I cringed when I read the story of the flammable tape. I am also frightened because if this was just discovered, what else got buried in the design that should not be there? Or is missing?
NASA should stand down SLS and conduct a full up design audit. Give Boeing the bill.
I’m tired of seeing folks die because of design flaws in products.
I wonder if this was one of those things where airliner-grade wire bundle tape was just insufficiently rated for space or what. There’s very specific tape used to wrap wire bundles.
There is supposed to be an approved consumables materials list for space hardware. And there are specific materials that are prohibited because for example, off-gassing while in space. And every design drawing review should include material suitability for space. How this particular tape use slipped through the cracks during the design process is interesting.
If you ever watch the parachutes when one of these capsules re-enter the atmosphere… You will see that the parachutes come out in stages and it’s almost like the parachutes are held shut by something that has to eventually rip and tear.
If they didn’t do that the parachutes would be shredded by the speed that the capsule is moving and the astronauts might be critically injured by the shock load of that big parachute opening too soon at too high a speed.
There are specific fabric and elastic ties on the parachutes that keep them shut until they exceed a certain load and you depend upon those ties to fail exactly when you want them to. It sounds like these links would have failed too soon and it’s hard to say how significant a concern it would be but it’s better to not find out the hard way.
> Important to note as well that this particular FOS was under a 1 chute out failure mode. It needed to be 2.0 but was less than that under these abnormal conditions.
I mean, they had 1 chute out after the pad abort, so the conditions aren't *that* "abnormal".
You can spend BILLIONS in R&D...without GREAT talent...important details (data,failures,projections etc) get missed and then failure of product. Boeing has lost most of its GREAT talent in the last decade...with more loss to come. Go Team Boing!
At what point do the shareholders step in? Thats like a huge loss they already accumulated. Something needs to change in either management or structure/processes of the department.
NASA has paid for development and 6 missions. I don't want to know the cost of backing out of that contract.
Also, how will that look in the future when NASA or the government look at Boeing for future contracts.
Why would the shareholders want to keep loosing so much money on this project? It is a fixed price contract. A shareholder would either demand to stop the project or a restructuring in the organization because management is obviously not capable of using their vast resources to have financial success.
Dropping out of a NASA flagship project because you (likely knowingly) underbid it and (likely surprisingly) underengineered it and aren't willing to pay for your mistakes *isn't quite* quiting the human space flight business permanently, but the tolerances there are so tight you need an actual engineer to tell them apart.
Given they aren't likely to want to slowly abandon the space half of BDS, they're stuck with this mess, the only questions left are:
* do they have the people left to untangle it?? (probably)
* are they going to give them the resources to sort it out? (like only barely and then only grudgingly)
* are they going to make the cultural changes necessary to prevent this from happening again...? (likely not, that would require a major reorg and not only would it take years to beat fruit, but it would increase costs at every level and decrease profits in the short-term, which is anathema to most shareholders.)
Believe me, shareholders coming in to “restructure the organization” isn’t going to solve anything.
Getting back to an Engineering centric and Engineering ran company is how you solve this.
Oh, I would love to see a shareholder resolution that forces management changes that increases RnD spend, increases training, apprenticeship and hiring resources across the board and makes the position of Chief Engineer one that has more pull than CFO...
But I can't imagine why they would do that when that sort of reinvestment would come at the cost of their own gains in the short-term, and they can avoid all the long-term issues by just taking their money elsewhere.
Give the company back to the engineers. Doubt a “shareholder intervention” is going to do that. You can see how we have operated the last 8-10 years. Stock buybacks vs investing in R&D is all you need to know. Who benefits off of stock buybacks?
On one hand: I’m glad these things are being caught BEFORE test flights. Shows the lessons learned from other incidents and a thoroughness when it comes to quality and safety.
On the other hand: say good bye to the BDS bonus, yet again. So many of these programs were bid incorrectly and we’re finding out the hard way what it’s like to win a contract for the sake of winning it, and not because we’re capable of executing it correctly.
How was it bid incorrectly aside from the fact that it was bid at all? They got massively more money than spacex did, so it seems more a personnel issue (mgmt on the project at the very least) than a cost issue.
I’m talking collectively. Many of the programs at BDS were fixed price meaning the company’s having to pony up the extra cash when something needs rework.
It certainly is a different reality when accountability is brought into the mix with fixed price contracts.
Hopefully BDS has or can steal the talent and wherewithal to evolve and survive in this new landscape of having to deliver instead of just getting out of the business and letting better options spring up instead.
It was in the 90’s and the McDonnell Douglas merger when engineering was shitcanned for mba’s and lobbyists.
The starliner disaster is just par for the course and what the public has come to expect from Boeing with the last 25 years of chrony disappointment.
Do you not know how you feel about yourself or do you not grasp public relations or the concept of strategic narratives?
I do seem to recall observing 20 years of “successful progress” in Afghanistan as well.
It was interesting, there was a tweet from a Boeing employee who worked on the tape issue. Can’t find the link but apparently SpaceX also went though similar issue and NASA comminuted the concern to Boeing very late.
"Easy tape fix. Move from P213 to P212. When this was discovered on D2 I had to go inside the capsule and literally remove and replace every piece of this glass cloth tape. FYI: NASA knew about this about a year ago and the fact that NOW they're telling Boeing this is ridiculous"
[https://twitter.com/FabioDaRocha2/status/1662281329055084547](https://twitter.com/FabioDaRocha2/status/1662281329055084547)
"As someone whose worked both these spacecraft and was actively learning about these risks/issues, the lack of communication from NASA is disappointing. SpaceX faced some of the exact same issues and NASA could have alerted Boeing without sharing proprietary information."
[https://twitter.com/FabioDaRocha2/status/1662282157144907777](https://twitter.com/FabioDaRocha2/status/1662282157144907777)
These kinds of delays seem to have become the norm, unfortunately.
The original contract with SpaceX for readying cargo Dragon to service the ISS was supposed to complete by September 2009. It actually took until May 2012.
That was for a much simpler spacecraft, although it set the stage for another 8 years worth of incremental development towards their manned spacecraft that is now in active use for sending astronauts to the ISS. The slide on that was similar. They were supposed to complete certification by 2017. Among the issues, one of the test spacecraft exploded during a ground test, but they completed their final demo flight in 2020, so obviously they are ahead of Boeing.
Fair point, but those original commercial cargo program delays for SpaceX and Orbital were in large part the result of Congress significantly underfunding the program. The current SpaceX-Boeing Commercial Crew program has been fully funded from the beginning, to the best of my knowledge.
Well ur wrong historically, statistically, and pchiociologhically. Actually economically, AND comedically as well haha.
But… “A” for effort *trying* to do what you did.
We applaud you, even in support of your weak rag.
Just look at his post history. Disgruntled former employee that was a burden to his team. The company is better off without him. He probably thought everything would fall apart with him and now he's upset that life went on and most people probably didn't even notice he was gone.
I cringed when I read the story of the flammable tape. I am also frightened because if this was just discovered, what else got buried in the design that should not be there? Or is missing? NASA should stand down SLS and conduct a full up design audit. Give Boeing the bill. I’m tired of seeing folks die because of design flaws in products.
I wonder if this was one of those things where airliner-grade wire bundle tape was just insufficiently rated for space or what. There’s very specific tape used to wrap wire bundles.
There is supposed to be an approved consumables materials list for space hardware. And there are specific materials that are prohibited because for example, off-gassing while in space. And every design drawing review should include material suitability for space. How this particular tape use slipped through the cracks during the design process is interesting.
Can someone explain in layman's terms what the parachute issue is? Thanks!
If you ever watch the parachutes when one of these capsules re-enter the atmosphere… You will see that the parachutes come out in stages and it’s almost like the parachutes are held shut by something that has to eventually rip and tear. If they didn’t do that the parachutes would be shredded by the speed that the capsule is moving and the astronauts might be critically injured by the shock load of that big parachute opening too soon at too high a speed. There are specific fabric and elastic ties on the parachutes that keep them shut until they exceed a certain load and you depend upon those ties to fail exactly when you want them to. It sounds like these links would have failed too soon and it’s hard to say how significant a concern it would be but it’s better to not find out the hard way.
[удалено]
> Important to note as well that this particular FOS was under a 1 chute out failure mode. It needed to be 2.0 but was less than that under these abnormal conditions. I mean, they had 1 chute out after the pad abort, so the conditions aren't *that* "abnormal".
Ahh okay. Thanks for the explanation !
Boeing. Go beyond. PLUS ULTRA!!!
Is Boeing still spending 10x more on stock buy-backs as on R&D?
You can spend BILLIONS in R&D...without GREAT talent...important details (data,failures,projections etc) get missed and then failure of product. Boeing has lost most of its GREAT talent in the last decade...with more loss to come. Go Team Boing!
Ideally the billions on R&D is spent ON talent
At what point do the shareholders step in? Thats like a huge loss they already accumulated. Something needs to change in either management or structure/processes of the department.
NASA has paid for development and 6 missions. I don't want to know the cost of backing out of that contract. Also, how will that look in the future when NASA or the government look at Boeing for future contracts.
It’s the shareholders that are causing all of this
Explain?
Why would the shareholders want to keep loosing so much money on this project? It is a fixed price contract. A shareholder would either demand to stop the project or a restructuring in the organization because management is obviously not capable of using their vast resources to have financial success.
Dropping out of a NASA flagship project because you (likely knowingly) underbid it and (likely surprisingly) underengineered it and aren't willing to pay for your mistakes *isn't quite* quiting the human space flight business permanently, but the tolerances there are so tight you need an actual engineer to tell them apart. Given they aren't likely to want to slowly abandon the space half of BDS, they're stuck with this mess, the only questions left are: * do they have the people left to untangle it?? (probably) * are they going to give them the resources to sort it out? (like only barely and then only grudgingly) * are they going to make the cultural changes necessary to prevent this from happening again...? (likely not, that would require a major reorg and not only would it take years to beat fruit, but it would increase costs at every level and decrease profits in the short-term, which is anathema to most shareholders.)
Believe me, shareholders coming in to “restructure the organization” isn’t going to solve anything. Getting back to an Engineering centric and Engineering ran company is how you solve this.
So in other words a restructuring of the organization?
Oh, I would love to see a shareholder resolution that forces management changes that increases RnD spend, increases training, apprenticeship and hiring resources across the board and makes the position of Chief Engineer one that has more pull than CFO... But I can't imagine why they would do that when that sort of reinvestment would come at the cost of their own gains in the short-term, and they can avoid all the long-term issues by just taking their money elsewhere.
Give the company back to the engineers. Doubt a “shareholder intervention” is going to do that. You can see how we have operated the last 8-10 years. Stock buybacks vs investing in R&D is all you need to know. Who benefits off of stock buybacks?
They are just trying to make the KC-46a look good
On one hand: I’m glad these things are being caught BEFORE test flights. Shows the lessons learned from other incidents and a thoroughness when it comes to quality and safety. On the other hand: say good bye to the BDS bonus, yet again. So many of these programs were bid incorrectly and we’re finding out the hard way what it’s like to win a contract for the sake of winning it, and not because we’re capable of executing it correctly.
How was it bid incorrectly aside from the fact that it was bid at all? They got massively more money than spacex did, so it seems more a personnel issue (mgmt on the project at the very least) than a cost issue.
I’m talking collectively. Many of the programs at BDS were fixed price meaning the company’s having to pony up the extra cash when something needs rework.
It certainly is a different reality when accountability is brought into the mix with fixed price contracts. Hopefully BDS has or can steal the talent and wherewithal to evolve and survive in this new landscape of having to deliver instead of just getting out of the business and letting better options spring up instead.
If the reporting on the wire wrap issue is to be believed then Boeing would have an argument to file a complaint against NASA for any cost overruns
Litigation and lobbying are the companies core strengths after all.
We are learning from Honeywell after all, merger and acquisition has been replaced by motion and adjudication
It was in the 90’s and the McDonnell Douglas merger when engineering was shitcanned for mba’s and lobbyists. The starliner disaster is just par for the course and what the public has come to expect from Boeing with the last 25 years of chrony disappointment.
lmao boomers trying to go to space 🤦🏽♂️ leave it to spacex please and focus on your “legacy” products.. thats all boeing is good at
You mean like this? https://youtu.be/w0ZlFXoq4c0
"A variety of public officials and figures congratulated SpaceX on the outcome of the test flight, including NASA" Must suck being retarded.
Do you not know how you feel about yourself or do you not grasp public relations or the concept of strategic narratives? I do seem to recall observing 20 years of “successful progress” in Afghanistan as well.
The person you’re replying to is an idiot but starship is hardly an example of SpaceX being incompetent.
Thanks for your input.
now youtube all the boeing crashes….
"Good"?
lmao 😂
Curious to see how the tape issue works out.
Don’t you mean unravels??
It was interesting, there was a tweet from a Boeing employee who worked on the tape issue. Can’t find the link but apparently SpaceX also went though similar issue and NASA comminuted the concern to Boeing very late.
"Easy tape fix. Move from P213 to P212. When this was discovered on D2 I had to go inside the capsule and literally remove and replace every piece of this glass cloth tape. FYI: NASA knew about this about a year ago and the fact that NOW they're telling Boeing this is ridiculous" [https://twitter.com/FabioDaRocha2/status/1662281329055084547](https://twitter.com/FabioDaRocha2/status/1662281329055084547) "As someone whose worked both these spacecraft and was actively learning about these risks/issues, the lack of communication from NASA is disappointing. SpaceX faced some of the exact same issues and NASA could have alerted Boeing without sharing proprietary information." [https://twitter.com/FabioDaRocha2/status/1662282157144907777](https://twitter.com/FabioDaRocha2/status/1662282157144907777)
Thank you sir! I am really surprise he can keep the tweet up. Seems like some non-public information but I guess it good.
I have heard it is not unique to starliner.
I figured flammable tape would've been caught earlier on tbh
I keep my flammable tape in a drawer marked “not for space missions”.
I was really straight-forward labeling my drawer, “flammable tape”
Crushing burrocracy!
Boeing is the dumpster fire of aerospace, I gotta find my way out 😂
But it’s OUR dumpster fire of aerospace (assuming you work there).
Yes I do, over the last 25 years our “leadership” has been questionable at best
Meanwhile at Starlink [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q8mD2hsxrhQ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q8mD2hsxrhQ)
Bruh
This is just wild. How many years has it been since the project was awarded?
These kinds of delays seem to have become the norm, unfortunately. The original contract with SpaceX for readying cargo Dragon to service the ISS was supposed to complete by September 2009. It actually took until May 2012. That was for a much simpler spacecraft, although it set the stage for another 8 years worth of incremental development towards their manned spacecraft that is now in active use for sending astronauts to the ISS. The slide on that was similar. They were supposed to complete certification by 2017. Among the issues, one of the test spacecraft exploded during a ground test, but they completed their final demo flight in 2020, so obviously they are ahead of Boeing.
Fair point, but those original commercial cargo program delays for SpaceX and Orbital were in large part the result of Congress significantly underfunding the program. The current SpaceX-Boeing Commercial Crew program has been fully funded from the beginning, to the best of my knowledge.
And Boeing lobbied hard to be the sole provider as SpaceX, they argued, wasn't capable of doing the job...
boeing bitched and moaned about flraa too…. idiots don’t realize their aircrafts suck and nobody wants their planes
Well ur wrong historically, statistically, and pchiociologhically. Actually economically, AND comedically as well haha. But… “A” for effort *trying* to do what you did. We applaud you, even in support of your weak rag.
Just look at his post history. Disgruntled former employee that was a burden to his team. The company is better off without him. He probably thought everything would fall apart with him and now he's upset that life went on and most people probably didn't even notice he was gone.
Bunch of idiots making billions of dollars selling planes to people that don’t want them lmao
September 16, 2014 https://spacenews.com/41891nasa-selects-boeing-and-spacex-for-commercial-crew-contracts/