In Astronauts carefully tell the truth, I noted astronaut Butch Wilmore confirmed Elon Musk’s assertion that he and Suni Williams really were stranded on the ISS, and that Musk offered to bring them home during Biden’s Handler’s Administration but was refused because they didn’t want Biden to look bad before the election.
The Biden Administration and the Democrat media went to great lengths to deny they were stranded. Arizona Democrat Senator Mark Kelly’s brother Scott claimed there was always a capsule docked there so they could come home at will. While there was a capsule docked, it was there as a “the ISS has totally failed” measure for every astronaut on the International Space Station. Wilmore and Williams’ eight day mission at the ISS stretched to nearly a year as NASA couldn’t figure out what was wrong with their “Starliner.” At Donald Trump’s request, Musk sent a SpaceX capsule to bring them home.
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Graphic: B oeing/NASA Starliner docked at ISS. Public Domain.
Now we’re learning the problems with the Starliner were far worse than NASA has admitted.
They were so severe Wilmore didn’t know if the thrusters would work well enough to allow him to dock with the ISS, and had no idea if they’d function well enough to de-orbit the capsule without burning up in the atmosphere.
If they couldn’t dock, their oxygen would quickly run out, and if they couldn’t de-orbit in the proper orientation they’d immolate.
Fortunately, they were, barely, able to dock. NASA couldn’t diagnose the problem from Earth and eventually decided to try to bring the Starliner back empty. It made it back in one piece but Boeing still doesn’t know what went wrong or if it will ever fly again.
Wilmore added that he felt pretty confident, in the aftermath of docking to the space station, that Starliner probably would not be their ride home.
Wilmore: “I was thinking, we might not come home in the spacecraft. We might not. And one of the first phone calls I made was to Vincent LaCourt, the ISS flight director, who was one of the ones that made the call about waiving the flight rule. I said, ‘OK, what about this spacecraft, is it our safe haven?’”
It was unlikely to happen, but if some catastrophic space station emergency occurred while Wilmore and Williams were in orbit, what were they supposed to do? Should they retreat to Starliner for an emergency departure, or cram into one of the other vehicles on station, for which they did not have seats or spacesuits? LaCourt said they should use Starliner as a safe haven for the time being. Therein followed a long series of meetings and discussions about Starliner’s suitability for flying crew back to Earth. Publicly, NASA and Boeing expressed confidence in Starliner’s safe return with crew. But Williams and Wilmore, who had just made that harrowing ride, felt differently.
Wilmore: “I was very skeptical, just because of what we’d experienced. I just didn’t see that we could make it. [emphasis mine]
Astronauts must be careful not to express doubt about the manned space program. There are more than enough congressmen willing to defund it in favor of their pet projects, and taxpayer-funded manned missions have been cash-strapped for decades. They also know if NASA gets mad at them their space flight days are over. Then again, astronauts who know NASA’s equipment almost got them killed, and NASA and the Biden’s Handler’s Administration left them stranded with no firm date for getting them home might not much care.
Being naturally lazy as all bureaucrats are, NASA management decided to instead take for them the easiest route, bringing Freedom to ISS in September as scheduled, even though it left these two humans without a lifeboat for a period of about four months.
Flying a quickly put together rescue mission also risked a lot of bad press, both for Boeing and for the Biden administration during the election campaign. (Biden’s fear was really unfounded. The press would have correctly lauded NASA and Biden for acting diligently and with speed.)
That both Wilmore and Williams are being so open and honest about these facts now suggests they either fear no retribution from the Trump administration, or do not ever expect to get another flight from NASA.
The Trump Administration isn’t going to retaliate against them. But federal bureaucrats have long memories and easily take offense. Wilmore and Williams certainly know their astronaut careers are over. On the other hand, they’ve spent more time in space than most and Williams holds the record for the most female spacewalking time.
Whether the unnecessary risk to their lives and Biden’s Handler’s and the media’s lies are justifiable is another matter.
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Mike McDaniel is a USAF veteran, classically trained musician, Japanese and European fencer, life-long athlete, firearm instructor, retired police officer and high school and college English teacher. He is a published author and blogger. His home blog is Stately McDaniel Manor.
This article was originally published at www.americanthinker.com
