20.12.2019 / 8.20 MEZ
The mission patch for Starliner's Orbital Flight Test honors the role Boeing has played an integral role in every U.S. human spaceflight program over the past half-century.
The olive branch on this patch nods to that history as a reference to the Apollo 11 moon landing patch, and to NASA as the agency welcomes Boeing to the era of commercial human spaceflight services. With shades of blue representing our methodical steps to reach low Earth orbit, this patch was ultimately inspired by the image of Starliner first docking to the Boeing-built International Docking Adaptor attached to the International Space Station.
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Starliner set for its historic debut flight on Friday morning
"This is the culmination of years of hard work."
Nearly a decade has passed since NASA first awarded funds to Boeing for the design of a crewed spaceflight capsule, and on Friday we should finally see the Starliner vehicle take flight for its first orbital test.
Officials from Boeing, United Launch Alliance, and NASA all said Tuesday that the Starliner capsule and its Atlas V rocket are ready for launch, scheduled for 6:36am ET (11:36 UTC) Friday from Space Launch Complex 41 in Florida. According to meteorologists, there is an 80 percent chance of favorable launch weather.
"When you see an integrated vehicle like this on the pad, it all becomes real," said Kathy Lueders, NASA's manager for the commercial crew program for much of the last decade.
This seven-day orbital test flight—provided Starliner launches on Friday, it will dock at the International Space Station on Saturday, and then land back on Earth on December 28—is essentially a shakedown test for the vehicle before astronauts fly inside of it. A mannequin nicknamed "Rosie" will ride along to gather in situ data for what astronauts will be exposed to.
"This is the culmination of years of hard work, and this is really setting up to be an incredible week," said John Mulholland, who manages the Starliner program for Boeing.
The capsule will launch on an Atlas V rocket, which is among the most trusted boosters in the world. This configuration of the Atlas rocket will use two side-mounted rocket boosters, and for the first time the Atlas' Centaur upper stage will employ two, rather than one, RL-10 rocket engines. This will provide a smoother and flatter launch trajectory and subject Starliner to lower gravitational forces, Mulholland said.
Sets up a big 2020
Officials were careful during a news conference on Tuesday to not set a date for a crewed flight test, in which NASA astronauts Michael Fincke and Nicole Mann will fly with Boeing astronaut Chris Ferguson to the station. That will depend upon the success of Friday's test flight, but if all goes well, it should happen during the first half of 2020, Mulholland said.
After funding several development efforts in the early 2010s, NASA down-selected to Boeing and SpaceX in 2014 to finalize design and development of their commercial crew vehicles. All told, the agency has paid Boeing $4.8 billion and SpaceX $3.1 billion for Starliner and the Crew Dragon spacecraft, respectively.
In March, the Dragon vehicle successfully performed an uncrewed flight test to the space station, but the company had a significant setback in April when the same vehicle exploded during a static fire test of its launch escape system. SpaceX and NASA have since diagnosed and fixed that problem, and a critical in-flight abort test is likely to occur in January.
That test, and Boeing's uncrewed flight test, represent the final stages of the commercial crew development program. Sometime in 2020, nine years after the final space shuttle mission from Florida, humans should again launch into orbit from the United States.
Quelle: arsTechnica
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Starliner test flight Update: 11.40 MEZ
We are now one hour away from the historic inaugural launch of Starliner, Boeing's spacecraft for NASA's Commercial Crew Program to launch American astronauts again from U.S. soil.
Starliner is a 21st century human space transportation platform optimized for missions to low Earth orbit. In its design, Boeing leveraged decades of heritage in human spaceflight as well as incorporated new technologies to make a safe and reliable vehicle. Starliner's two main pieces are the crew module and service module, and the crew module is intended to be reused on 10 missions.
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Quelle: ULA,NASA
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Update: 14.30 MEZ
Boeing Starliner Update
Despite launching successfully at 6:36 a.m. EST Friday on the United Launch Alliance Atlas V rocket from Space Launch Complex 41 at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida, Boeing’s CST-100 Starliner is not in its planned orbit. The spacecraft currently is in a stable configuration while flight controllers are troubleshooting.
Quelle: NASA
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Update: 19.30 MEZ
Mission Update
Boeing Update on Starliner Orbital Flight Test
The CST-100 Starliner is in a safe, stable orbit after an anomaly this morning following launch and spacecraft separation from the Atlas V. The anomaly appears to have been the result of a mission elapsed timer (MET) using an unexpected timeline, which delayed orbital insertion thruster firings, putting Starliner in an unplanned orbit. Further root cause analysis is needed. The Boeing flight control team quickly took action to place Starliner into an orbit that supports a safe landing at White Sands Missile Range in New Mexico. The combined Boeing and NASA team now plan to work together to define test flight objectives for the remainder of the mission, while preparing for the Starliner landing. At this time, we do not expect the Starliner to dock at the International Space Station on this flight. We are proud of the team for their professionalism and quick action to protect the vehicle and enable a safe return. We look forward to reviewing and learning from the data that has been generated from this mission so far.
Quelle: Boeing
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Update: 21.12.2019
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Rückschlag für Boeing-RaumschiffTestflug von "Starliner" zur ISS fehlgeschlagen
Das Boeing-Raumschiff "Starliner" wird nicht wie geplant an die ISS andocken. Nach dem Start hatte es Probleme gegeben, bei denen offenbar zu viel Treibstoff verbrannt wurde.
Der Testflug einer Raumkapsel, die das private Luftfahrtunternehmen Boeing für bemannte Raummissionen der US-Raumfahrtbehörde Nasa entwickelt hat, ist fehlgeschlagen. Nach dem Start vom Weltraumbahnhof Cape Canaveral schlug "Starliner" einen falschen Kurs zur Internationalen Raumstation ISS ein. Das teilten Boeing und die Nasa mit. Daher werde die unbemannte Kapsel die ISS nicht erreichen.
Zunächst hatte Nasa-Administrator Jim Bridenstine auf Twitter geschrieben, die Kapsel sei in einer stabilen Umlaufbahn um die Erde. Allerdings habe ein Antrieb versagt, der für das Erreichen der ISS notwendig sei. Dafür könnte ein Softwarefehler verantwortlich sein.
Vor Journalisten sagte Bridenstine später, eine "Anomalie" an der Borduhr habe zu dem Problem geführt. "Das Raumfahrzeug befand sich in einer anderen Zeit als in der tatsächlichen", sagte Bridenstine. Weil die Bordinformatik suggeriert habe, dass der Flug bereits in einem späteren Stadium sei, als tatsächlich der Fall war, habe die Kapsel mehr Treibstoff verbraucht als geplant. Deshalb sei es nicht möglich, an die ISS anzudocken. Nasa-Angaben zufolge soll die Mission nun schon nach 48 Stunden mit der Landung auf der Erde wieder enden.
Eigentlich hätte das Raumschiff am Samstag erstmals 400 Kilometer über der Erdoberfläche an die ISS andocken sollen. Die Rückkehr war für den 28. Dezember geplant.
Der gescheiterte Testflug ist ein Rückschlag für die Bemühungen der USA, bei bemannten Raumfahrtmissionen von russischen "Sojus"-Raketen unabhängig zu werden. 2011 hatte die US-Raumfahrtbehörde ihr eigenes Shuttle-Programm nach drei Jahrzehnten eingestellt. Später wurde ein Strategiewechsel für eine Rückkehr zur bemannten Raumfahrt mit US-Raumkapseln eingeleitet: Statt selbst neue Shuttles zu entwickeln, wurden Privatunternehmen dafür angeheuert.
Boeing wie auch sein Konkurrent SpaceX erhielten in der Folge Milliardenbeträge, um bemannte Raumfähren für die US-Raumfahrt zu entwickeln. SpaceX absolvierte bereits im März mit seiner für bemannte Missionen vorgesehenen Raumfähre "CrewDragon" einen erfolgreichen Testflug zur ISS. An Bord war, wie jetzt beim "Starliner", nur ein Dummy, also eine mit Sensoren versehene Puppe.
Quelle: SpiegelOnline
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NASA blames 'automation' and timers not being in sync for Boeing Starliner flop
Instead of heading to the ISS, the spaceship will return to earth on Sunday.
It was supposed to be a historic day for Boeing, but the launch of its hyped-up Starliner spacecraft did not go exactly as planned.
Instead of heading to the International Space Station, the unmanned spacecraft is now supposed to return to Earth on Sunday.
NASA officials blamed the error on "automation," saying at a news conference Friday that the spacecraft believed the time was "different than it actually was."
All seemed to go as planned initially -- the liftoff successfully took place just before 7 a.m. from Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida. Shortly after, however, NASA's live coverage of the launch appeared to go down and Boeing put out a statement that the spaceship was dealing with an "off-nominal insertion" but maintained it was "in a safe and stable configuration."
It soon became clear that the Starliner was not going to make it to the International Space Station as planned.
"This is in fact why we test," NASA administrator Jim Bridenstine said at a news conference Friday.
Bridenstine said it was an "automation" error.
"The anomaly resulted in the vehicle believing the time was different than it actually was, and because that timing was a little bit off, what ended up happening is the spacecraft tried to maintain a very precise control that it normally wouldn’t have tried to maintain and it burned a lot of prop," Bridenstine said.
"And when that prop got burnt it looked like we weren’t able to go ahead and rendezvous with the International Space Station," he added.
By the time the engineers were "able to get the signals up to actually command it to do the orbital insertion burn, it was a bit too late," Bridenstine said.
He maintained, however, that the error likely would have been solved had a crew been onboard.
"This anomaly had to do with automation, and [astronauts] Nicole and Mike are trained specifically to deal with the situation that happened today where the automation was not working according to plan," he said. "Had they been in there we very well may be docking with the International Space Station tomorrow, had they been in the space craft."
Bridenstine said he did not know what the "root cause" of the error that caused the timing to be off.
The Starliner's failure to make it to the ISS is another setback Boeing. On Monday, the company announced it was suspending production of its 737 Max jets which have been grounded since March after two deadly crashes that killed a total of 346 people. The company admitted that its automatic flight control system played a role in the deadly 737 Max crashes.