Boeing employee and former NASA astronaut Christopher Ferguson will no longer command the first crewed test flight of Boeing’s new passenger spacecraft, the CST-100 Starliner, slated to carry its first human passengers next year.

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I’m taking on a new mission, one that keeps my feet planted here firmly on Earth and prioritizes my most important crew – my family. He is assuming a new role as director of mission integration and operations, where he will support the astronauts and make sure that their training is adequate, according to Boeing. The Starliner underwent rounds of acoustics vibration, thermal vacuum and electromagnetic interference and electromagnetic contamination testing. Boeing’s Starliner project has been riddled with delays and setbacks pretty much from the moment it got started. “I have made several commitments which I simply cannot risk missing. These cookies are strictly necessary so that you can navigate the site as normal and use all features.

Without these cookies we cannot provide you with the service that you expect. This vehicle, known as Spacecraft 2, will fly Starliner’s Crew Flight Test (CFT) after it returns to Florida from environmental testing. For years the complexities and high costs of legacy data storage have been accepted as inevitable. His love of Christopher Ferguson, commander of the final space shuttle flight and now a Boeing executive, has stepped down as commander of the first piloted test flight of … With Ferguson stepping down, Wilmore will now start training immediately with Mann and Fincke. He will be replaced by fellow NASA veteran Barry "Butch" Wilmore, who will join astronauts Mike Fincke and Nicole Mann. I’m not going anywhere. Astronaut Chris Ferguson trains in the Boeing Starliner mock-up at NASAs Johnson Space Center in Houston. “Stepping down was a difficult decision for Chris, but with his leadership and assistance to this point, this crew is positioned for success.”.

A no-earlier-than-December date for the reflight (assuming all "mandatory" fixes have been made) has been mooted, with the first crewed demo pushed back to no earlier than June. “I want to share with you a difficult and personal decision I’ve had to make,” Ferguson says.
NASA and Boeing had planned for Starliner’s first crewed flight to happen as soon as this year, but the flight has been significantly delayed due to problems with the program.

“Next year is very important for my family,” he said in the video. Now, Boeing is targeting no earlier than June of next year for the first crewed test flight, and Ferguson indicated to The Washington Post that he had a family wedding and other commitments in 2021.

For more info and to customise your settings, hit pic.twitter.com/PgdhPqwYQS, — Christopher Ferguson (@Astro_Ferg) October 7, 2020. Well, sorry, it's the law. Former NASA 'naut Christopher Ferguson has withdrawn as commander from the first crewed mission of Boeing's calamity capsule, the CST-100 Starliner.

Part of Situation Publishing, Biting the hand that feeds IT © 1998–2020, Hand-over to happen on the lunar surface. Ferguson, a former NASA astronaut, is … However, the first uncrewed and truncated mission suffered near-catastrophic problems on its flight in December 2019. The most public and visible of these setbacks was the uncrewed mission to the International Space Station that never actually made it to the ISS due to a malfunction. In 2018, Ferguson was assigned as commander of the first crewed flight test of Starliner, along with astronauts Nicole Mann and Mike Fincke who would be joining as crewmates. Three-time Space Shuttle flyer Ferguson joined the Boeing Starliner programme in 2011. Christopher Ferguson CST-100 Director of Crew and Mission Systems at Boeing Cape Canaveral, Florida 500+ connections You can also change your choices at any time, by hitting the Since he is technically no longer a NASA astronaut, Ferguson would have become the first private citizen to fly on a privately made spacecraft to orbit. Why pay $250+ for a box of 3M N95 masks when these work better for $1.89 each? Such were the software snafus that the words "spacecraft loss" were heard around the halls of NASA. We measure how many people read us, And the company is gearing up to perform a second uncrewed test flight of Starliner, currently planned for December. If people say no to these cookies, we do not know how many people have visited and we cannot monitor performance. I’m not going anywhere, I’m just not going to space next year. Most recently, Mike served as Tech Editor at The Daily Dot, and has been featured in USA Today, Time.com, and countless other web and print outlets. Christopher Ferguson, a former NASA astronaut, and current Boeing staff member, was to be one of the first people to take Starliner for a spin. In fact, plans for the mission had already been largely solidified, with an announcement of the crew that would be taking that first crewed flight. These cookies are used to make advertising messages more relevant to you. and ensure you see relevant ads, by storing cookies on your device. Three-time Space Shuttle flyer Ferguson joined the Boeing Starliner programme in 2011.

View Christopher Ferguson’s profile on LinkedIn, the world's largest professional community. Moving the bulk of an organisation’s systems to the cloud means that Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP)—typically the largest single application— also must move. Wilmore was already part of the backup crew for the mission, so he had already been training for the flight in case he needed to be slotted in.

In a video posted to Twitter, Ferguson said leaving the flight was a “difficult and personal decision” he had to make. Now, as though Boeing’s Starliner is cursed, one of the astronauts set to take part in that first mission has announced he’s stepping down from his seat on Starliner. The company notes that Ferguson will also be one of the last people the crew will see before they leave for space — and one of the first they’ll see when they return. I have made several commitments which I simply cannot risk missing. Here's an overview of our use of cookies, similar technologies and

I’m just not going into space next year.”.

Wilmore has flown aboard both Space Shuttle and Soyuz, and has accumulated 178 days in space. It threw a major wrench in Boeing’s plans, pushing back the timeline for a crewed mission by many months. Christopher Ferguson, a former NASA astronaut, and current Boeing staff member, was to be one of the first people to take Starliner for a spin. Mike Wehner has reported on technology and video games for the past decade, covering breaking news and trends in VR, wearables, smartphones, and future tech.
That makes a lot of sense since the crewed flight tests were supposed to happen much earlier than they are now scheduled for, and it’s entirely likely that Ferguson believed the crewed flights would have already been wrapped up by the time his other commitments grabbed his attention. He was assigned to the first crewed test flight of the CST-100 Starliner in 2018, only to watch the uncrewed demonstration mission almost end in disaster (delicately referred to by NASA as a "close call"). Ferguson made the announcement on Twitter in a brief video where he explains his decision in somewhat vague detail. Ferguson commanded the last flight of NASA’s Space Shuttle in 2011, before retiring from the agency that year. Ferguson will remain on the Starliner programme, but without a definitive launch date or mission duration, planning will be a challenge. Ferguson has been instrumental in the multiyear development of Boeing’s Starliner, a privately built crew capsule designed to ferry astronauts to … I am deeply committed to human spaceflight. Here’s a closer look at what makes Pure Storage better.

®, The Register - Independent news and views for the tech community. Former NASA 'naut Christopher Ferguson has withdrawn as commander from the first crewed mission of Boeing's calamity capsule, the CST-100 Starliner.

I’ll still be working hard with the #Starliner team and the @NASA_Astronauts on our crew. Boeing’s Starliner crew shakeup gets a little more clear as we learn one of the reasons why commander Chris Ferguson stepped down. reporting is second only to his gaming addiction. In December 2019, Boeing launched the Starliner on its debut flight to the space station — with no crew on board — but the mission suffered from numerous software glitches that prompted the company to bring the capsule home early before it could reach the ISS.

... CST-100 Director of Crew and Mission Systems at Boeing. I’m dedicated to the Starliner program and I’m passionate about the team that has built her. Boeing therefore bit the bullet and agreed to fly the mission again once minor stuff, like a lack of end-to-end testing, had been addressed. If you're cool with that, hit “Accept all Cookies”.