{"id":45218,"date":"2024-05-07T18:08:41","date_gmt":"2024-05-07T10:08:41","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wp-productionenv-bjg9h2g2bgg5b8aa.southeastasia-01.azurewebsites.net\/news\/spacex-got-the-fanfare-but-boeings-first-crew-flight-is-still-historic\/"},"modified":"2024-05-07T18:08:41","modified_gmt":"2024-05-07T10:08:41","slug":"spacex-got-the-fanfare-but-boeings-first-crew-flight-is-still-historic","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/news\/spacex-got-the-fanfare-but-boeings-first-crew-flight-is-still-historic\/","title":{"rendered":"SpaceX got the fanfare, but Boeing\u2019s first crew flight is still historic"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>If you want to know what it\u2019s like to take a new spacecraft on its first test run in orbit, there are only three people in the Western world you can call.<\/p>\n<p style=\"\">That fact should drive home the rarity of debuting a new human-rated spaceship. When Boeing\u2019s Starliner capsule lifts off Monday night, this group of three will grow to five. Veteran NASA astronauts Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams, both former US Navy test pilots, will be at the controls of Starliner for the ride into low-Earth orbit atop a United Launch Alliance Atlas V rocket.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe first crewed flight of a new spacecraft is an absolutely critical milestone,\u201d said Jim Free, NASA\u2019s associate administrator. \u201cThe lives of our crew members, Suni Williams and Butch Wilmore, are at stake. We don\u2019t take that lightly at all.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Launch is set for 10:34 pm EDT (02:34 UTC), and NASA TV\u2019s coverage begins at 6:30 pm EDT. You can watch below.<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" width=\"560\" height=\"315\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/wb3qcR2tUQs?si=VNLut60sTCJKkazm\" title=\"YouTube video player\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen=\"\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>After liftoff from Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida, Wilmore and Williams will monitor Starliner\u2019s systems and take over manual control for a few piloting tests as the spacecraft autonomously approaches the International Space Station. Assuming the launch happens Monday night, docking at the space station is scheduled for early Wednesday. Starliner will remain in orbit at least eight days, with the earliest opportunity to undock and land set for May 15.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt\u2019s a test pilot\u2019s dream\u2014everything we\u2019re doing from start to finish,\u201d Wilmore said.<\/p>\n<p>If you start the clock from the day Boeing announced the Starliner program in 2010, this moment is running nearly 10 years behind the company\u2019s original schedule.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt\u2019s a little bit of an emotional roller coaster as things were getting fixed, or you see a couple steps back, but then you see a couple steps forward,\u201d Williams said. \u201cWe\u2019re at that point now. We knew we would get here eventually. It\u2019s a solid spacecraft.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>,<\/p>\n<h2>A test pilot\u2019s dream<\/h2>\n<p>Wilmore, 61, is a native of Tennessee. He will take the left seat in Starliner\u2019s cockpit as the commander of the Boeing test flight. Williams, 58, grew up in Massachusetts and will serve as Starliner\u2019s pilot. Both astronauts have flown to space twice before and have launched and landed on the space shuttle and Russian Soyuz capsules.<\/p>\n<p>They are set to join a small club of astronaut test pilots who have hands-on experience piloting a new type of spacecraft in orbit for the first time. Astronauts Doug Hurley, Bob Behnken, and Bob Crippen are the only three Americans alive who can make that claim. Hurley and Behnken flew on the first astronaut mission on SpaceX\u2019s Dragon spacecraft, and Crippen piloted the first space shuttle mission in 1981 alongside commander John Young, who died in 2018. Yang Liwei, the first astronaut to fly on China\u2019s Shenzhou spacecraft in 2003, rounds out the global club.<\/p>\n<p>Ars spoke with Hurley, Behnken, and Crippen in the days before the first crew flight of Boeing\u2019s Starliner spacecraft.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt\u2019s a unique opportunity to get to fly a brand-new spaceship, which is awesome,\u201d Hurley said. \u201cThose don\u2019t come around very often.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Hurley and Behnken retired from NASA\u2019s astronaut corps after their 2020 mission and now work for Northrop Grumman and Lockheed Martin. Crippen, now 86, left the agency in 1995 after a stint as director of the Kennedy Space Center in Florida.<\/p>\n<p>This will be the first time anyone has ever flown on Starliner, and the first crew launch aboard an Atlas V rocket. The Atlas V\u2019s 99 previous flights have all lofted satellites or deployed NASA probes heading into deep space. Hurley and Behnken\u2019s flight with SpaceX in 2020 was on the 85th launch of a Falcon 9 rocket.<\/p>\n<p>,<\/p>\n<p>Crippen\u2019s experience was vastly different. The space shuttle never launched without people in it, and the first flight of&nbsp;<em>Columbia<\/em>, known as STS-1,&nbsp;might have been the riskiest mission ever undertaken by NASA. In retrospect, NASA officials calculated there was a 1-in-12 chance that a catastrophic failure on the STS-1 mission could have killed the crew.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cButch and Suni are going up on the Atlas V, which is a pretty reliable booster, whereas John and I had a completely experimental spacecraft,\u201d Crippen said. \u201cThey both are very experienced astronauts, and they\u2019re well-qualified to do this.\u201d<\/p>\n<figure class=\"ars-img-shortcode id-2022129 align-center\">\n<p>                <img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1920\" height=\"1249\" src=\"https:\/\/cdn.arstechnica.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/05\/sts-1_landing.jpg\" class=\"attachment-full size-full\" alt=\"\" srcset=\"https:\/\/cdn.arstechnica.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/05\/sts-1_landing.jpg 1920w, https:\/\/cdn.arstechnica.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/05\/sts-1_landing-300x195.jpg 300w, https:\/\/cdn.arstechnica.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/05\/sts-1_landing-640x416.jpg 640w, https:\/\/cdn.arstechnica.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/05\/sts-1_landing-768x500.jpg 768w, https:\/\/cdn.arstechnica.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/05\/sts-1_landing-1536x999.jpg 1536w, https:\/\/cdn.arstechnica.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/05\/sts-1_landing-980x638.jpg 980w, https:\/\/cdn.arstechnica.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/05\/sts-1_landing-1440x937.jpg 1440w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1920px) 100vw, 1920px\"><\/p>\n<p>                Astronaut Bob Crippen walks down stairs to disembark from the space shuttle <em>Columbia<\/em> following its first landing on April 14, 1981, at Edwards Air Force Base, California.<\/p>\n<p>                    Credit:<br \/>\n                                          NASA<\/p>\n<\/figure>\n<p>Crippen met with the Starliner crew at the space center in Florida a few months ago, when he got a chance to see the Starliner spacecraft up close.&nbsp;\u201cSeeing it reminded me a lot of the command module we had from Apollo,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n<p>The first Starliner crew has trained together nearly four years. Wilmore replaced the mission\u2019s original commander in 2020, and Williams has been assigned to the Boeing commercial crew program since 2018.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cMy advice is know the spacecraft as well as you can,\u201d Crippen said. \u201cI&nbsp;think they\u2019re well prepared. They\u2019ve had a considerable amount of time \u2026 with the delays they\u2019ve had.\u201d<\/p>\n<h2>A different experience<\/h2>\n<p>Wilmore and Williams will each take a turn at the controls of Starliner once the capsule is in orbit. In the first few hours after liftoff, the astronauts will check that they can fire thrusters to point Starliner\u2019s rear-mounted solar array toward the Sun to generate electricity. Starliner has two hand controllers for the crew to control the orientation of the spacecraft, along with cockpit displays reminiscent of the flight of the space shuttle. The touch and feel of the Starliner cockpit displays are starkly different from SpaceX\u2019s Crew Dragon, which primarily employs touchscreen controls for manual flying, along with a single row of buttons to execute commands and perform emergency functions.<\/p>\n<p>,<\/p>\n<p>Bob Hines, a NASA astronaut who launched to the space station on a SpaceX Dragon spacecraft two years ago, was aboard the orbiting research lab when Boeing\u2019s Starliner arrived for its first docking. He is one of the few astronauts who has been inside a Dragon and Starliner in space.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThere\u2019s a pretty stark contrast between the two,\u201d he told Ars. \u201cDragon feels a little bit bigger. That\u2019s probably just because it\u2019s a different shape.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Both spacecraft are designed to ferry four people to and from low-Earth orbit, and if everything goes according to plan, both fly autonomously. Starliner, like Dragon, will normally dock with the space station in autopilot mode. Dragon splashes down in the ocean under parachutes, while Starliner will parachute to a landing on the ground, likely at White Sands, New Mexico. And engineers designed both spacecraft for reuse. The capsule poised to launch Monday night is the same ship that flew into orbit on Boeing\u2019s first unpiloted Starliner test flight in 2019.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe general philosophies for what the crews\u2019 roles are in the vehicle are a little bit different,\u201d Hines said. \u201cStarliner is an incredibly capable vehicle. Even if they lose communication, they can complete an entire rendezvous and docking with no communications if they need to, if the flight rules allow it. SpaceX is primarily controlled from Hawthorne (SpaceX mission control) from the ground, so they\u2019re very reliant on having communications, and they have a very robust system between the ground and tracking and data relay satellites. They\u2019re able to do that.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>On their Starliner test flight, Wilmore and Williams will be the eyes and ears for astronauts who will fly on the Boeing capsule in the coming years. Sensors recorded accelerations, vibrations, and sound throughout the first two Starliner test flights. Now, Wilmore and Williams will test the human experience.<\/p>\n<p>,<\/p>\n<p>In a press conference leading up to the Starliner test flight, Ars asked Wilmore about the sensations he expects to feel riding on Atlas V and Starliner during launch.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cVibrations? No idea. Looking forward to it,\u201d he said. \u201cThe engine, the RD-180, will throttle down to not exceed three-and-a-half Gs on launch. It\u2019ll be a different sensation. The shuttle flight that I flew, compared to the Soyuz, was completely different. We\u2019re looking forward to finding out what those physical sensations are.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>SpaceX\u2019s Crew Dragon demonstration flight in 2020 was nearly flawless. The only real surprises, according to Hurley and Behnken, were some of the sensations and sounds they experienced while inside the spacecraft.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe big thing that stood out for us was when we separated from the trunk just before reentry,\u201d Hurley said. \u201cIt felt like a giant 2-by-4 hit the back of our seats. I may have let out an expletive when that happened, like, \u2018Holy cow, what was that?!\u2019 I looked over at Bob, and the look on his face showed the same thing, even though he didn\u2019t say it.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>For Behnken, one of the biggest surprises was the sound of venting and valves moving on the Falcon 9 rocket during the countdown.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWhen we fueled up and the launch escape system was armed \u2026 there was a kind of a significant sound and jolt, and the timing when you send computer commands to when valves actually move and do reconfiguration, and the sounds that go along with that, was a bit of a surprise to both of us,\u201d he said in an interview with Ars.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe\u2019ve been forewarned about a couple of different things on the launch pad as valves are moving; you might hear a little boom here or there as they\u2019re priming valves,\u201d Williams said. \u201cWe\u2019ll be ready as much as we can be.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>,<\/p>\n<h2>A distant second<\/h2>\n<p>From the outside looking in, there is a bit of an anticlimactic feel to the launch preparations for Starliner. Four years ago this month, SpaceX launched the first crew mission aboard the Dragon capsule, ending a nine-year gap in US capability to put its own astronauts into orbit.<\/p>\n<p>Boeing and SpaceX started their commercial crew programs at about the same time. In September 2014, NASA\u2019s commercial crew program awarded Boeing a $4.2 billion contract and SpaceX a $2.6 billion contract to complete development of the Starliner and Crew Dragon spacecraft.<\/p>\n<p>Both companies encountered delays, but SpaceX reached the finish line first with the flight of Hurley and Behnken on Crew Dragon. This was the first debut of a new class of American spacecraft since the first flight of the space shuttle in 1981, with astronauts John Young and Bob Crippen onboard.<\/p>\n<p>SpaceX\u2019s first astronaut mission took on added significance because it restored independent human spaceflight capability to the United States for the first time since the retirement of the space shuttle in 2011. Also, launch of the Dragon spacecraft\u2019s Demo-2 mission in 2020 occurred about two months into the coronavirus pandemic. A lot of people were stuck at home, and for many, this giant leap forward for America\u2019s space program was a welcome respite.<\/p>\n<p>Fast-forward four years, and SpaceX has launched 13 astronaut missions on its fleet of Dragon capsules. Crew Dragon missions are launching at a cadence similar to the rate that the space shuttles launched in the final years of that program, rotating NASA crews to and from the International Space Station and pioneering a series of all-private human spaceflight missions.<\/p>\n<figure class=\"ars-img-shortcode id-2022091 align-center\">\n<p>                <img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1800\" height=\"1200\" src=\"https:\/\/cdn.arstechnica.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/05\/53699170302_8387ce723a_k.jpg\" class=\"attachment-full size-full\" alt=\"\" srcset=\"https:\/\/cdn.arstechnica.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/05\/53699170302_8387ce723a_k.jpg 1800w, https:\/\/cdn.arstechnica.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/05\/53699170302_8387ce723a_k-300x200.jpg 300w, https:\/\/cdn.arstechnica.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/05\/53699170302_8387ce723a_k-640x427.jpg 640w, https:\/\/cdn.arstechnica.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/05\/53699170302_8387ce723a_k-768x512.jpg 768w, https:\/\/cdn.arstechnica.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/05\/53699170302_8387ce723a_k-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https:\/\/cdn.arstechnica.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/05\/53699170302_8387ce723a_k-980x653.jpg 980w, https:\/\/cdn.arstechnica.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/05\/53699170302_8387ce723a_k-1440x960.jpg 1440w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1800px) 100vw, 1800px\"><\/p>\n<p>                The crew access arm is seen extended into position next to the Starliner spacecraft on its launch pad at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station, Florida.<\/p>\n<p>                    Credit:<br \/>\n                                          United Launch Alliance<\/p>\n<\/figure>\n<p>Early on in the commercial crew program, SpaceX, led by one of the most famous people on the planet, played the role of insurgent. It was the startup with the mission of shaking up the space industry. Boeing, one of the world\u2019s largest and oldest aerospace companies, could be the dictionary example of the space industry establishment.<\/p>\n<p>,<\/p>\n<p>Considering all of that, it\u2019s easier to understand why the first crew launch of Boeing\u2019s Starliner isn\u2019t getting the same fanfare as SpaceX\u2019s Dragon test flight. While it won\u2019t capture the headlines that SpaceX\u2019s Dragon test flight did in 2020, the first time astronauts fly to space on Starliner will be historic. Starliner will be the sixth human-rated spacecraft from the United States to fly astronauts into orbit, following NASA\u2019s Mercury, Gemini, Apollo, the space shuttle, and SpaceX\u2019s Dragon.<\/p>\n<p>Once Starliner is up, the United States will have two independent orbital-class crew spacecraft in service at the same time. This has never happened before because all of NASA developed all of its previous crew ships in serial fashion, with no overlap in operations between each program. NASA officials say having two human-rated spacecraft is important because it will help ensure US astronauts always have a way to fly to the space station, even if SpaceX or Boeing ground their vehicles due to technical problems.<\/p>\n<p>It\u2019s also a pivotal moment for Boeing. Problems with the workhorse 737 airplane have put Boeing on the defensive, and the company\u2019s chief executive has announced he is leaving his post by the end of this year. The Starliner program, too, has been troubled. The spacecraft\u2019s first unpiloted test flight in 2019 ended prematurely due to software problems, and Boeing officials later admitted they did not run an end-to-end test of the capsule\u2019s flight software. There were several incidents with Starliner\u2019s propulsion system, including a significant propellant leak during a ground test in 2018 and corroded valves that thwarted an attempt to launch a second unpiloted test flight in 2021.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cSpaceX was first, and Boeing is a distant second,\u201d Hurley said. \u201cThere was enough blame to go around for that. Certainly, that first orbital flight test, they were lucky to get the vehicle back, if I\u2019m being frank.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>,<\/p>\n<p>Last year, Boeing appeared to be closing in on a summertime launch of this crew test flight. But engineers discovered more problems that kept Starliner on the ground. These issues involved the capsule\u2019s parachutes and flammable tape inside the craft\u2019s cockpit. All of these delays cost Boeing more than $1.4 billion. Boeing was on the hook for the cost overruns because NASA\u2019s commercial crew program operates through fixed-price contracts.<\/p>\n<p>Boeing and NASA officials say those problems are now behind them. \u201cThis is a clean spaceship, and it\u2019s ready to fly,\u201d said NASA Administrator Bill Nelson.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI feel very excited and optimistic for them that they\u2019re at the point where they can finally do the crew test flight,\u201d Hurley said. \u201cCertainly, I think they\u2019re more than prepared, from the crew standpoint, to execute the mission, and we just have to stay positive and optimistic that the hardware and everything else is where it needs to be, which by all indications it is.\u201d<\/p>\n<h2>Calculating risk<\/h2>\n<p>The risk of flying on new commercial crew capsules is relatively low compared to the 1-in-12 odds of a fatal accident on the first space shuttle mission. NASA set a safety threshold for the Crew Dragon and Starliner spaceships at 1-in-270 odds of an accident during a seven-month mission that would kill the astronauts onboard.<\/p>\n<p>Before SpaceX\u2019s astronaut test flight in 2020, NASA determined the \u201cLoss of Crew\u201d (LOC) probability on a long-duration Crew Dragon mission was 1-in-276. NASA calculated the overall risk of a \u201cLoss Of Mission\u201d (LOM) on Crew Dragon at 1-in-60. That risk covers scenarios where the Crew Dragon doesn\u2019t reach the space station as planned, but the crew safely returns to Earth.<\/p>\n<figure class=\"ars-img-shortcode id-2022128 align-center\">\n<p>                <img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1800\" height=\"1212\" src=\"https:\/\/cdn.arstechnica.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/05\/50182385066_d1ff8f191c_k.jpg\" class=\"attachment-full size-full\" alt=\"\" srcset=\"https:\/\/cdn.arstechnica.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/05\/50182385066_d1ff8f191c_k.jpg 1800w, https:\/\/cdn.arstechnica.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/05\/50182385066_d1ff8f191c_k-300x202.jpg 300w, https:\/\/cdn.arstechnica.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/05\/50182385066_d1ff8f191c_k-640x431.jpg 640w, https:\/\/cdn.arstechnica.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/05\/50182385066_d1ff8f191c_k-768x517.jpg 768w, https:\/\/cdn.arstechnica.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/05\/50182385066_d1ff8f191c_k-1536x1034.jpg 1536w, https:\/\/cdn.arstechnica.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/05\/50182385066_d1ff8f191c_k-980x660.jpg 980w, https:\/\/cdn.arstechnica.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/05\/50182385066_d1ff8f191c_k-1440x970.jpg 1440w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1800px) 100vw, 1800px\"><\/p>\n<p>                Astronauts Bob Behnken and Doug Hurley inside SpaceX\u2019s Crew Dragon spacecraft after splashdown to conclude the Demo-2 mission in August 2020.<\/p>\n<p>                    Credit:<br \/>\n                                          NASA\/Bill Ingall\u2019s<\/p>\n<\/figure>\n<p>For Starliner, the odds for a Loss of Crew on a seven-month mission are 1-in-295, according to Steve Stich, NASA\u2019s commercial crew program manager. The Loss of Mission risk number is 1-in-57.<\/p>\n<p>,<\/p>\n<p>Assuming the Starliner test flight this month goes well, NASA hopes to certify Boeing\u2019s capsule to fly long-duration missions to the space station beginning next year. On those lengthy missions, the top risk to the spacecraft and its crew will be potential damage from collisions with space debris or micrometeoroids, small fragments of rock and dust coming toward Earth from the Solar System. Other major risk factors include Starliner\u2019s parachutes and vehicle separation systems, he said.<\/p>\n<p>Arriving at a specific probability for a catastrophic failure on any spacecraft hinges on assumptions, such as current understanding of the ever-changing space debris environment at the altitude of the space station. This makes it a challenge to settle on odds for a Loss of Crew or Loss of Mission.<\/p>\n<p>These probabilistic risk assessments can change over time due to better data on the performance of a given rocket engine or other critical component. At the time of the first space shuttle flight, engineers calculated the probability for a Loss of Crew on that mission at between 1-in-500 and 1-in-5,000. NASA arrived at the 1-in-12 number after grounding its probabilistic model with flight data from actual shuttle missions. By the end of the shuttle program, after two fatal disasters, NASA calculated the risk of a Loss of Crew on any single mission was about 1-in-90.<\/p>\n<p>Starliner and Crew Dragon improve these odds by having the capability to abort off their rockets and parachute into the ocean in the event of a launch failure. The only sure way for a shuttle crew to safely make it back to Earth was to fly the spaceplane back to a controlled landing at a runway.<\/p>\n<p>Wilmore and Williams are used to taking calculated risks.<\/p>\n<p>,<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe wouldn\u2019t be sitting here if we didn\u2019t feel, and tell our families that we feel, confident in this spacecraft and our capabilities to control it and to be on it,\u201d Williams told reporters in March.<\/p>\n<p>Before becoming an astronaut, one of Wilmore\u2019s assignments in the Navy was to fly the service\u2019s new T-45 training jet off of an aircraft carrier for the first time. On that first flight, when the catapult launched his aircraft off the deck, it didn\u2019t give the T-45 as much speed as expected. Wilmore nearly went into the water when the airplane launched off the end of the carrier.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI went down to 16 feet above the water,\u201d he told Ars. \u201cThe aircraft carrier is 60 feet, so I settled 44 feet on the first one \u2026 I was ready to pull the ejection seat handle if I thought I was to hit the water.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The Navy ruled out pilot error or a hardware problem with the aircraft or the steam catapult on the carrier. \u201cThe engineers, after checking all their data, what they found out is that they had done the equivalent of transposing a fraction.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>That caused the catapult to operate at a wrong setting and almost put Wilmore and his T-45 into the sea. This was an example, Wilmore said, of what test flights are for.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cYou don\u2019t know that until you test,\u201d he said. \u201cSo we may hit a cliff. In these various tests that we\u2019re doing, we may find something that is not right.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Williams is also a seasoned Navy test pilot with more than 3,000 flight hours in more than 30 different aircraft, primarily helicopters. She also served as the safety officer for the Naval Test Pilot School.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cSuni and I know this spacecraft, in an integrated fashion, better than anybody,\u201d Wilmore said. \u201cThere are people that know certain sections of it a lot better than us, but we know it better than just about anybody. We\u2019ve been doing this a long time, and future crews are not going to have that luxury, so we want to find it all now.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>If you want to know what it\u2019s like to take a new spacecraft on its first test run in orbit, there are only three people in the Western world you can call. That fact should drive home the rarity of debuting a new human-rated spaceship. When Boeing\u2019s Starliner capsule lifts off Monday night, this group [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":45219,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[2125,1784,670,524,235,2127,1545,190,9506,316,1306,3757],"class_list":["post-45218","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","tag-bob-behnken","tag-bob-crippen","tag-boeing","tag-commercial-crew","tag-crew-dragon","tag-doug-hurley","tag-human-spaceflight","tag-nasa","tag-space-shuttle-2","tag-spacex","tag-starliner","tag-sts-1"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/45218"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=45218"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/45218\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/45219"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=45218"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=45218"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=45218"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}