NASA has officially upgraded the severity rating of the first manned flight of Boeing’s Starliner spacecraft, rating the incident as a “Type A mishap” (Type A serious incident), the highest level in the agency’s incident classification system. This level is used for situations where there is a serious risk to human life or the possibility of loss of the vehicle. There were no casualties, but the agency now acknowledges that the mission came closer to disaster than was initially publicly reflected.
This statement came after the final report of the Crewed Flight Test (CFT) mission, which was sent to the International Space Station (ISS) with astronauts Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams on June 5, 2024. The goal of the mission was to certify the capsule as the United States’ second operational manned transport system, joining SpaceX’s Crew Dragon, the only vehicle currently performing this mission.
What was expected to be a historic flight turned into an investigation
Starliner managed to reach orbit and dock with the ISS. However, the flight did not go smoothly. During critical maneuvers, multiple malfunctions occurred in the thrusters in the service module and helium leaks were detected in the pressurization system. At some moments, the vehicle lost some of its orientation control capacity, technically referred to as “loss of control in six degrees of freedom.”
Backup systems enabled the mission to continue and a worse scenario was prevented. However, the final report revealed that the performance decline was more serious than initially assessed. According to agency officials, at some moments the situation could have turned into a much more serious problem.
Due to doubts about the reliability of the propulsion system during reentry, NASA decided that Wilmore and Williams would not return to Earth aboard the Starliner. The capsule returned uncrewed on September 6, 2024, and made a successful landing in New Mexico. The astronauts stayed on the ISS for a few more months and returned to Earth in a Crew Dragon vehicle in March 2025.
