Capsule fail another blow for Boeing
Boeing, still reeling from the crashes of two passenger jets that killed 346 people and led to the worldwide grounding of its most popular aircraft, suffered another major setback yesterday when the spacecraft it is designing to fly Nasa astronauts to space failed to achieve the correct orbit, forcing the cancellation of its planned mission to the International Space Station.
Officials said they were still investigating what caused the Starliner capsule’s main engine not to fire as scheduled to push it on to a path to rendezvous with the station. But suspicion immediately fell on the capsule’s software, which was directing the uncrewed craft’s operations after launch.
The problem has reignited questions about Boeing’s procedures as Nasa seeks to resume human spaceflight from United States soil.
While Boeing’s space and aviation divisions largely operate as separate businesses, questions are sure to arise about whether they share approaches to design, testing and evaluation that could result in shared problems with software, which was also considered the culprit in the 737 Max jet crashes.
The failure of the Starliner capsule to achieve the correct orbit came after what appeared to be a flawless liftoff of the Atlas V rocket, operated by the United Launch Alliance.
Boeing and Nasa officials said they were still gathering details about what went wrong and why, as they seek to bring the spacecraft back to the ground, most likely tomorrow in New Mexico.
The original plan had been for the capsule to dock with the space station today, deliver holiday presents and supplies, and return to Earth on December 28.
Officials painted a complicated picture of multiple miscues aboard the craft. By the time crews on the ground figured out what was wrong and sent corrective instructions to the capsule, it had burned through so much fuel that officials decided they would need to abort the mission to the station and bring the craft down.
Nasa administrator Jim Bridenstine said the failure would not have been life-threatening had astronauts been on board.
He said earlier he had complete confidence in Boeing.
‘‘We’re very comfortable with Boeing as a company. Look at the history that Boeing has delivered on behalf of the United States of America. There is a lot of capability here.’’
In 2014, Boeing and SpaceX won contracts to build spacecraft designed to resume human spaceflight from US soil. In March, SpaceX successfully flew its Dragon capsule without crew to the space station, and it hopes to complete a test of its emergency abort system next month.