NASA plays it cool over leaky spacecraft

 

NASA and Boeing managers have again extended the stay of Starliner at the International Space Station (ISS) this time into July, raising questions among more outspoken commentators as to whether its crew of two Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams will need to be offered an alternative means of returning to Earth.

It was revealed in a statement at the weekend that NASA wants more time for analysis to ensure helium leaks and faulty thruster are fully understood before risking the capsule’s first ever return flight with a crew.

The fact that the date has been pushed into July takes it closer to it’s 45-day on orbit limit following lift-off on 5 June. The return flight was originally scheduled for 14 June and then 26 June before the latest decision.

“Mission managers are evaluating future return opportunities which will follow the Space Station’s two planned spacewalks on June 24 and July 2,” said Steve Stich, NASA's commercial crew programme manager. “We are taking our time and following our standard mission management team process.”

The crewed test of the spacecraft, previously test-flown in space twice since 2019 without crew on board, has encountered five failures of its 28 manoeuvring thrusters, five leaks of helium gas meant to pressurize those thrusters, and a slow-moving propellant valve that signalled unfixed past issues.

The issues and the additional tests run by NASA and Boeing call into question when exactly Starliner's crew will be able to make the roughly six-hour return journey home, and in the process add to the programme's broader problems mand delays.

NASA wants Starliner to become a second US spacecraft capable of ferrying astronauts with the ISS and Boeing has already spent $1.5 billion in cost overruns beyond its $4.5-billion development contract.

Already running four years behind schedule, the Starliner crewed launch was a month later than planned due to minor problems with its Atlas 5 rocket, trouble with a countdown computer and because of an initial helium leak in the system used to pressurize the capsule’s thrusters.

NASA and Boeing managers decided the leak was too small to pose a safety threat and Starliner was cleared for launch but once in orbit further helium leaks developed and the Starliner’s flight computer took seven manoeuvring jets off-line when the telemetry did not match pre-launch expectations.

Starliner's undocking from the ISS and return to Earth is one of most complicated phases of its test mission. Most of the craft’s 28 thrusters are backups but at least 12 (six for control and six for backup) are required to meet flight safety rules.

NASA’s weekend update provided no further details but it is clear that managers were unhappy with all contingencies that Wilmore and Williams might encounter during a return flight to Earth, including safely undocking from the Space Station, manoeuvring away, performing a de-orbit burn, separating the crew capsule from the service module, and then flying through the atmosphere before landing under parachutes in a New Mexico desert.

It is not ideal that on such a high profile mission NASA is having to continue delaying the vehicle’s return. Officials have downplayed the overall seriousness of the situation saying Starliner is cleared to come home “in case of an emergency” though have not clarified why they are not ready to release Starliner to fly back to Earth with crew under "normal circumstances".

The situation has promoted many comments and much concern on social media, including some suggesting the Starliner crew is stranded in space. But this is far from true because in the event that NASA decided not to risk a crewed return flight they would have the option of commissioning a dedicated SpaceX Dragon mission to pick them up from the ISS.

Such a move would not look good from a PR perspective for either NASA or Boeing but it would be infinitely preferable to risking the lives of astronauts in a capsule returning to Earth with unresolved or uncertain technical issues. 

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Editor's note: first published by ROOM Space Journal under heading 'NASA postpones Starliner's crew return amid thruster concerns' on Sunday, 23 June 2024.

Looming catastrophe of climate change

Fossil-fuel companies have become the “godfathers of climate chaos” and should be banned from advertising in every country, the secretary general of the United Nations stated while delivering dire new scientific warnings of global heating.

Speaking in New York this week, António Guterres called on all media to stop enabling “planetary destruction” by taking fossil-fuel advertising money as he warned the world faces “climate crunch time” in its faltering attempts to stem the crisis.

“Many governments restrict or prohibit advertising for products that harm human health,” he said. “I urge every country to ban advertising from fossil-fuel companies. And I urge news media and tech companies to stop taking fossil-fuel advertising.”

In his speech, Guterres announced new data from the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) showing there is an 80 percent chance Earth will breach 1.5C in warming above pre-industrial times in the next five calendar years. 

The WMO says there is a already a 50-50 chance that the global average in the period between 2024 to 2028 will be above 1.5C in warming.

“We are playing Russian roulette with our planet,” he said. “We need an exit ramp off the highway to climate hell.”

According to the European Union’s Copernicus monitoring system, the past 12 months (from June 2023 to May of this year) have already breached this target following a string of months with record-breaking heat, with the average global temperature being 1.63C higher than the pre-industrial average.

Guterres likened the looming catastrophe to the meteor that wiped out the dinosaurs. “We’re having an outsized impact and, in the case of climate, we are not the dinosaurs - we are the meteor. We are not only in danger - we are the danger.”

He admitted that the 1.5C target was “still just about possible” but said there needed to be far greater effort from countries to slash carbon emissions, to boost climate finance to poorer countries, and for the fossil-fuel industry to be made pariahs by governments, the media and other businesses.

“The godfathers of climate chaos - the fossil-fuel industry - rake in record profits and feast off trillions in taxpayer-funded subsidies,” he said. “It is a disgrace that the most vulnerable are being left stranded, struggling desperately to deal with a climate crisis they did nothing to create.

“We cannot accept a future where the rich are protected in air-conditioned bubbles, while the rest of humanity is lashed by lethal weather in unlivable lands.”

Guterres attacked fossil-fuel firms for their meagre investments in cleaner forms of energy and for “distorting the truth, deceiving the public and sowing doubt” about climate science.

He called for global bans on fossil-fuel advertising and for public relations and media companies to cut ties with oil, gas and coal interests.

“These companies should stop acting as enablers to planetary destruction. Stop taking on new fossil-fuel clients and set out plans to drop your existing ones. Fossil fuels are not only poisoning our planet - they’re toxic for your brand.”

The speech was timed to act as a rallying call by the UN which is increasingly concerned that the climate crisis has slipped down the list of priorities for a world racked by war in Ukraine and Gaza, and other economic worries.

A meeting of the powerful G7 group of countries will take place in Italy next week, followed by November’s Cop29 climate summit, to be held in Azerbaijan, along with a G20 gathering in Brazil.

Amid this wrangling the impacts of the climate crisis continue to hit home, with countries including India and the US recently gripped by severe heatwaves. 

A study released this week found that extensive flooding that has devastated parts of southern Brazil, leading to 169 deaths, was made at least twice as likely due to human-caused climate change.

But Guterres urged people not to lose courage or hope. “No country can solve the climate crisis in isolation and we do still have a choice,” he said.

“This is an all-in moment. We can create tipping points for climate progress, or we can career to tipping points for climate disaster.”

He warned that it was now the people of Earth versus the polluters and the profiteers – and it is time for leaders to decide whose side they’re on.

“Tomorrow it will be too late,” Guterres concluded. “Now is the time to mobilise, now is the time to act, now is the time to deliver. This is our moment of truth.”

Professor emeritus of geophysical and climate hazards at University College London, Bill McGuire, agrees and says that as a scientist he is faced with “indifference and a failure to understand the reality of the climate crisis every day.

“We must wake people up. Extreme weather, especially heatwaves and floods, is set to be all-pervasive and will have a colossal impact on our lives and livelihoods,” he warns.

“A recent report by the European Environment Agency warned that climate breakdown will bring ‘catastrophic’ consequences for an unprepared Europe, most notably through heat stress, river flooding and flash floods.

“And this applies equally to the UK. Disruption to transport and utilities, interference with industrial and business operations, serious pressures on food production and supply, and increased burdens on the health service and hospitals, will conspire to make day-to-day living harder and far more unpredictable.”

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A Moment of Truth – UN speech by António Guterres (5 June 2024)
Hothouse Earth – by Bill McGuire (2022)