The crew of the Boeing CST-100 Starliner received promising news regarding their return to Earth. Recent ground testing of the spacecraft’s thrusters, which have prevented its return since early June, has been completed. Boeing and NASA were waiting for these tests to conclude before planning the vessel’s homecoming.
An update shared late last week stated, “Ground testing of a Starliner Reaction Control System (RCS) thruster at the White Sands Test Facility in New Mexico is complete, and teams are now reviewing the data.” The purpose of the test was to assess thruster degradation to understand the failures of certain thrusters during flight and the potential implications of reactivating them on the overall Crew Flight Test performance.
Some thrusters were described as “de-selected,” meaning they malfunctioned. Leaking helium tanks that control the thrusters caused significant delays before and during the Starliner launch. Officials mentioned at a press conference last month that the spacecraft contains 70 hours of helium, far exceeding the seven hours required for its operations. They previously indicated that the craft could return immediately if necessary, but they emphasized that they were not fully prepared for the return yet.
Boeing and NASA stated in their latest update that a return flight could occur by the end of this month. However, the timeline has since become less specific: “Boeing and NASA engineers will proceed with thruster disassembly and inspections and continue finalizing flight rationale to support readiness reviews for Starliner’s planned return to Earth with commander Butch Wilmore and pilot Suni Williams in the coming weeks.”