This weekend, the troubled Boeing Starliner spacecraft began making alarming noises while docked at the International Space Station (ISS), prompting one of the station’s astronauts to provide an urgent report to ground control.
The strange sound was first reported on Saturday morning by Butch Wilmore, who is trapped aboard the ISS with fellow astronaut Suni Williams after the Starliner started experiencing problems following its maiden crewed voyage in June.The recorded interaction was first posted by a user on a NASA Space Flight forum.In the recording, Wilmore asked NASA crew in Houston to identify the sound, which was described as both a “pulsing” and a “clanging.”The Earthside crew member speculated that it sounded “almost like a sonar ping.”
NASA has determined the origin of the strange sound: A specific audio configuration between the ISS and Starliner.
NASA has shed new light on this weekend’s space mystery aboard the International Space Station, where an unusual sound could be heard from the speaker inside Boeing’s troubled Starliner spacecraft while docked at the ISS.The space agency revealed Monday that the mysterious noise was the result of a specific audio configuration between the space station and the Starliner spacecraft.”The space station audio system is complex, allowing multiple spacecraft and modules to be interconnected, and it is common to experience noise and feedback. The crew is asked to contact mission control when they hear sounds originating in the comm system,” read the NASA statement addressing the audio quirk.NASA said the pulsing sound has stopped and has had no “technical impact to the crew.”
Meanwhile, the return date for Starliner has been set to September 6.
Teams with NASA and Boeing gave the green light to undock what will be the uncrewed spacecraft from the International Space Station as early as Sept. 6 at 6:04 p.m., leaving behind NASA astronauts Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams, who flew up on board Starliner when it launched from Cape Canaveral on June 5.The duo arrived on the ISS a day later, but because of thruster issues and helium leaks on Starliner’s propulsion module, NASA opted to play it safe and keep the astronauts on board the station to await a rescue ride home from Boeing’s competitor, SpaceX.If the weather is clear for the landing site, Starliner will autonomously undock from the ISS, something it was able to do back in 2022 during the second of its two uncrewed test flights. It then faces a six-hour flight back to Earth with a desert landing target of White Sands Space Harbor in New Mexico at 12:03 a.m. Sept. 7. After the parachute and air-cushioned landing, it will be shipped back to Boeing’s Starliner factory at Kennedy Space Center.
It must be noted that some people did have fun over the weekend with the news.
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