NASA Releases Starliner Failures Report as It Preps for March Launch of Artemis 2
VLM writes:
To quote Cheryl Warner, NASA News Chief, "At a news conference on Thursday, NASA released a report of findings from the Program Investigation Team examining the Boeing CST-100 Starliner Crewed Flight Test as part of the agency's Commercial Crew Program."
The direct link to the redacted report is:
https://www.nasa.gov/wp-content/uploads/2026/02/nasa-report-with-redactions-021926.pdf?emrc=76e561
Redacted? "For the full report, which includes redactions in coordination with our commercial partner to protect proprietary and privacy-sensitive material is available online."
Its 311 pages and they're not providing a summary so it is likely to be extremely juicy and spicy, as NASA historically doesn't water down press releases for many other reasons. So I know what I'll be reading with breakfast tea later this morning.
So the facts are above. My separate opinions below.
I'd give it a different take than the report as I've read it so far; they designed a semi-disposable cost-reduced capsule but space projects ALWAYS take longer so if backflowing oxidizer will inevitably very slowly eat the o-rings in the helium manifold, well, its going to sit around a long time before launching so its going to eat thru, thats the nature of space program delays. Or propellant residue plus CO2 will rot out thruster nozzles given enough time, and space programs being space programs they will indeed be given time to sit around and slowly rot. They still are not sure about the RCS thrusters jamming but it seems likely to be a lack of ground testing during R+D; teflon is like a viscous liquid over a long time while under stress, key being over a long time.
The "Hardware Longevity and Sparing Concerns" section hints to me that the program is about to be cancelled if it doesn't cancel itself first. Reads like they're not permitted under the terms of the investigation to recommend program shutdown but they wanted to recommend it anyway.
The report follows that with numerous identified management failures at NASA and Boeing. This is the new Boeing, which is no longer competent, so "NASA's hands-off contract approach limited insight" precisely when Boeing needed adult supervision as they've downsized, outsourced, refused to recruit, or otherwise eliminated their competent adults for various reasons over the years. But who knows, what do y'all think?
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