Boeing’s troubled Starliner spacecraft is set to depart from the International Space Station tomorrow, Friday, September 6. But it will be traveling without its crew of two NASA astronauts, Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams, who will be staying on the space station until early next year.
The Starliner has had a long wait at the station for what was originally intended to be a one-week trip. After the spacecraft developed an issue with its thrusters during its journey to the station, officials chose to keep it docked while engineers investigated the problem. But more than eight weeks later, it was still not clear exactly what the cause of the issue was or whether it would occur again.
NASA reiterated its confidence in the Starliner, and the agency has previously emphasized that the spacecraft could be used to carry astronauts in an emergency — but to avoid any potential risk, it will bring the Starliner home uncrewed. “We’ve had two good landings with Starliner so far, and we’re expecting another one Friday,” said Steve Stich, manager of NASA’s Commercial Crew program.
As the Starliner has had problems with its thrusters, its undocking from the space station will be simplified. It will fire the thrusters to move away from the station and then move above it, which is a quicker path and should put less strain on the thrusters. The problem seems to have to do with the pulse rate of the thrusters — that is, how often they are fired in a short period of time. So minimizing their use in the undocking procedure gives the best chance of a successful return to Earth.
NASA also announced that it had solved the mystery of the weird noise that the Starliner was making this week, as it traced the sound to an audio configuration issue. It is “common to experience noise and feedback” due to the connection of the multiple spacecraft to the space station’s audio system, the agency said, adding that the sound has no effect on the station or the spacecraft.
Even without the crew, NASA and Boeing are both extremely keen to get the Starliner back to Earth safely so the thruster issue can be investigated in more depth. NASA has stressed that it wants two commercial providers of transport to the ISS, with Boeing set to join SpaceX in providing this service.
Wilmore and Williams will join the next batch of astronauts who are traveling to the ISS as part of the Crew-9 mission, and then travel home with them in February 2025 on a SpaceX Crew Dragon spacecraft.