Boeing Starliner Launched Scrubbed Until at Least Wednesday After Redundant Computer Issue (npr.org) 41
"The seemingly star-cross Boeing Starliner — within minutes of its long-delayed blastoff on the spacecraft's first piloted test flight — was grounded again Saturday," writes CBS News, "when one of three redundant computers managing the countdown from the base of the launch pad ran into a problem, triggering a last-minute scrub."
More details from NPR: With 3:50 left in the countdown, the rocket's computer initiated a hold. The next launch attempt won't happen until at least Wednesday, NASA said.
An issue with one of the three redundant computer systems at the base of the launch pad that are responsible for initiating the launch sequence prompted the automatic halt, said Tory Bruno, the head of United Launch Alliance, the government contractor trying to launch the Starliner. "We do require all three systems to be running — triple redundancy," ULA President and CEO Bruno said at a Saturday afternoon press briefing. "Those three big computers do a health check. ... Two came up normally. The third one came up, but it was slow to come up, and that tripped a red line that created an automatic hold." ULA engineers don't know why the computer halted, and will troubleshoot ground support equipment overnight, NASA said in an update on Saturday evening.
More details from NPR: With 3:50 left in the countdown, the rocket's computer initiated a hold. The next launch attempt won't happen until at least Wednesday, NASA said.
An issue with one of the three redundant computer systems at the base of the launch pad that are responsible for initiating the launch sequence prompted the automatic halt, said Tory Bruno, the head of United Launch Alliance, the government contractor trying to launch the Starliner. "We do require all three systems to be running — triple redundancy," ULA President and CEO Bruno said at a Saturday afternoon press briefing. "Those three big computers do a health check. ... Two came up normally. The third one came up, but it was slow to come up, and that tripped a red line that created an automatic hold." ULA engineers don't know why the computer halted, and will troubleshoot ground support equipment overnight, NASA said in an update on Saturday evening.
Stop. (Score:2)
Please.
Just stop.
It's over.
Pack up.
Go home.
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They will once it performs the anomaly of exploding. Glad I'm not paying for that flight.
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If you're a US Taxpayer, you are paying for that flight.
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Please. Just stop. It's over. Pack up. Go home.
I do have concerns about Starliner, having been designed and built during the age when the number one thrust of Boeing has been to service the Stockholders - perhaps they should shift from Aerospace to selling Pizza.
But all said, all of the hand wringing smacks of Spacex fans gloating about their enemies failures and problems, while acting like their own issues are actually successes.
How's Starship doing? Everything on schedule and performing nominally?
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Yeah, last test flight released more funding. They demonstrated cryogenic fuel transfer.
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If they kill as many with Pizza as they did with their I'll fated planes: I rather prefer no Pizza for me
I find that fairly concerning (Score:2)
Any computer used to control a space-capable rocket ought to be using old rock-solid hardware and the simplest extremely vetting code you can get away with for the job.
By the time you're on a launchpad, it should be as reliable as dawn.
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"Have you tried turning it off and back on again?"
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This is not a new computer system - it's the ground computer system for the Atlas V rocket, which has been around for a couple of decades and is nearing retirement (production has ended and fewer than two dozen launches remain).
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It is a reliable computer system. It was a triply redundant system. The first two computers came up fine. The third took a bit longer than it should have to come up, so it was reported as a failure. This was traced to a failed piece of hardware.
Hardware fails. It happens. The
Trebuchet? (Score:4, Funny)
They should just use a trebuchet. That won't reach space either, but it will fail a lot cheaper.
This is actually being developed (Score:4, Informative)
https://earthsky.org/space/spinlaunch-slingshot-to-space/
And yes, this is designed to reach space.
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Not only the extreme lateral g-forces, but running into sea-level air at Mach 6+ when leaving the launch device is going to cause it's own set of issues.
It's an interesting idea but I expect diminishing returns of launch speed vs. air resistance/heating will limit the usefulness of this idea. If they need to ship bulk materials/metal to orbit for refining, building, or some other process in the future it might have a use case. Anything else I don't see being viable unless they can build their launch platf
The computer is trying to save itself (Score:2)
Maybe the computer is scared that the helium leak https://spaceflightnow.com/202... [spaceflightnow.com] could lead to its destruction and acted out of self-preservation
Three? (Score:4, Interesting)
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They may be doing it like the Space Shuttle did. It had three independent computers and a polling computer. For an action to happen, all three computers had to send the same request to the poll. If any one machine gave a different answer, it would be automatically shut down and the shuttle would run on just two computers.
AFAIK, that only happened once with a space shuttle. And I have no idea what its plan was if the last two computers had a disagreement.
Re:Three? (Score:5, Informative)
These are the ground control computers, which were polled entering the "terminal countdown" phase, the final 4 minutes of the countdown. They are redundant to handle an unexpected failure during that critical time, but entering that phase their safety guidelines require all three systems to be functional.
They had an earlier issue with a different part of the redundant computer systems in the same rack (each of the three sets is in a separate rack), so it seems possible that it was a power issue with that rack or a communications issue between that rack and the others. The previous issue safety guideline did allow them to say "that's a redundant piece and we'll just move to the next computer" and continue with the countdown. These are the systems that handle timing-critical things like umbilical retraction and release of the hold-downs (explosive bolts on Atlas V IIRC). You don't want to enter that phase already being down a computer if you can easily avoid it (this isn't some ultra timing sensitive launch to rush).
These aren't new systems for Starliner; they're the ground control computers for the Atlas V rocket, which has been launching for over two decades (and will be retired before too long).
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These are the ground control computers, which were polled entering the "terminal countdown" phase, the final 4 minutes of the countdown. They are redundant to handle an unexpected failure during that critical time, but entering that phase their safety guidelines require all three systems to be functional.
The amusing part is people falling all over themselves to blame this on Boeing. And we know who they are.
Truth is, this has nothing to do with the Starliner capsule. Think of the launch computers as a three input and gate.
Truth is, This is all part of launching rockets.
Artemis had several scrubs to work out some issues. It flew, the returning parts returned.
Starship is yet to achieve orbit and appears to be a little explodey.
Even the Falcons have scrubbed launches, the latest one last week.
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Three systems for redundancy, but they stop if one of them don't work? What's the point of having three?
More to the point... how is having three computers triple redundancy?
If you've got one computer, you have zero redundancy. You can survive zero failures and remain operational.
If you've got two computers, you have single redundancy. You can survive one failure and remain operational.
If you've got three computers, you have double redundancy. You can survive two failures and remain operational.
What's the arrangement of three machines, even in a peer/polling/vote arrangement where three of them can fa
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Apparently triple redundancy is one of the conditions. You have to draw the line somewhere.
Also, if the computer failure was caused by something external to itself, it could affect the other computers. Better to shut down before you are committed.
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The point is to have three chances to realize something is wrong. And can abort.
What is the point in launching with two remaining computers, after 10 seconds flight they start disagreeing about input and compute different output?
What now?
Better abort than fail and lose all, or not?
What's wrong with these guys? (Score:2)
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Funny thing is, that such redundant system are very common components in safety related systems. Availability is considered an integral part of safety, therefore typical systems contain stringent safety checks together with a decent level of redundancy.
While the safety aspect of this system seems to have worked well, I wonder, why a company for which this ought to be a standard component failed to install working ones.
At some point they need to come clean with their QA ...
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The failure here was on the ULA side of things. They're a solid company that does quality work but their ground systems seem to be having trouble lately. Part of that is them retiring the AtlasV and moving to Vulcan. The other part is they just don't launch as often as, say, SpaceX. ULA goes months between launches whereas SpaceX yeets an F9 out there every 4 days.
Probably... (Score:2)
Looking for a Windows Update... or installing one...
Triple? (Score:2)
Three units make the system double redundant. Not more. Bruno doesn't know his stuff.
Sad: Musk Such a Cunt, Cheering for Boeing (Score:1, Troll)
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How brutal is it that Boeing's competition in this is such a fucking cunt that even they look good.
When is the first manned Starship flight happening?
Their Boeing to Die (Score:2)
This just in: security footage shows one of the astronauts scheduled to fly on the Starliner sabotaging the computer the night before. Ask for comment, they said, "Please! I have a family!"
Three? (Score:4, Informative)
The space shuttle had five, which is sensible because that's the minimum to use the Byzantine General's Problem to detect errors and data corruption.
Don't tell me (Score:2)
The safety guy was supposed to prevent that from happening but they fired him months ago.
Reliability (Score:2)
They clearly do not have sufficient reliability to send people to space. They are rushing it before fixing all their bugs. Will not end well, mefears. Maybe not on the first flight, but on the 2nd or 3rd.
Would YOU get on that thing? (Score:2)
There no way you'll catch me on it!