The crew of the Boeing CST-100 Starliner has received promising news regarding their return to Earth. Recent ground tests on the spacecraft’s thrusters, which have prevented it from returning since early June, have been completed. Boeing and NASA were waiting for these tests to plan the spaceship’s homeward journey.
An update mentioned, “Ground testing of a Starliner Reaction Control System (RCS) thruster at White Sands Test Facility in New Mexico is complete, and teams are now focusing on reviewing data.” The tests aimed to analyze thruster degradation to better understand the issues that caused some thrusters to be inactive during flight and to assess the potential impact of reintegrating these thrusters before the Crew Flight Test.
Some thrusters were marked as “de-selected,” indicating they had ceased functioning. Leaks in the helium tanks that control the thrusters were noted both before and during the Starliner’s launch, resulting in several delays. Officials had stated last month that the spacecraft carried 70 hours’ worth of helium, though only seven hours were needed. While they indicated that the craft could technically return to Earth immediately if necessary, they also expressed that they were not fully prepared for its departure yet.
In their most recent update, NASA and Boeing suggested that the return flight might occur by the end of this month. However, the timeframe has since become less specific: “Boeing and NASA engineers will continue with thruster disassembly and inspections, and will move forward with finalizing flight rationale for readiness reviews concerning Starliner’s planned return to Earth with commander Butch Wilmore and pilot Suni Williams in the upcoming weeks.”