Boeing has now lost $1.1 billion on Starliner, with no crew flight in sight::“We’re not really ready to talk about a launch opportunity yet.”
Because Starliner was funded by NASA through a fixed-price contract, as part of the Commercial Crew program, Boeing is responsible for any cost overruns and financial losses due to delays.
There’s one piece of good news, unless you’re a Boeing shareholder. That aside it’s sad that a former engineering powerhouse like them just lurches from disaster to disaster these days.
“Unless you’re a Boeing shareholder” :-(
I bought a few shares of Boeing just before their 737 MAX debacle, and then COVID hit straight after. I thought things might turn around, so I’m apparently just holding the bag until they screw up so badly that I can buy the entire company.
You’re reply is almost word for word what I was going to say. They used to be an engineering company, but once the goddamn marketers and business fucks take over, they tend to ruin everything. HP used to be the same thing. And a whole host of other companies that no longer exist.
Won’t anyone think of the shareholders?!
Does Boeing have any recent projects that are an unmitigated success? Everything I see from them is about a new project being a disaster in some manner.
The fact they are even running is quiet surprising. The demographic of Boeing had an average age around 60 change to around 30 In A matter of 5 years. The amount of experience lost is crazy.
The 777X is moving along, albeit somewhat slowly. Boeing has just been limping along.
That’s not an encouraging thought. After the MAX debacle it’s hard to imagine Boeing not launching another death machine. I’ll be sure to steer clear of their new fancy plane.
During a normal flight, these substandard links would not be an issue. But Starliner’s parachute system is designed to land a crew safely in case one of the three parachutes fails. However, due to the lower failure load limit with these soft links, if one parachute fails, it’s possible the lines between the spacecraft and its remaining two parachutes would snap due to the extra strain.
The second issue involves P-213 glass cloth tape that is wrapped around wiring harnesses throughout the vehicle. These cables run everywhere, and Nappi said there are hundreds of feet of these wiring harnesses. The tape is intended to protect the wiring from nicks. However, during recent tests, it was discovered that under certain circumstances possible in flight, this tape is flammable.
I cannot imagine these two are insomourtable, but it also depends on how likely are these to occur in practice.
From what I saw, part of the issue is that P-212 glass cloth isn’t flammable, implying that there was a mistake in ordering or using P-213 instead.
As for how likely they are, spacecraft carry a pure oxygen supply and fires are one of the most dangerous things that can occur. Astronauts have died on the ground in training capsules that ignited, after which NASA paid close attention to any potential risk. As for the parachute, I don’t know how likely they are to fail, but it effectively changes from a point of failure with one redundancy (can lose one chute, but still land) to a single point of failure that would result in the death of all astronauts aboard if it failed. NASA’s pretty good about making sure that astronauts never die from something that could have been planned for.
Disappointing, was keen to see how the starliner went. Everyone seems to be putting there eggs in the starship basket
Starship is the sequel!
This was supposed to be Boeing’s crew Dragon rival. Meanwhile, that thing has flown like 10 crew missions, plus cargo supply missions already.
Though it’s a very good thing that Dragon is a completely different architecture to Starship, even if they are both SpaceX.
Wonder if they are re-taping it or not.
Boeing is a disaster. If the MAX story isn’t enough to demonstrate how incompetent these idiots are then I don’t know what to tell you.
Nothing good will come of this.
Fuck yeah. We have far too many problems planetside to be chasing environmentally disastrous dick-waving billionaire ego projects / nationalistic military industrial complex saber rattling in space.
What are the young to dream of if not the stars?
A planet that’s not on fire for their children, being able to afford a home, and dead billionaires.
¿Por que no los dos ?
Because billionaire dick waving ego projects preclude it
