A Blue Origin Oopsie and a Starliner Promise

Oopsies First

It's hard to get more details without subscribing to Bloomberg, if they even have the details, but the Rocket Report relays Bloomberg is saying they lost the upper stages for the next two New Glenn flights; that is, the second and third flights, after the fast-approaching first flight.

Blue Origin experiences rocket stage incidents. Blue Origin sustained failures in recent weeks of testing, including a factory mishap that damaged a portion of a future New Glenn rocket, Bloomberg reports. The upper portion of one rocket crumpled into itself, in part due to worker error, while it was being moved to a storage hangar, the publication reported. In a separate incident, another upper rocket portion failed during stress testing and exploded. Repairs are underway, another person said, noting there were no injuries during either episode.

Running into a tight timeline ... Notably, the incidents with these stages involved hardware that had been intended for use on the second and third launches. The upper stage that will be used by the first launch of New Glenn appears to not have been impacted. It is unclear whether these incidents will impact the debut launch of New Glenn, which is facing a tight deadline in mid-October to launch a Mars mission for NASA.

I'm having a hard time reconciling "exploded" and "repairs are underway." I suppose I'm envisioning something like the RFA explosion in the UK Spaceport (first story) and it could have been something much smaller and therefore less destructive. The first one, with the second stage crumpling in onto itself "in part due to worker error" could have a very simple explanation. As Inc. (magazine?) stated:

Though we don't know exact details, in this case what seems to have happened is that workers moved the rocket stage from a place where it had been exposed to Florida's typically hot weather into a cool, air-conditioned space without controlling its pressure valves properly. When it cooled enough, the gas pressure inside dropped too far for the structure to withstand.

It's actually a well-known problem with examples that go back to the early days of spaceflight. 

A few hours ago (on Friday, August 23) a launch date for the New Glenn first flight, the ESCAPADE probes to Mars, was announced: No Earlier Than Sunday, October 13.  

Dave Limp, Blue Origin's new CEO, left, and founder Jeff Bezos observe the New Glenn rocket on its launch pad, February 21 at CCSFS.  Image credit: Jeff Bezos via Instagram.

As for that Starliner Promise

Boeing and NASA experts have been continuing their efforts to determine how to return astronauts Butch and Suni from the Starliner test flight. While I've read things that sounded more definite than this, like "they're going to announce their decision Saturday," at the NASA blogs they say:

NASA’s decision on whether to return Starliner to Earth with astronauts aboard is expected no earlier than Saturday, Aug. 24 at the conclusion of an agency-level review chaired by Ken Bowersox, the associate administrator of NASA’s Space Operations Mission Directorate. The agency flight readiness review is where any formal dissents are presented and reconciled. Other agency leaders who routinely participate in launch and return readiness reviews for crewed missions include NASA’s administrator, deputy administrator, associate administrator, various agency center directors, the Flight Operations Directorate, and agency technical authorities.

NASA will host a televised news conference following the review’s conclusion to discuss the agency’s decision and next steps. More information on the news conference will be shared once confirmed.

How can you see it? Space.com has a YouTube channel that you can check on during the day - since we really have no idea when they'd have the video conference. You can check them during the day, either at their home page or the article on this announcement.