Things have just not gone well for Boeing in 2019 - https://www.foxnews.com/science/boeings-starliner-off-course-in-orbit-after-launch-debut.  Personally I think it is time for Boeing to release the software developers unless it is found the software or spacecraft was hacked.  The spacecraft got into space okay but something told it to go into the wrong orbit.  Spectre!  Where is Bond?

 

I heard on the radio this morning that they think they can thruster it into the proper orbit for docking.  Is that out of the question now?

They have been working on this for 9 years with all the latest technology and a $4 billion dollar budget and they still have a dud? By comparison Apollo took 9 years from 1961 to a man on the moon in 1969

Something's seriously wrong with these guys and gals. I am sure the equipment works fine it is just the coding 

From the Boeing Space twitter feed:

Quote

The mission continues: #Starliner is executing test objectives while on orbit. We’re working closely with @NASA to determine the cause of the anomaly. Safety is our top priority. We will use the data to benefit future missions.

 (my bold)

Seems like I've heard that recently.

BTW Mods can merge my topic into this one...

I feel the same way but Apollo, Space X and the Russian programs all had failures; Apollo One was deadly. This was an un-crewed test; manual control was regained just not soon enough to rendez-vous with the ISS. If they can land it back; it'll be one of those successful failure situations. Automation has safely transported millions of passengers in 2019. Sadly faulty automation has also killed too many. The initial analysis on this event in particular is that the timers on the rocket and the spacecraft differed. They'll be finding out why that happened I'm sure before they launch crewed missions to the ISS.

50+ years on this is still rocket science. It ain't easy. And it is a measure of the courage required to be an astronaut. But I can hear them cursing in Boeing's board rooms...

 

20 minutes ago, CYXR said:

... But I can hear them cursing in Boeing's board rooms...

I bet. They were hoping for some good PR in the aftermath of the 737 Max saga. Seems like 'cost savings' backfired a bit.

1 hour ago, CYXR said:

BTW Mods can merge my topic into this one...

I feel the same way but Apollo, Space X and the Russian programs all had failures; Apollo One was deadly. This was an un-crewed test; manual control was regained just not soon enough to rendez-vous with the ISS. If they can land it back; it'll be one of those successful failure situations. Automation has safely transported millions of passengers in 2019. Sadly faulty automation has also killed too many. The initial analysis on this event in particular is that the timers on the rocket and the spacecraft differed. They'll be finding out why that happened I'm sure before they launch crewed missions to the ISS.

50+ years on this is still rocket science. It ain't easy. And it is a measure of the courage required to be an astronaut. But I can hear them cursing in Boeing's board rooms...

 

And don't forget the Hubble space telescope, whose primary mirror had a crippling aberration caused by faulty placement of a test instrument during construction--not discovered until after launch (there was no test of the completed telescope in the more than 10 years that passed between the mirror's construction in 1979 and Hubble's launch on STS-31 in 1990). 

And then there's the 1999 Mars Climate Orbiter fiasco...the satellite burned up in the Mars atmosphere because a trajectory error went uncorrected...even though the anomalous flight path had been discovered during the flight.  In the post-failure investigation, NASA determined that JPL's guidance software was computing trajectory control maneuvering using metric impulse measurements (newton-sec) and Lockheed-Martin's software was supplying measurements made in US standard units (lb-sec).

The devil is in the details...

7 hours ago, w6kd said:

The devil is in the details...

So it would seem... the failure is now being blamed on "automation".  Turns out that dumb spacecraft can't even tell time!!  More here

Greg

Maybe they are still using old Pentium CPU machines?  You know, the ones with the label "Insel Intide" and instead of precise mathematical division, it approximated values.