Boeing’s Starliner spacecraft landed in a New Mexico desert late on Friday, months after its original departure date and without the two astronauts it carried when it launched in early June.
Starliner returned to Earth seemingly without a hitch, a Nasa live stream showed, nailing the critical final phase of its mission.
The spacecraft re-entered Earth’s atmosphere around 11pm ET at orbital speeds of roughly 27,400km/h (17,025mph). About 45 minutes later, it deployed a series of parachutes to slow its descent and inflated a set of airbags moments before touching down at the White Sands Space Harbor, an arid desert in New Mexico.
Still was the right decision not to chance it.
But I bet the astronauts wish they’d been on it now.
Someone who’s worked their entire life to not only become trained as an astronaut, but actually go on a space mission. What do you think they prefer? Going home today or staying another few months on an actual space station?
I think they’d prefer going home. The mission they came up for is long done, they may have important events in their life or their family’s lives scheduled for after the planned return, and staying up for months increases the chances of long term damage to their bodies.
I imagine they’re pretty bored by now.
They certainly won’t be bored. Astronauts time on the ISS is a precious resource, and work will have been found for them even if they weren’t expected to be there
I keep saying the same thing and get a bunch of people replying things like, “how do you know they want to see their kids?”
That makes me wonder. What happens if an astronaut just…refuses to come back? They’re up on the station and their mission is at its end. They broadcast to NASA. “Actually, I’ve decided not to come back. I live here now.” How would NASA handle that situation?
I seem to recall reading somewhere they have sedatives and stuff because people have a real potential to freak out and try to walk out of air locks.
I’ll see if I can find the article.
Edit: I didn’t reread it… but I had this one book marked
“Actually, I’ve decided not to come back. I live here now.”
Ed Baldwin, is that you?
Boeing killed John Barnett
I like the part where they waited until after markets closing to take a chance. Also note how NASA announced that astronauts were staying after markets closed.
Right choice, play it safe. Glad it landed safely, competition in space is a good thing. Better than a monopoly.
Amazing. Given Boeings recent track record, I didn’t expect it to do that.
