2 ms·

It does. It can (and will) land on land instead of water.

coolspot 2y ago
Like Soyuz? Interesting, why would they want that capability? All Russian space vehicles land on land because they don’t have easy access to warm waters and Kazakhstan steppe is big and empty. But why boeing/nasa would want that?
- dotnet00 2y ago
  Tradeoffs on the kind of refurbishment needed compared to a splashdown, since Starliner is supposed to be reusable. Plus stuff like faster extraction of time-sensitive payloads and overall cheaper capsule processing operations since you don't need specially fitted boats chasing after the capsule. Dragon was also initially intending to land on solid ground, but dropped the idea when NASA asked for additional tests to prove that popping landing legs out of the heat shield would be safe. SpaceX had intended such landings in large part because of the plans for Red Dragon, but since by then they had started to shift towards Starship, they deemed it easier to just splashdown and deal with the extra refurbishment than try to prove out a technology they no longer felt the need for.
- GMoromisato 2y ago
  Landing in water is bad for equipment--the salt water tends to corrode, so refurbishing the capsule after a water landing is a bit harder.
- simplicio 2y ago
  Think the main reason is that sea-recoveries are expensive compared to ones on land. I imagine there's at least some extra risk to a sea recovery as well (one of the Mercury capsules sank during recovery, though happily not with its astronaut inside).
dave78 2y ago
Is that a feature or just a difference? I assume there's trade-offs with both - is landing on land significantly better?
- starik36 2y ago
  It's faster and more efficient, I think. You don't need a fleet of ships to go out to the sea.
  - dave78 2y ago
    Interesting to think about. I know Starliner lands in Utah. I don't know where, but I'm guessing it's somewhere very remote. I wonder if the effort to get out to the ocean to recover a ship is significantly different than getting to a remote part of the desert to recover. Additionally, I know when the first Crew Dragon landed, it clearly wasn't hard or expensive to get to given that there were a bunch of small, private boats that (inappropriately) approached the spacecraft. It was quite close to shore, not like the old Apollo missions landing in the middle of the Atlantic or Pacific.

Like Soyuz? Interesting, why would they want that capability? All Russian space vehicles land on land because they don’t have easy access to warm waters and Kazakhstan steppe is big and empty. But why boeing/nasa would want that?

dotnet00 2y ago
Tradeoffs on the kind of refurbishment needed compared to a splashdown, since Starliner is supposed to be reusable. Plus stuff like faster extraction of time-sensitive payloads and overall cheaper capsule processing operations since you don't need specially fitted boats chasing after the capsule. Dragon was also initially intending to land on solid ground, but dropped the idea when NASA asked for additional tests to prove that popping landing legs out of the heat shield would be safe. SpaceX had intended such landings in large part because of the plans for Red Dragon, but since by then they had started to shift towards Starship, they deemed it easier to just splashdown and deal with the extra refurbishment than try to prove out a technology they no longer felt the need for.
GMoromisato 2y ago
Landing in water is bad for equipment--the salt water tends to corrode, so refurbishing the capsule after a water landing is a bit harder.
simplicio 2y ago
Think the main reason is that sea-recoveries are expensive compared to ones on land. I imagine there's at least some extra risk to a sea recovery as well (one of the Mercury capsules sank during recovery, though happily not with its astronaut inside).

dave78 2y ago

Is that a feature or just a difference? I assume there's trade-offs with both - is landing on land significantly better?

starik36 2y ago
It's faster and more efficient, I think. You don't need a fleet of ships to go out to the sea.
- dave78 2y ago
  Interesting to think about. I know Starliner lands in Utah. I don't know where, but I'm guessing it's somewhere very remote. I wonder if the effort to get out to the ocean to recover a ship is significantly different than getting to a remote part of the desert to recover. Additionally, I know when the first Crew Dragon landed, it clearly wasn't hard or expensive to get to given that there were a bunch of small, private boats that (inappropriately) approached the spacecraft. It was quite close to shore, not like the old Apollo missions landing in the middle of the Atlantic or Pacific.