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NASA decides to keep 2 astronauts in space until February, nixes return on troubled Boeing capsule (apnews.com)

submitted 3 months ago by [email protected] to c/spaceflight

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[–] [email protected] 2 points 3 months ago (2 children)

Probably why it’s going to take till Feb— they’ll adapt it and launch the adapted capsule to retrieve them.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 3 months ago (1 children)

Nope, the February return flight is an expedition that was already planned long before this issue, the only change is that they're going to launch with 2 crew members instead of the usual four, so they can bring back the 2 stranded by Boeing.

NASA says they aren't considering any emergency missions, but it sounds that if they thought it was necessary they could ask spaceX for another launch.

Push comes to shove, they could fit everything into the spaceX capsule that's parked at the ISS, but they don't really want to go over 4 occupancy unless it's an emergency.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 3 months ago (3 children)

So they’ll send up 2 extra dragon suits for the stranded astronauts to use? I thought space suits are so highly customized and tailored to each astronaut that they can’t just do that.

[–] [email protected] 14 points 3 months ago

At the press conference, NASA confirmed that there is a spare suit on the ISS that fits, and Dragon will bring up another one. Assessment was that this still presented risk, but less risk than the astronauts taking the Starliner back to earth.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 3 months ago

They just need to get close enough. There's already one spare Dragon IVA suit on ISS that's a close enough fit to work. They'll send up another. During training, the crews actually use suits that were customized for other people while they wait for their new ones.

[–] [email protected] 0 points 3 months ago

I’m sure they can find a way to beam their measurements down

[–] [email protected] 2 points 3 months ago (1 children)

Couldn’t they just send up some Dragon spacesuits?

[–] [email protected] 1 points 3 months ago

The Dragon will be half-crewed on the way up, so that's exactly what they're doing