Lead
Not long ago, there was the worrying news that two American astronauts had successfully entered the International Space Station after nearly thirty hours of travel.
However, the company that built Merlin made a number of fatal mistakes in the development of the "starliner", resulting in serious design flaws in the spacecraft.
After the American astronauts entered the "starliner", the news of a helium leak was detected in the spacesuit, and helium is a substitute for the air and oxygen needed by the astronauts for their normal life.
At the same time, the failure of the spacecraft's systems increased the risk that the two astronauts would not return.
And in the process of wanting to get people back to Earth, they are facing a huge dilemma.
All sorts of mistakes made by Boeing.
The main character of the flight was the CST-100 starliner developed by Boeing, the main mission of the spacecraft is to go to the International Space Station for a short-haul manned mission, which was originally planned for 2020 but was postponed to April 2, 2021 due to the epidemic.
This is also the first time that the United States has sent a man to the International Space Station again in more than a decade.
However, this time it is finally time to "escape" from Earth, and the countdown has officially begun.
The United States has been subject to various problems in manned flights before, so in order to solve this problem, Boeing has specially developed a new generation of manned spacecraft, but this spacecraft has not improved much from the previous generation, and Russia has also provided a lot of help to this spacecraft, so that the space station space can be officially opened to the United States in 2021.
The two astronauts who entered the ISS this time are astronauts from NASA, named Michael Hawking and Captain Victor Glock of the United States Navy.
A helium leak was detected in their spacesuit, and the ground control center found a large amount of helium leak in Michael and the snowy spacesuit, so NASA said that it would test the air in the capsule and every move had to be carried out with great care.
Astronauts must be in a special environment after entering the spacecraft, so astronauts need to go through strict training and review before space flight, because of this, once it is found that there are potential safety hazards in the cabin, no matter how big or small, or even a particle of dust, it may have a great impact on astronaut detection, so it is also serious and cautious in the detection process, and requires meticulousness.
However, when it was ushered in, such a big safety problem was discovered, and it can be seen that the system problems on the spacecraft are not only serious, but also frequent, which makes NASA staff suffer.
To be honest, because in the previous US manned program, NASA originally planned to choose one of the two manned spacecraft to be better for key research and development, but because the development progress of Boeing's spacecraft was faster than that of SpaceX, NASA finally chose Boeing's spacecraft for key research.
But it was precisely because of the hasty attitude of the "starliner" developed by Boeing to participate in the commercial "tender" for the International Space Station, which will be held in 2024, that the astronauts of this flight fell into a crisis.
At the same time, also in order to make the first spacecraft before SpaceX, Boeing has been preparing for the salvage of the "starliner".
Obviously, this inaction, irresponsible attitude of Boeing has taken a great risk to the safety of astronauts' lives.
The dilemma faced by the spacecraft on its return.
There were many problems with the spacecraft developed by Boeing, which caused a large amount of spacecraft information to be leaked, and even the key technologies that allowed the spacecraft to reach the space station were carefully recorded in NASA's manuscripts.
This practice made Boeing unable to cover up the great hidden dangers of the spacecraft during its service, and at the same time seriously violated the regulations on the protection of intellectual property rights of spacecraft technology.
In the end, because Boeing developed the "starliner" very perfunctory, resulting in a large amount of redundant information in its system, hackers from all over the country immediately broke through these redundant information, including many foreign hacker organizations, and finally these unstoppable "hacker storms" unveiled Boeing's "starliner" and became a joke in the world.
However, Boeing's priority over SpaceX this time does make NASA feel in a dilemma, especially since the spacecraft developed by Boeing has successfully arrived at the International Space Station, but when it comes back, it finds itself "difficult to ride a tiger".
If the astronauts are forcibly allowed to return on a "starliner", then the problems that constantly arise on the spacecraft will become uncontrollable from the astronauts' entrance.
And if no one is on board, the two astronauts will be stranded indefinitely on the ISS, which will increase the task of extinguishing the fire as much as possible.
Therefore, when faced with a dilemma, NASA decided to let one astronaut move freely and reconnoiter the systems on the spacecraft, while the remaining astronaut stayed outside the spacecraft to carry the spacecraft properly.
However, despite NASA's actions, it has also seriously increased the risk to the safety of the two astronauts' return.
On the other hand, NASA did not want to ask for foreign aid, which led to ridicule of American space technology.
Boeing, for its part, also hopes to be able to deal with the problems of the spacecraft smoothly, otherwise this "mistake" will be remembered by others.
But Boeing's approach will only greatly consume the space-time research of outside astronauts.
Fatal flaw.
Previously, Boeing's "Starliner" had great problems when it tried to enter orbit from the ground, first of all, the thrusters failed, resulting in propulsion problems, and then the spacecraft accelerated incorrectly, resulting in insufficient altitude for liftoff.
These problems caused serious changes in the environment inside the cabin, and even eventually led to the failure of the return home, which could not be completely separated from the control of the earth's gravity.
Therefore, the failure to enter orbit from the ground made NASA feel that it was difficult for NASA to finally allow the astronauts to enter the International Space Station smoothly.
The helium leakage inside the spacecraft will only make the environment inside the spacecraft more unstable, even if the 3D printed mask is opened, it is a temporary method of pacification.
At the same time, if it is put into orbit, then the internal environment of the spacecraft will be affected by unstable factors, which will affect the safe work of astronauts.
However, if it is successfully put into space, it will have a significant impact on the environment of space.
As a result, there was a helium leak inside the spacecraft and needed to be dealt with as soon as possible.
On the other hand, because the funds allocated by NASA for the development of the "starliner" are not sufficient, or even insufficient, Boeing has adopted many "shortcuts" that dare not be known to the public.
This has led to many potential safety hazards in today's "starliners".
epilogue
Space exploration is the common dream of all mankind, and it cannot be traded for money, honor, or even human life, but as a space power, it should take life safety as the first principle, and at the same time, we should also take Huawei as a benchmark to look at the concept of "no-fault spaceflight" and "zero defect" upheld by China's aerospace project, emphasizing "safety first".
We should not turn a blind eye to product quality and safety because of the pursuit of profits, and we should not add any stain to human dreams.
A good dream needs a clean start.
After this incident, it will not only affect the current space technology of the United States, but will also have a considerable impact on future space cooperation.
I hope that this incident is an example, and I also hope that Boeing and other companies that will develop spacecraft in the future will be more responsible and strict with themselves.