NASA recently gave a routine astronaut assignment announcement. But it might indicate that the space agency is taking away something big from one of its top contractors. Astronauts Nicole Mann and Josh Cassada were reassigned and will now be available as commander and pilot respectively for the Crew-5 SpaceX mission next year, as per NASA.
The duo was previously assigned to a crewed mission with the Boeing Starliner, and now it seems NASA has decided that the problem-riddled spacecraft was taking too long to take its first-ever successful flight.
There’s still hope for Starliner
“Mann and Cassada previously were assigned to missions on NASA’s Boeing Crew Flight Test and NASA’s Boeing Starliner-1 mission, respectively,” reads the announcement. “NASA decided it was important to make these reassignments to allow Boeing time to complete the development of Starliner while continuing plans for astronauts to gain spaceflight experience for the future needs of the agency’s missions.”
It means, the Starliner is so behind schedule that it has started creating problems for the space agency’s commercial crew program. For years, Starliner’s development was plagued by delays, failed launches, and other problems. The problems have become so big that even Roscosmos has started mocking Boeing by offering its help to repair the spacecraft that ran into trouble during a preflight test.
Mann and Cassada will still be flying with Boeing’s spacecraft besides the new SpaceX assignments. But as NASA noted in the announcement, it wouldn’t be fair to them to deny valuable flight experience until whenever Boeing manages to figure out how to get their spacecraft to orbit.
Serious issues with Starliner
Previously, it was reported that Boeing Starliner’s glitch was more serious than it was reported. There have been many failures with valves in the propulsion system forcing the space agency to delay the launch further. Starliner, which is Boeing’s hope for taking NASA astronauts to the ISS, has seen several setbacks in the last few years.
Before that, the Orbital Flight Test-2 launch was slated to happen in July end, but issues at the ISS derailed those plans. The orbital outpost was sent off course when the Russian module Nauka unexpectedly fired up its thrusters.
