from Hacker News

NASA and Boeing deny Starliner crew is stranded: We're not in rush to come home

by sylvainkalache on 6/29/24, 12:05 PM with 10 comments

• by creativeSlumber on 6/29/24, 1:42 PM

  > “I want to make it real clear that we’re not in any rush to come home,” Steve Stich, NASA’s commercial crew program manager, said during the press conference. “The station is a nice, safe place to stop and take our time to work through the vehicle and make sure we’re ready to come home.”

  It's like you went on a trip and your vehicle is having technical issues, but you are at the hotel so you can extend your stay until the car issue is sorted out. Any reasonable person would call it stranded.

  It is sad that NASA has lost it's integrity and trying to cover up for private company.

• by walking_debt on 6/29/24, 1:44 PM

  Stranded is a loaded term that comes with a lot of negativity for folks and priors. Sure they aren’t ENTIRELY stuck and they also all want this project to work. The astronauts have spent a lot of time trying to make it work for themselves and others too.

  Boeing has all kinds of problems and I think everyone could agree well this didn’t work like we expected.

  But they throw away this module, this is maybe their best time to figure out what went wrong.

  I think for everyone’s hope, we see Boeing get itself together and become what it portends itself to be; because competition is good.

  I wish the headlines are about how they are losing and not how anything is reckless or the sky falling. They are just getting their collective plans handed back to them by their competitors as ha you lose.

• by vikramkr on 6/29/24, 1:40 PM

  Iirc even if the Boeing capsule was no good for return they'd be able to send up a dragon or have extra folks pack into another capsule for emergency measures right? It's not like even the worst case is "stranded"

• by ourmandave on 6/29/24, 1:01 PM

  I'm not a Boeing fanboy, but they are test pilots for Starliner and so fully planned that they could be up there for a while. They even launched with a helium leak.

  There's no danger to anyone on SSIS.

• by mhb on 6/29/24, 1:10 PM

  "Ground control to Boeing: I want you to imagine for a moment how the media would cover it if Elon Musk’s SpaceX had technical problems that left two astronauts stranded in space. Wall-to-wall coverage? Live 24/7 interviews with the astronauts’ families? Endless think pieces about Elon Musk’s toxic recklessness? Yes, and yes, and oh, yes. We would know the astronauts’ names, know their hobbies, and we’d probably be encouraged to rally for their safe return. It’s funny only because at this very moment, two NASA astronauts are stranded in space, by Boeing. And though we’re allowed to make fun of Boeing planes, if you question Boeing or NASA spacecraft, you might inadvertently be praising SpaceX."

  https://www.thefp.com/p/tgif-the-president-has-a-cold