“‘Someday Starliner could be a backup to a Dragon mission,’ Stich added.”
This is a lie, and it’s disturbing seeing a NASA leader repeat it.
Starliner is stupid. It launches exclusively on the Atlas V [1]. Atlas V is being discontinued because it runs on the Russian RD-180 [2]. Every remaining Atlas V launch has already been sold [3]. If Dragon were grounded, the only way Starliner could serve as a back-up would be if NASA sacrificed a future Starliner mission.
Boeing has no plans to mate Starliner to a modern launch vehicle. Based on its track record, it would likely cost the company hundreds of millions if not billions of dollars. All to be an also-ran.
This is a lie, and it’s disturbing seeing a NASA leader repeat it.
Starliner is stupid. It launches exclusively on the Atlas V [1]. Atlas V is being discontinued because it runs on the Russian RD-180 [2]. Every remaining Atlas V launch has already been sold [3]. If Dragon were grounded, the only way Starliner could serve as a back-up would be if NASA sacrificed a future Starliner mission.
Boeing has no plans to mate Starliner to a modern launch vehicle. Based on its track record, it would likely cost the company hundreds of millions if not billions of dollars. All to be an also-ran.
[1] https://www.boeing.com/space/starliner/launch/innovations.ht...
[2] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/RD-180
[3] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atlas_V