin' billionaires) Blue Origin. Hints in this latest report also suggest they may be throwing money at Blue to help get humans down on the Moon (either as a legitimate alternative, or at least to "inspire" SpaceX to step it up), so generally speaking, early days and all that, but so far, I'm surprisingly not disappointed in Isaacman.
Lets go exploring.
(Score: 1, Spam) by DadaDoofy on Friday February 27, @05:19PM (3 children)
It just goes to show the lengths people with MDS will go to avoid kneeling to SpaceX. It doesn't matter that SpaceX wins in every category - cost, performance, schedule - you name it. They must have an alternative, any alternative, even it means wasting money, time, and but for good luck, human lives.
(Score: 1, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Friday February 27, @09:03PM (2 children)
How's that SpaceX moon lander coming? Still on track for delivery in 2024, I assume?
(Score: 3, Insightful) by khallow on Saturday February 28, @03:19AM
Of course not. But it still wins on those grounds - cost , performance, schedule. Let's keep in mind that Starliner has experienced a little schedule slip from its initial launch date of 2017 - meanwhile the Dragon 2 has presently 19 successful manned flights. And Starliner development cost at least twice as much with more problems exhibited on the two manned flights it managed.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by RS3 on Saturday February 28, @02:17PM
People, that is exactly, exactly, the problem. Someone dreams up a delivery schedule, and everyone's brains glom onto that concept. Top-level managers' priorities are: money and its partner time, which of course are interrelated.
Have you forgotten the cause of the Challenger disaster? It wasn't "O-rings". It was completely broken prioritization by NASA management. Engineers, you know, the smart ones who know stuff, said "don't launch". But unfortunately they're not at the top of the power pyramid, are they (we)?
NASA spent years and huge piles of money on intensive studies to conclude the obvious: give engineers full veto power.
So they did that for a while. But as usual people who are more prone to being bosses / managers / time-money / power motivated crept back into management structure and we then had the again preventable Columbia disaster.
W. Edwards Deming, Tom Peters, et al, will tell you that companies like Paul Mason, "We will sell no wine before its time", do very well because quality, not schedules, are the top priority.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by Spamalope on Friday February 27, @01:51PM (2 children)
Douglas management took over Boeing, removed engineers from management and outsourced everything they could while gutting testing.
It it any surprise the same troubles affecting MAX also plague Starliner?
I wonder - is it affecting military aircraft production too and they're just keeping the trouble classified?
(Score: 2, Informative) by khallow on Friday February 27, @03:48PM
Well, Boeing has an extensive rap sheet [corp-research.org] (bribery and illegal corporate espionage in particular). This doesn't include MAX.
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Friday February 27, @03:55PM
And Boeing bought Rockwell' Space Division which built Apollo and shuttle.
(Score: 4, Touché) by Snotnose on Friday February 27, @05:18PM (1 child)
When a crew is stranded for months I'd say that's right under killing the crew in the severity list.
You can call me antisocial. Just don't call me.
(Score: 3, Funny) by krishnoid on Friday February 27, @05:27PM
Videos, videos everywhere, but not the ones we really, *really* want.