Boeing continues to burn money with Starliner. The manned capsule program is behind a recent loss of $125 millionamount of money that is added to the 1.1 billion dollars in the red. This is bad news for a company that, despite being an American symbol, has not recorded an annual profit since 2018is dealing with alleged quality problems at its aircraft factories and will change its CEO later this year.
NASA’s Commercial Crew Program, which is primarily intended to secure access to the International Space Station (ISS), has been a boon for SpaceX but a nightmare for Boeing. The former has been transporting astronauts to the ISS since 2020 with its Dragon capsule, while the latter is stuck on the first manned test of Starliner, a mission that began at the beginning of June and has no set end date.
Starliner, a nightmare for Boeing
The challenges for Boeing’s space division (formally ‘Defense, Space & Security’) began years ago when the company decided to accept a fixed-price contract for the aforementioned ISS transportation service. After passing the initial stages of the program in 2014, NASA awarded a contract for $4.2 billion for Boeing to complete development of Starliner and $2.6 billion for SpaceX to do the same with its manned version of the Dragon capsule.
Starliner’s first launch (without a crew) was supposed to have taken place in 2017. This test, however, was delayed several times until 2019. A problem prevented the capsule from docking with the ISS, so it returned to Earth shortly after reaching space. Starliner successfully docked with the ISS for the first time in 2022, although still without astronauts. The ship’s first manned mission did not come until last May, when it was launched on an Atlas V rocket.
After a few setbacks, Starliner docked with the ISS and the astronauts moved to the orbital laboratory with the intention of staying there for about a week. The specialists have decided to make the most of the current state of the ship to study some small helium leaksdetected before launch, and a failure in the propulsion system. Laboratory tests are also being carried out on the ground before giving the green light for its return (with or without astronauts).
Now, Boeing looks set to continue burning cash as it addresses the issues surrounding it and lays the groundwork for Starliner’s first operational mission sometime in 2025. The company itself has said that “there remains a risk that we could experience additional losses in future periods.” Boeing has experienced the damaging effect of the fixed-price contract firsthand.
When the company signed its contract with NASA to develop a transport space capsule to the ISS, an alternative to SpaceX’s manned Dragon, it possibly did not imagine that its project would be plagued with delays and cost overrunsThe US space agency, however, has agreed additional disbursements in the past to ensure that its second contractor remains in the running. It remains to be seen how this will all play out and whether Starliner will end up providing regular service to the ISS.
Images | NASA
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