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Arthur T Knackerbracket has found the following story:
The Boeing Starliner, one of two new spacecraft to take astronauts from US soil to the International Space Station (ISS), has returned to Earth safely after its somewhat shaky first Orbital Flight Test. The capsule blasted off atop a United Launch Alliance Atlas V rocket without any drama, but soon after a timing glitch prevented the spacecraft from reaching its planned orbit, denying a rendezvous with the ISS. On Sunday, Starliner returned to Earth, deploying parachutes and airbags to land safely in New Mexico.
"You look at the landing, it was an absolute bulls-eye," said Jim Bridenstine, NASA administrator, in a press conference Sunday. The capsule landed in the desert just before 5 a.m. PT, its trio of parachutes carrying it safely to the earth. It was the first time a capsule was safely brought back to US soil in history.
However, while the landing was on target, Starliner's journey in space was a different story.
Also at: Starliner makes a safe landing—now NASA faces some big decisions
Previously: Starliner Fails to Make Journey to ISS
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday December 24 2019, @05:03AM (2 children)
Listen to the press conference.
They keep repeating it was just a timing issue, but a whole hoard of things went wrong. Whatever redundancies/fail-safes they had, didn't work. They don't know why. The engines burnt themselves out beyond safe margins. The pod itself failed to properly deploy its communications equipment (which is why they couldn't remotely control), and many other things. The whole mission was a blazing cluster fuck that they're now blaming on a timing error. Ironically saying you screwed up one of the most fundamental aspects of any launch (indicating gross ineptitude) is their effort at running PR for the disaster that this thing was.
(Score: 2) by takyon on Tuesday December 24 2019, @05:37AM (1 child)
1. It was just a little timing issue. Everything else was an act of God!
2. It seems to me that they have been successful at confusing the issue, or I haven't been paying enough attention. But they can't cover up the "go fever" for the next launch of Starliner to be crewed (and forget an in-flight abort test). That is transparent and baffling.
3. Is it legal to bet on whether astronauts will die on either the Dragon or Starliner mission?
lol [seradata.com]
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(Score: 2) by Gaaark on Tuesday December 24 2019, @11:11AM
Maybe it was an Imperial to Metric conversion problem....they converted seconds to litres!
--- Please remind me if I haven't been civil to you: I'm channeling MDC. I have always been here. ---Gaaark 2.0 --