NASA To Decide Whether To Require Additional Boeing Starliner Test Flight Written 10 January 2020

The Washington Post reports that following December’s failed Boeing Starliner test, NASA must decide whether it will “require the company to repeat the uncrewed test flight or” whether it will “allow the next flight to proceed, as originally planned, with astronauts aboard.” Requiring The Boeing Company “to redo the test flight without anyone aboard would be costly, possibly requiring” Boeing “to spend tens of millions of dollars to demonstrate that its new spacecraft is capable of meeting the space station in orbit.” However, if “NASA moved ahead with the crewed flight and something went wrong that put the astronauts in danger, the agency would come under withering criticism that could plague it for years.” For the moment, NASA “has formed an independent team with Boeing to examine what went wrong” during the test flight and is also “reviewing data to help it determine whether the capsule achieved enough objectives during its truncated flight.” NASA Administrator Jim Bridenstine has said, “I’m not saying we’re going to do it. But I’m not ruling it out, either.”
Full Story (Washington Post)