Space snafu is another black eye for Boeing
NASA astronauts Barry Wilmore and Sunita Williams are welcomed by the crew of the International Space Station after they arrived using the Boeing Starliner spacecraft on June 6. Credit: AP
Butch and Suni are lost in space.
OK, “lost” is a little harsh for what’s happening to NASA astronauts Barry “Butch” Wilmore and Sunita “Suni” Williams. It’s more like they’re stranded in space, not in the Gilligan sense but stranded like being stuck at the airport amid weather delays that canceled your flight home and created cascading backups that make you feel like you’re never going to get out of there.
Wilmore and Williams have been at the International Space Station since June 6 and they’re still there because of technical issues with the Boeing Starliner craft that brought them there, issues that have NASA concerned about a safe return. The Gilligan’s Island-esque aspect to this is that what was supposed to be a one-week tour now looks likely to last eight months. That’s when the astronauts could hitch a ride back on a SpaceX Dragon craft scheduled to arrive in February — the extraterrestrial equivalent of calling for an Uber to get home from the airport.
NASA hasn’t made that call yet but admits it’s a strong possibility. That would be a serious black eye for Boeing, already reeling from an epic string of self-inflicted black eyes which have the troubled aerospace giant looking more like a minnow.
There were the two crashes of the company’s 737 MAX 8 planes within five months in 2018 and 2019 that killed 346 people. There was the door plug that blew out of an Alaska Airlines 737 MAX 9 jet in January and terrified passengers — a door plug investigators later found was missing bolts that held it in place. And there were disclosures this past week on Capitol Hill that Boeing factory workers said they were forced to work too quickly and on jobs for which some were not qualified; one called the company’s safety culture “garbage. Nobody’s accountable.”
Boeing’s space division has been similarly plagued. Numerous planned launches, crewed or otherwise, of its Starliner craft were scrubbed for issues like a faulty oxygen relief valve, a helium leak in the service module, 13 propulsion valves that failed to open, thruster failures, the computer ground launch sequencer not loading properly, and — my personal favorite — adhesive tape used to wrap wires that Boeing only belatedly realized was flammable.
You’re forgiven if you’re thinking it’s a wonder Wilmore and Williams agreed to board such a star-crossed vessel.
The comparison to SpaceX’s Dragon craft is damning. Both companies received contracts from NASA in 2014 to shuttle astronauts to and from the space station. Dragon has made more than 20 trips, eight of them crewed. All returned safely. SpaceX is looking ahead to landing astronauts on the moon in 2026 and, eventually, Mars, while Boeing flails at bringing home the only two people it has put into space.
To be clear, officials say Wilmore and Williams are in no danger. They’re living and working at the space station even if it’s on an extended-stay program. But Boeing’s bumbling offers lessons that must be learned.
Space once was the province of governments to flex their celestial muscle and showcase their technology. But those programs have tended to be expensive and slow.
Boeing’s Starliner — like SpaceX’s Dragon — is part of NASA’s ballyhooed innovation of partnering with private industry and that largely has been a good way to go. But while business is generally more nimble, better at “disruption,” and able to get things done more quickly and cheaply, it all depends on which business gets the contract.
It’s also true that space exploration — like any technology — can and usually does proceed in fits and starts. You get some things wrong and some things right. Mistakes are made. The graph of progress is seldom a straight line. Caution is wise, especially when lives literally are at stake.
NASA needs to get its people home, then decide whether to pull the plug on Boeing.
Columnist Michael Dobie's opinions are his own.
Michael Dobie is a member of the Newsday editorial board.
