An investigation into the troubled flight of Boeing’s Starliner spacecraft to the International Space Station in 2024 has uncovered a series of technical and management errors by both NASA and the aerospace company.
Jared Isaacman, the NASA administrator, said at a news briefing on Thursday that the problems pointed to shortcomings in the culture at the space agency that could endanger the lives of its astronauts.
As recommended by the report, NASA has classified the flight as a “Type A mishap,” the highest-level designation for a mission failure. The loss of the Columbia and Challenger space shuttles, killing the astronauts aboard, were also Type A episodes.
The Starliner’s failure left two astronauts, Suni Williams and Butch Wilmore, at the space station for nine months. Their stay had been expected to last as little eight days, although it would not have been a surprise if that test flight had stretched to a few weeks.
“We are trying to set the record straight and classify the situation accordingly so lessons are learned,” Mr. Isaacman said at the briefing announcing the findings.
Mr. Isaacman said the most troubling shortcomings were not hardware failures but problems with “decision-making and leadership that, if left unchecked, could create a culture incompatible with human spaceflight.”
The greatest danger to the astronauts occurred when Starliner’s thrusters failed as it approached the space station. Enough of the thrusters were made operational again to allow the astronauts to dock successfully.
“At that moment, had different decisions been made, had thrusters not been recovered or had docking been unsuccessful, the outcome of this mission could have been very, very different,” Mr. Isaacman said.
As Boeing and NASA engineers sought to understand what had gone wrong, Ms. Williams and Mr. Wilmore remained on the station for months. NASA finally decided that Starliner would return empty, and the two astronauts eventually returned to Earth in a SpaceX Crew Dragon spacecraft instead.
After the retirement of the space shuttles in 2011, NASA hired Boeing and SpaceX to carry NASA astronauts to and from the space station. SpaceX’s first mission in 2020 was successful, and the company, led by Elon Musk, has since successfully launched 12 more missions for NASA.
SpaceX’s success points to how an entrepreneurial approach can speed NASA’s progress at lower costs, but Boeing’s missteps show how it can fall far short. NASA has employed a similar route for the landers to be used during Artemis missions that will take astronauts to the surface of the moon.
The litany of flaws cited in the investigators’ report include inadequate testing, proceeding with the flight when engineers did not fully understand earlier thruster malfunctions and inadequate oversight of Boeing by NASA.
Mr. Isaacman said the thruster problems were still not fully solved. “We are not going to fly again, crew or uncrewed, until it’s ready,” he said.
The investigators’ report also described dysfunction at both Boeing and NASA. “Disagreements over crew return options deteriorated into unprofessional conduct while the crew remained on orbit,” Mr. Isaacman said.
In a statement, Boeing said the company remained committed to Starliner.
“Boeing has made substantial progress on corrective actions for technical challenges we encountered and driven significant cultural changes across the team that directly align with the findings in the report,” the company said in a statement. “NASA’s report will reinforce our ongoing efforts to strengthen our work.”
Starliner is just one example of flawed engineering in Boeing’s recent past. The company’s reputation was badly damaged by the fatal crashes of two 737 Max jetliners in 2018 and 2019.
In January 2024, a panel blew off another 737 Max, renewing concerns about the company’s quality and safety standards.
The International Space Station is scheduled to be retired in 2030. In November, NASA and Boeing modified the Starliner contract, reducing the number of guaranteed flights to four from six.
Mr. Isaacman, however, said NASA was still committed to using Starliner. The space agency’s officials have said that having various spacecraft from different companies provides options in case one encounters problems.
“There will be other space stations, I guarantee it,” he said. “And they are going to require crew and cargo access to and from low Earth orbit. And I think the nation and the world benefit when you have multiple providers that are capable of doing that.”
Kenneth Chang, a science reporter at The Times, covers NASA and the solar system, and research closer to Earth.
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