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In a mission update Thursday, July 25, NASA and Boeing leaders still could not commit to a return date for Starliner pilot Suni Williams, from the town of Needham in Norfolk County, and commander Butch Wilmore.
The pair – serving as guinea pigs of sorts for Starliner’s first crewed mission – remain in limbo aboard the International Space Station after numerous helium leaks and malfunctions with the spacecraft’s thrusters were discovered.
"We don't have a major announcement today relative to a return date," Steve Stich, NASA’s Commercial Crew Program manager, said Thursday. "We're making great progress, but we're just not quite ready to do that."
Engineers in New Mexico have spent recent weeks firing test engines more than 1,000 times in order to replicate how Starliner’s thrusters would have ignited, Boeing said.
Additional testing in the coming days should serve as “icing on the cake” for better understanding the issues, said Mark Nappi, Boeing’s Commercial Crew Program manager.
NASA said it hoped to bring Williams and Wilmore back to Earth on Starliner, but noted there are contingency options if the spacecraft is ultimately not approved for a return flight.
“We need to get through the process,” Nappi added. “We have another critical Starliner mission management team to review all the thruster data that we just talked about. Of course, I’m very confident we have a good vehicle to bring the crew back with.”
In the meantime, the stranded Williams and Wilmore are keeping themselves busy supporting the Expedition 71 crew with space station research and maintenance.
Both astronauts took part in vein scans using an ultrasound device on Monday, July 15, to help researchers understand how microgravity affects the human body, according to a mission update.
They took turns imaging each other’s neck, shoulder, and leg veins while doctors on the ground monitored in real-time. The pair also spent time taking inventory of the food stored on the space station.
Williams and Wilmore launched into orbit on Wednesday, June 5, for what was supposed to be a week-long expedition for Starliner. It was the first time a woman had been aboard a maiden flight of a crewed spacecraft.
The journey marks its last test before the craft goes into regular service in 2025 as part of NASA’s Commercial Crew Program, aimed at providing safe, reliable, and cost-effective transportation to the space station. SpaceX began providing service in 2020.
NASA previously said that Starliner has enough fuel to remain in orbit until mid-August.
A 1983 graduate of Needham High School, Williams became an astronaut in August 1998 after more than a decade as a helicopter pilot in the US Navy. She made her first trip to the International Space Station aboard Space Shuttle Discovery in December 2006.
Throughout her career, she has logged more than 3,000 flight hours in 30 different aircraft. In 2019, her hometown of Needham honored her by naming its new elementary school Sunita L. Williams Elementary School.
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