Stranded on the ISS possibly till next year.
- Thread starter Gingerbread Demon
- Start date
It would’ve taken longer, been more expensive, been less redundant, and required more input from NASA, all of which defeats the purpose of Commercial Crew. The new program is designed to be more hands-off, letting the companies that develop the spacecraft do their own thing so long as they hit certain performance milestones (like, ahem, a crewed launch, docking, and return). It's cheaper for NASA, and it also introduces Core American Values™ of capitalism and competition into the process, letting companies try their own things and see which approach works better, ideally speeding up innovation in spaceflight.
It's also redundant. If the flight suits were standardized and then found to be flawed in some way, it'd ground all Commercial Crew spacecraft until the problem could be fixed. NASA specifically wanted more independent variety in engineering after the Space Shuttle era, where whenever there was a problem, it had to be checked and fixed on every shuttle before any missions could fly. Besides, it's more than just a screw for an airhose, the suits have electronics, climate control, pressure regulation, it's not as simple as just mandating a jack and a location on the suit, and making all those things work together between different spacecraft that were being designed would require constant back-and-forth between competing companies and NASA. Car companies don't even like having to give up a tiny bit of design control to participate in Android Auto and Apple CarPlay, and that's a relatively petty ask compared to an entire spacecraft life-support system being designed around someone else's suit.
Granted, after this, and the PR drubbing NASA is taking, they're probably going to reconsider those trade-offs, bite the bullet, and mandate some kind of universal launch-and-reentry suit in the future for new spacecraft, not that it'd solve the main problem. Indeed, even if the suits were cross-compatible, the Dragon up there was only fitted for four people; there wouldn't be any jacks for two other astronauts to plug their suits into, they'd have to come back in shirt-sleeves anyway if there was an emergency evacuation after Starliner left.
It would have only required a minimal approach to standardisation though.
Running off a certain air pressure and power supply. It wouldn't even have required uniform valves and sockets - just supply adapters for the other capsule feeds.
These aren't daily use items, just emergency fall backs.
Running off a certain air pressure and power supply. It wouldn't even have required uniform valves and sockets - just supply adapters for the other capsule feeds.
These aren't daily use items, just emergency fall backs.
SpaceX's Falcon 9 has been grounded by the FAA after the first stage booster crashed when landing on its barge Wednesday (28AUG2024) morning following a Starlink launch from Florida, ending a streak of 267 successful landings. Another launch schedule for later in the same day from California was cancelled. The grounding will last until the investigation is completed and any necessary corrective actions approved.
The Polaris Dawn mission originally rescheduled for launching this Friday (30AUG) is now on an indefinite hold.
The Polaris Dawn mission originally rescheduled for launching this Friday (30AUG) is now on an indefinite hold.
Don't be sensible
I believe that is what is going to occur - they can't use their Starliner suits because NASA wanted dissimilar redundancy, however I recall reading somewhere that acceptably fitting Spacex suits for Butch and Suni have been identified in SpaceX's stock, and will be riding up to the ISS for their return next year.
The astronauts still have plenty of food and water to sustain them, yes?
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See, this is one of the many reasons why I could never be an astronaut.
The water purified in the ISS is a few degrees better than the ones in our current systems, I've heard.
So I guess that the best advice you could give an ISS astronaut right now, is:
Urine good company.
And they can look out the windows and see the constellation Urion.
(Okay, I stole that last one from Apollo 13. )
Urine good company.
And they can look out the windows and see the constellation Urion.
(Okay, I stole that last one from Apollo 13.
)
While this weekend's landing of Boeing's Starline was a "bullseye landing," it seems there were problems during descent.
A new thruster failed and the guidance system experienced a temporary blackout.
One reason NASA had delayed the return was over concerns that if a certain combination of thrusters failed, it could drift and potentially collide with the ISS.
A new thruster failed and the guidance system experienced a temporary blackout.
One reason NASA had delayed the return was over concerns that if a certain combination of thrusters failed, it could drift and potentially collide with the ISS.
