NASA will bring the Starliner spacecraft back without a crew

The spacecraft is scheduled to land at White Sands Spaceport in New Mexico, with the two astronauts who previously traveled on the spacecraft, Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams, remaining at the ISS. As we know, on August 24, NASA announced problems with Starliner's gas leaks and propulsion system, determining that the spacecraft was not safe enough to return the crew.

Williams and Wilmore were scheduled to return to Earth aboard SpaceX's Crew Dragon spacecraft around February next year. However, the mission is now in limbo after the US Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) grounded SpaceX's Falcon 9 rocket after it caught fire while landing on August 28.

Starliner spacecraft. Photo: NASA

“The Starliner spacecraft will make a fully automated return flight with controllers at Starliner Mission Control in Houston and at Boeing Mission Control in Florida,” NASA announced Thursday. “They will be able to remotely control the spacecraft and safely land it in the southwest of the United States.”

Whether or not the Starliner successfully returns to Earth will be crucial to the future of Boeing's spacecraft development program. If the flight fails, NASA will not be granted safety certification to continue the program.

These test flights and the Starliner redesign process will likely cost the company millions of dollars, adding to the roughly $1.5 billion in losses already recorded on the Starliner program.

Even if the Starliner's return flight goes well, NASA still has to decide whether to certify the spacecraft as safe, given that it failed to complete its mission as intended.

Ha Trang (according to NASA, CNN)

Source: https://www.congluan.vn/tau-vu-tru-bi-hong-starliner-cua-boeing-sap-tro-ve-bo-lai-hai-phi-hanh-gia-mac-ket-tren-iss-post310065.html