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I think many might not be aware of Starliner's sordid history. It has failed essentially every qualification test in various ways. Their pad abort test (where y
by somenameforme 2y ago
I think many might not be aware of Starliner's sordid history. It has failed essentially every qualification test in various ways. Their pad abort test (where you simulate a launch abort while on the launch pad) resulted in only 2 of the 3 parachutes deploying in beyond optimal conditions. NASA considered that such a resounding success that they let them completely skip the far more challenging in-flight abort test. Their first automated mission to the ISS completely failed and did not make it to the station. NASA finally required a redo from Boeing and their second one did make it to the ISS, but only after experiencing widespread leaks and thruster failures literally identical to the ones that have now left these astronauts stranded.
If SpaceX or another company had remotely similar results, they would never have been greenlit. For instance in spite of a flawless pad abort test, NASA required SpaceX also carry out an in-flight abort. And that's completely reasonable - you don't simply skip tests, even with optimal performance. Skipping tests following suboptimal performance is simply unjustifiable. And so I think we're largely looking at another Challenger type disaster caused by a disconnect between management (and likely political appointees) versus engineering staff, rather than inherent risk. But this is not a vessel that should have ever had a single human anywhere near it, and so their official comments (and even actions) on the situation are going to be heavily biased due to their own behaviors.
- tim333 2y agoSounds like it might be better if Boeing dropped out if their thing doesn't work properly, costs much more and is mostly in there through political lobbying.
- MPSimmons 2y agoI am certain that if Boeing thought that they could drop this without repercussions, they would absolutely do it.
- lupusreal 2y agoThey said a year or two back they will refuse to take on new fixed-price contracts going forward. Apparently the only way they can be profitable is by scamming taxpayers.
- NickC25 2y agoTime for nationalization, then. If a producer of critical infrastructure cannot make profit without cutting corners, it should be nationalized so that the need to place profit ahead of anything and everything the producer does is eliminated.
- edem 2y agothen the taxpayers can foot the bill
- Sprocklem 2y agoIt's a contract with NASA. Taxpayers already are footing the bill.
- BHSPitMonkey 2y agoI think they mean for the continued costs of correcting the issues. It's a fixed cost contract, and Boeing is currently on the hook for the runaway costs this mission is incurring.
- WJW 2y agoWhy would the government need or want to own a producer that is not capable of producing things profitably while competitors that can do so exist in the market?
- engineer_22 2y agoI agree with you but since the government is not great at managing cost and budgets, and private industry is showing burgeoning capacity to develop orbital vehicles, maybe it would be in the national interest to steward a winding down of the business and transfer of assets to other industry participants.
- autoexecbat 2y agoI hope they just cut their losses and sell the program to Blue Origin, they're a deep pocketed company who'd love to say they have an orbital vehicle
- _joel 2y agoThey also wrapped their avionics cables in flammable tape and had to redo everything. The original, approved tape was still available, not a supply issue. I think that is pretty telling.
- xattt 2y agoInflammable means flammable? What a country! /s
- pfdietz 2y agoMy eyes get inflamed just reading the word, wondering where it could have come from.
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- taneq 2y agohttps://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Contronym https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Contronym :)
- dfxm12 2y agoA contronym is a word with two opposite meanings Inflammable has one meaning.
- Qwertious 2y ago"in" denotes the opposite, so "inflammable" has been used to mean not flammable due to expectations of grammatical consistency, and as a result the word is generally preferred to be avoided entirely nowadays in favor of either "flammable" (or "highly flammable"), or "nonflammable".
- jfengel 2y ago
- fredgrott 2y agoname one Soyuz operation to the same space station that resulted in a similar failure.... It would seem that Dragon is being held up to the same standard that was set for Soyuz...Boeing is the only one failing.... We are looking at a testing and engineering failure combined of Boeing.
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- kevin_thibedeau 2y agoSoyuz MS-22 had to be ditched last year due to its coolant failure.
- michaelt 2y ago> It has failed essentially every qualification test in various ways. [...] Their first automated mission to the ISS completely failed and did not make it to the station. NASA finally required a redo from Boeing and their second one did make it to the ISS, but only after experiencing widespread leaks and thruster failures I don't follow spaceflight news in any great depth - but doesn't SpaceX also have a rocket thingy that keeps exploding? Isn't "just launch over and over until it stops exploding" the way rockets are made these days?
- FactolSarin 2y agoThat's SpaceX's philosophy, but Boeing operates on a measure-twice build-once philosophy where everything is supposed to be close to perfect in the first place.
- wkat4242 2y agoBut it's not close enough to perfect and they didn't factor a failure into the costs. So now there's pressure in not doing a second trial run that may or not be perfect because they don't want to lose money. Not only that but it's year later than planned and has failed most of its tests. And even if everything had worked as planned it would have lost money. It's really not a very successful philosophy anymore.
- tim333 2y agoDifferent types of tests. The SpaceX ones were mostly supposed to do that.
- mensetmanusman 2y agoThere will be businesses cases written about what happens when any organization becomes completely over burdened by risk mitigation. This applies to government as well. One reason nothing can be done. (Also interestingly it correlates nicely with the average age of decision makers as they approach death).
- hedora 2y agoThe issue with Boeing isn’t risk mitigation. The problem is that they have managers that don’t understand basic engineering and manufacturing practices, and that focus entirely on short-term financial engineering. Case studies for those sorts of mistakes have already been written. For example, look at the US automotive bailout and collapse of Detroit, or read up on IBM and GE’s performance over the last decade.
- radicaldreamer 2y agoAT&T is another one and you’re seeing the same thing play out in the entertainment sector with Warner Bros. Discovery and Disney and one could argue Google is on the same path. Financial engineering is a dead end in multiple industries but will continue unabated because of how the management employee lifecycle works — the people who run companies into the ground are long retired with their huge comp packages by the time the company is defunct.
- Log_out_ 2y agoThe parasite wellfare is the actual purpose of the system pushed forth by parasites, anything else projected on the hosts is irrelevant selfhypnosis.
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- lenerdenator 2y agoIt's fairly obvious at this point that Boeing's problem isn't one of too much risk mitigation.
- panick21_ 2y agoThis is a highly inacccurate post. The companies could themselves propose certification and NASA only said if it is ok, if you didnt test you had do more certification work. NASA didnt require an abort test for either company. SpaceX just decided to have one, Boeing didnt. The parachute test had nothing to do with abort tests.
- somenameforme 2y agoYou can read the requirements (and more) here. [1] ---- In 2014, NASA awarded separate fixed-price contracts to Boeing and SpaceX to develop their respective systems and to fly astronauts to the ISS. Each contract required four successful demonstrations to achieve human rating for the system: pad abort, uncrewed orbital test, launch abort, and crewed orbital test. ---- Parachutes are an integral part of the abort tests. If those parachutes fail, which is a somewhat common problem with these designs, then even if the capsule escapes a failing rocket, they're going to head the ground like a rock. [1] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commercial_Crew_Program https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commercial_Crew_Program
- autokad 2y agoI think shade needs thrown at NASA for taking too long to make SpaceX a part of this solution. If they are sending up an unproven vehicle, why not have SapceX already on stand by? These astronauts should have been home in June, now they are saying they might not be home until 2025? someone needs fired.
- adgjlsfhk1 2y agobecause astronauts being in space isn't a problem. the ISS always has a capsule docked to it in case emergency evacuation is needed
- adolph 2y agoHere lies an hyperboloid argument or Catch-22. It isn't a circular argument because after dipping down to a solution we rebound into ether. 1.A: Astronauts stranded 2.B: No they are not stranded, there is an emergency evac capsule 3.A: Ok, bring them home 4.B: The emergency evac capsules are the vehicles they arrived on
- adgjlsfhk1 2y agoYou have 4. wrong. 4 is It isn't an emergency
- wkat4242 2y agoWell if I were one of the astronauts I'd be thrilled to have a few months extra in space <3 This is probably the least bad effect of this.
- throwawaymaths 2y agoYou forgot (IIRC) 1/4 parachutes failing on the landing of second launch and the cables on the remaining parachutes not being within load factor.
- cybernoodles 2y agoReminds me of the cause of the Apollo 13 oxygen tank explosions: "The high temperature emptied the tank, but also resulted in serious damage to the teflon insulation on the electrical wires to the power fans within the tank. The exposed fan wires shorted and the teflon insulation caught fire in the pure oxygen environment." https://nssdc.gsfc.nasa.gov/planetary/lunar/ap13acc.html https://nssdc.gsfc.nasa.gov/planetary/lunar/ap13acc.html