NASA overhauling Starliner undocking from space station as capsule returns without crew

Esther Bower

BREVARD COUNTY, Fla. - Starliner’s crewed flight test is coming to an end. NASA plans to undock the troubled vehicle from the International Space Station on Friday as the astronauts stay behind.

One of the big changes NASA had to make during the undocking procedure was to get the Starliner capsule away from the ISS as fast as possible.

If the vehicle fails, NASA doesn’t want to endanger the space station and its inhabitants.

The weeklong crewed test flight turned into months of troubleshooting and hasn’t ended how it was supposed to.

"It has been a really busy and challenging summer," said Dana Weigel, a NASA manager at the International Space Station.

Those challenges started for NASA and Boeing before Starliner left Earth in June.

The spacecraft launched with helium leaks. Then, the thrusters failed in orbit.

NASA says that after studying the data, the spacecraft isn’t safe to bring people home, but NASA officials are still backing Boeing.

"Many parts of the mission went extremely well. Starliner is a great spacecraft. The life support systems are performing very well," said Steve Stich, who manages NASA’s Commercial Crew Program.

Starliner will undock from the ISS on Friday at 6:04 p.m. if the weather cooperates, but it won’t be a normal undock and de-orbit.

"Starliner will do an immediate thruster burn rather than a normal trajectory that has Starliner stay close to the ISS and head underneath," said the ISS Flight Director, Anthony Vareha.

Engineers don't want to waste time by sending Starliner away from the ISS just in case any other problems arise.

"The reason we chose to do this breakout burn is it gets the vehicle away from the station faster," said Vareha.

Astronauts Sunni Williams and Butch Wilmore will stay on station through early next year. The duo will return to earth with Crew 9 in February.

"I'm personally looking forward to getting Starliner back. We've learned a lot on this test flight, and we'll continue to learn more," concluded Stich.

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