Where Does Starliner Stand with NASA?

With the successful return of the Starliner CFT-1 (Crewed Flight Test-1) capsule Friday night it's worth taking a look at what we can find to understand the big picture.  A lot of ink has been used  bits have been thrown around over the last three months - and then some. Far more has been said in private, in meetings between the major players: NASA and Boeing at the top level and the various engineering groups and managers at Boeing in private. Naturally we have "zero point zero" access to that.  

On Thursday, Stephen Clark at Ars Technica posted an article that tries to extract a full picture. "After another Boeing letdown, NASA isn’t ready to buy more Starliner missions." The article starts out with an important fact that's easy to lose sight of: this flight was seven years behind Boeing's original schedule. Boeing and SpaceX got their contracts to ferry astronauts to the ISS at the same time - a full ten years ago. Boeing's contract was bigger. The industry "gurus" thought SpaceX didn't have a chance. You probably know that story. 

SpaceX launched its first Dragon spacecraft with astronauts in May 2020, and six months later, NASA cleared SpaceX to begin flying regular six-month space station crew rotation missions.

The short version is that SpaceX is just shy of four years ahead of Boeing. The ISS has (approximately) six years of life left before it gets taken out of orbit.  Boeing is not ready to start flying regularly - they're not accepted and qualified to launch crews.  With crew rotations every six months, there are only 12 flights left and SpaceX has many of them contracted already. How many could they get? The article implies they already have been penciled in for six.

Then there's the work left to be done on Starliner itself. It strikes me as the entire thruster assembly has to be redesigned and proven out - something has to test fly. That means work for Aerojet Rocketdyne as well as Boeing. NASA officials haven't said whether they will require Boeing to launch another Starliner test flight before certifying the spacecraft for the first of those potential six crew rotation flights on Boeing's contract. I can't see why they wouldn't require another full up test flight. 

Before this test flight, and the enduring "fustercluck" we were witnesses to, NASA penciled in Boeing's first mission to the ISS for August of 2025; call it one year. That was before this mission, its problems and the redesign that seems to be hanging out there. One year at most? Fat chance. From everything we've seen, I'm inclined to think this is the Boeing behind SLS and Artemis where nothing is completed on time.

NASA has only given Boeing the "Authority To Proceed" for three of its six potential operational Starliner missions. This milestone, known as ATP, is a decision point in contracting lingo where the customer—in this case, NASA—places a firm order for a deliverable. NASA has previously said it awards these task orders about two to three years prior to a mission's launch.

Josh Finch, a NASA spokesperson, told Ars that the agency hasn't made any decisions on whether to commit to any more operational Starliner missions from Boeing beyond the three already on the books.

"NASA’s goal remains to certify the Starliner system for crew transportation to the International Space Station," Finch said in a written response to questions from Ars. "NASA looks forward to its continued work with Boeing to complete certification efforts after Starliner’s uncrewed return. Decisions and timing on issuing future authorizations are on the work ahead."

The question seems to come down to what NASA's going to do. They have said from the start of the Commercial Crew Program that they wanted more than one reliable ride into space. Do they move more missions from Boeing's side to SpaceX?  

It also depends on what Boeing is going to do. How much is their new CEO Kelly Ortberg willing to pay to try to turn their reputation around?  

Boeing has not issued a public statement on its long-term commitment to the Starliner program since NASA's decision to end Starliner's Crew Flight Test (CFT) mission, but we do have second-hand information from Boeing's CEO, Kelly Ortberg, relayed through NASA Administrator Bill Nelson. "He expressed to me an intention that they will continue to work the problem once Starliner is back safely, and that we will have our redundancy and our crewed access to the space station," Nelson told reporters on August 24.

Keep in mind that the way the Fixed Price contracts of the Commercial Crew Program work, Boeing is responsible for costs of Starliner not working as advertised. As of July, Boeing has reported nearly $1.6 billion in losses to pay for delays and fix technical problems on Starliner. More financial losses for the Starliner program are likely in the year ahead to cover fixes for the thruster problems and helium leaks that plagued the test flight. While Boeing's contract was for $4.6 billion, they've only completed program milestones that have resulted in NASA paying them roughly $2.7 billion. Put another way, if Boeing said, "we changed our minds; we're not doing any more of this," they'd be out $1.9 billion income plus being out the nearly $1.6 billion - $3.5 billion total. Their best chance of minimizing losses is staying in the program and, obviously, turning their Starliner performance around.

Boeing's Starliner, apparently named Sea Anchor (visible under the American flag), before the June launch of CFT-1. Image credit: Miguel J. Rodriguez Carrillo/AFP via Getty Images