SpaceX Crew Dragon vs Boeing Starliner Explained

- And Endeavor takes off. - Since the retirement of the space shuttle in 2011, the United States has not had the ability to transport

crew

to orbit. Instead, we have relied on the Russian Soyuz for almost a decade as we race to develop alternatives. Commercial

crew

providers are now close to completing development of two crewed spacecraft in low Earth orbit: Crew Dragon and the Boeing CST-100 Starliner. And today we will compare them head to head. (upbeat electronic music) And this episode is sponsored by me, ineedmore.space/shop. And if you want to help me do more of this kind of storytelling, just pick up a t-shirt.

It would really mean a lot, and I put a lot of effort into making t-shirt designs that I think people would like to wear. So if you want to support more episodes like this, consider purchasing a t-shirt at ineedmore.space/shop. Let's go back to the episode. After the Constellation program, NASA's replacement for the space shuttle, collapsed for various reasons, the United States' manned exploration program was left with the SLS and the Commercial Crew Program. NASA would focus on deep space exploration, while private industry would take over low-Earth orbit transportation. NASA would help develop and finance the capsules and then become their customers to purchase flights in these capsules as needed.

Companies were then free to sell commercial flights in these capsules to private customers, tourists, corporations, or even countries that lacked their own human spaceflight capability. NASA would again gain autonomous access to the ISS from the United States and space flight companies would increase their profits and finance the development of better space technologies and services. It was a win-win situation. The investment paid off and the companies ended up creating two incredible, modern crew capsules. - And the takeoff, the rise of Starliner and a new era in human spaceflight. - First, let's take a look at Boeing's CST-100 Starliner.

It is a capsule shaped like a truncated cone, similar to other historical American capsules. It is slightly larger than the Apollo command module, but smaller than the next-generation Orion, developed by Lockheed Martin. The capsule can carry up to seven passengers to low-Earth orbit, although NASA will use it in a configuration with four seats and some cargo-carrying capacity. The Starliner features an interior similar in design features to Boeing's commercial airliner, specifically the 787 Dreamliner. It has a full range of manual controls and large screens that display a wealth of crucial data. However, this will not be used to a large extent because the capsule is designed for autonomous operation and will be able to meet and dock with the International Space Station on its own.

At IAC 2019, I had the pleasure of sitting in a Starliner simulator and docking the ship on my first attempt after a quick explanation from a Boeing representative. I noticed that the control interface clearly had space shuttle heritage down to the exact same switch models flown on the orbiters. It was nice to see manual toggle switches available in case of emergency. The capsule itself features a ton of innovations that truly make it a 21st century spacecraft, such as a completely seamless design with interlocking parts. This ensures consistency and eliminates much of the unreliability that welding introduces. It also has 12 reusable command module thrusters for maneuvering.

It also has an independent service module. A sheet of static solar panels is mounted on the base to power the spacecraft's electronic subsystems. It has many boosters on board, built by Aerojet Rocketdyne, including 20 OMV boosters, which are used to support orbital maneuvers and attitude control in the event of a low-altitude launch abort, and 28 RCS boosters to maneuver and provide thrust to International Space. Season. It also includes the pusher-style launch abort system, or LAS, powered by four RS-88 Bantam engines. They use hydrazine, a hypergolic propellant. And although it is very toxic, it guarantees an instantaneous start of the engines that take the capsule to a safe place in the event of an anomaly during launch.

Also located within the service module are tanks transporting hydrazine and hydrogen tetroxide. The service module is attached throughout the course of the spacecraft's mission and detaches just before reentry, exposing the crew module's heat shield. It is then burned up in the Earth's atmosphere and spent on each flight. The Starliner landing sequence begins with deorbiting and reentry. After decelerating due to atmospheric drag, while stabilized by onboard thrusters, it deploys its parachutes and ejects the heat shield before landing, exposing the air pockets. The main parachutes deploy, slowing it further, and the airbags inflate to provide a soft landing on the sandy desert expanse of the US Army's White Sands Missile Range - Two, one, launch. - Now, let's look at the SpaceX capsule.

In 2010, SpaceX had developed the uncrewed Dragon capsule for transporting cargo to the International Space Station under NASA's CRS contract. This was an extremely critical and lucrative deal for SpaceX and allowed them to fund the rest of their development. The next logical step was to scale this proven design for an Earth-orbiting capsule that can safely deliver and return cargo on a crew transport vehicle for NASA's commercial crew program. Initial prototypes of the capsule were simply the Dragon 1 design with additional booster capsules for the launch abort system. This, however, was not the final design. On May 30, 2014, Elon unveiled the Dragon 2 capsule, also known as the Crew Dragon, and it said something like this. (audience applauding) The capsule was a sleek black and white capsule that looks like something out of a science fiction movie, much like this one.

Now, the interior was spacious and spacious. The seats were minimalist. Four huge touch screens folded from the top with all available controls and telemetry presented in neat animations. It was a 21st century spaceship. But it wasn't just a facelift. SpaceX, in its typical way, had done something completely crazy with its new project. The booster capsules would not only provide an abort mode. Instead, they would be able to land the capsule by propulsion anywhere on the planet and beyond with considerable precision. New engines called SuperDracos were being developed, powered by hydrazine and completely 3D printed from Inconel.

Eight of these highly accelerable hypergolic engines would enable powered descent and landing. Dragon 2's control surfaces are largely touchscreens with very few physical switches. Now, this design has many benefits. For example, as Crew Dragon operations evolve, they can make upgrades to control interfaces using just a software patch rather than physically reconfiguring switches and dials, which adds cost and complications. The downside, well, at least for now, is largely the use of unproven technology and touch screens for essential spaceflight functions, but I'm sure that's something that will be part of the future of spaceflight. I am not worried.

SpaceX plans to use the Dragon 2/Crew Dragon variant for a mission to the Martian surface. They called him Red Dragon. The Red Dragon capsule will be launched aboard a Falcon Heavy on a trans-Martian injection trajectory. It would then brake aerodynamically into the Mars atmosphere and land propulsively. It would carry experiments, payloads or even rovers to preemptively explore future mission sites. However, things changed drastically for Dragon's future. The landing legs that came out of the heat shield proved difficult to qualify for NASA crew safety requirements. They were also not big fans of the propulsive landing method and preferred traditional parachutes as the primary landing method.

SpaceX had been counting on NASA support for Red Dragon development and possibly contracts for lander missions. With no prospect of landing Dragons on Earth or Mars, SpaceX halted development of propulsive landing technology. Instead, they decided to accelerate development of their largest next-generation Mars rocket, which eventually became Starship. Dragon would now use parachute systems to land. The SuperDraco engine would now simply be used as an abort engine. The capsule would fall into the ocean like the old Gemini and Apollo capsules. And unlike the Starliner, it will not be reused for human spaceflight. However, it will still be modified to be used as a cargo replenishment ship for the CRS-2 contract and replace the existing Dragon 1 fleet.

You may also have noticed something that looks a lot like a service module in Crew Dragon, but it's actually not. It's called a trunk and it actually has four main functions: the first is to hold the solar panels, the second is to hold the radiators that help keep the spacecraft cool, and the third is where the fins are mounted in case of a crash scenario. launch abort, and the fourth, which, in my opinion, one of the most fascinating aspects is a pressureless cargo hold, very similar to the one the space shuttle had, which allows Crew Dragon to carry supplies, exterior modules, or experiments to the Space Station which would be accessed through the Canadarm.

An American flag flew on the first space shuttle mission, STS-1, to the Columbia orbiter in April 1981. When Atlantis flew the final shuttle mission, STS-135, in July 2011 to the International Space Station, its fleet He helped build it, carried the same flag and left it on board. The next crew to fly to the ISS from US soil would retrieve this flag and return it to Earth as a symbolic gesture. This has fueled a race between the two companies to reach the ISS first; a capture of the flag, so to speak. This race, however, has been characterized by a slew of unexpected development challenges for both vendors.

In July 2018, Boeing's Starliner was undergoing testing on its abort systems when hypergolic propellant began leaking from the spacecraft due to a series of faulty valves. This was a critical problem and delayed the orbital test flight by more than a year. During the pad abort test in early 2019, one of the three main parachutes simply did not deploy. This was a cause for concern, but the test was still declared a success. However, the anomaly that occurred during its orbital flight test is a rather serious setback. The capsule was launched into a lower orbital trajectory rather than a stable orbit, so that if an anomaly occurs, its crew can easily exit orbit using the onboard thrusters, rather than having to be stuck in orbit.

After separation, the capsule was supposed to perform a series of orbit-raising burns to reach the ISS and rendezvous. The capsule, named Calypso, portrayed as the daughter of Atlas in Greek mythology, lifted off atop United Launch Alliance's Atlas V rocket in a new N22 configuration, which functioned normally, N22 meaning N without fairing, two solid rocket motors and two Centaur upper stage engines. However, after a successful separation, it began firing its thrusters quite heavily, resulting in rapid fuel consumption. A subsequent investigation revealed that the capsule's onboard computers had captured the incorrect elapsed time of the Atlas mission. And as a result, his watch was set back 11 hours.

It thought it was in the middle of performing an orbit raising burn, even though the main engines were not firing, and began using its thrusters to keep the capsule stable. It was also located between two tracking and data relay satellites, which meant it could not receive its orders from the ground. When controllers finally regained communication with Starliner, it had lost too much fuel. She couldn't reach the ISS and docking was out of the question. She was in an off-nominal orbit with strange parameters and was eventually deorbited and returned to Earth. Reentry and landing were successful. Now this was an embarrassing defect for a ship that cost billions to develop.

However, Boeing astronauts seem eager to test the capsule on its manned flight. Now, SpaceX has had its own problems, with abort systems and parachutes. Now, once the booster landing program was cancelled, parachutes became the mode of landing.main landing. However, a test conducted in 2019 showed undesirable results, so the parachutes had to undergo a redesign and NASA required 13 drop tests to qualify them. Now, SpaceX's orbital flight test had gone perfectly. The capsule launched perfectly on a Falcon 9 Block 5, docked with the ISS, had a series of hugely successful live broadcasts with an absolutely adorable Earth stuffed animal, and returned its passenger, a test dummy named Ripley in a suit.

SpaceX, safe and sound to Earth. However, the most worrying failure came after this. The DM-1 capsule from this mission was undergoing some propellant testing at Cape Canaveral. Then, it suddenly exploded. (booming explosion) A red nitrous plume of nitrous tetroxide rose into the sky and could be seen from all sides. A video of the incident was leaked, showing the capsule shattered by an internal explosion, making it a public and highly sensational failure. An investigation was launched, seeking probable cause. And after a few months, it was revealed that he had a very specific source. It turns out that the video was not the only thing that was leaked.

A faulty check valve allowed some nitrogen tetroxide to flow in the wrong direction and form a slug. When the system was pressurized with helium prior to ignition, the bullet accelerated directly toward the titanium valve, damaging and igniting it, leading to the explosive failure. The valve has since been replaced with a rupture disc and the system was verified by in-flight abort testing, which was amazing! Now, let's note that SpaceX received $2.6 billion to develop Crew Dragon, while Boeing received $4.2 billion to develop Starliner. Now, Boeing defended this by saying that SpaceX already had a cargo capsule in flight that they were modifying into a crewed version, while they had to start from scratch.

Now, SpaceX had opted to perform additional testing on its systems, while Boeing's route involved more simulations and paperwork to qualify the onboard systems. This represents a fundamental distinction between their approaches and possibly the effects are reflected in their failures. If Boeing had conducted more real-world testing, a simulation error, such as a clock problem on Starliner, may have been avoided. Similarly, if SpaceX had spent a little more time qualifying their parts, they would have noted that placing titanium near nitrogen tetroxide is not the best idea and is a known failure mode that has affected spacecraft in the past. .

Oh, and if you fly Dragon, you can use this. And if you fly Starliner, you can use this. So now that we've gone over both spacecraft, let's go over some of their technical specifications that you'll probably find interesting. The SpaceX Crew Dragon has the capacity to carry seven astronauts to low-Earth orbit, but NASA is opting for four or even three seats on the International Space Station because they want more room for pressurized cargo. It can survive on its own in low Earth orbit for a week or 210 days docked with the International Space Station. It can carry 6,000 kilograms or 13,000 pounds to orbit, as well as bring 3,000 kilograms or 6,600 pounds back.

You can have up to 1,300 cubic feet of unpressurized space with the trunk extended. That's a much bigger opportunity to transport cargo. Boeing's Starliner has some very similar attributes to SpaceX's Crew Dragon. In free flight, it can survive up to 60 hours in low Earth orbit, not as long as Crew Dragon, but a few days, enough time to reach the International Space Station or any other point in low Earth orbit. Once docked to the Space Station, it can remain there for 210 days because it enters passive mode. It can also carry up to seven crew members, and NASA also sends three or four crew members to the International Space Station, taking up that extra space for cargo.

And it has no uncompressed storage area. Manned flight tests for both capsules will take place soon. The United States will once again have its own human spaceflight capability, opening up many more possibilities for missions. In addition to missions to the ISS, we may see them used for a variety of other purposes. Perhaps foreign governments will be interested in purchasing seats for their crews in low Earth orbit. Perhaps there will be transport of researchers, tourists or engineers to private space stations in low Earth orbit. Maybe we'll see them used to ferry crews onto mopeds headed to the Moon or even Mars.

Then, who knows? I'm excited to see crews taking off from Cape Canaveral in American spacecraft again. So what do you think about the commercial crew program? Who do you think has a better chance of reaching the International Space Station first: Dragon or Starliner? (test pattern humming) Wait, Boeing is going to do what? Well well. Well, this is what happens when you record a video a month before it comes out. It turns out that Boeing needs to read a million lines of its software to re-certify its spacecraft for manned or crewed spaceflight, and that will probably delay the first crewed launch by, I know, about a year.

So I think it's pretty safe to say that SpaceX will win the capture the flag competition. But this is actually a really good teaching moment that we can talk about right now. This is one of the reasons why NASA wanted multiple suppliers for the commercial crew program, for events like this. If you look back at the Columbia and Challenger accidents, when the space shuttle crashed, it basically shut down all of NASA's manned space operations. That's because they had a launch vehicle. One of the things NASA and its international partners learned from the space shuttle is that multiple options are needed to access space, which is why having the Cygnus resupply ship, SpaceX's cargo Dragon, the Russian Progress vehicle and the Japanese vehicle, which escapes my memory.

But regardless, multiple options are needed to access space, and the same must be true for the crew. And NASA hoped that in case something happened to a Boeing spacecraft, they would still have a SpaceX spacecraft so they could access the Space Station on a regular basis and vice versa. God forbid something happened to the SpaceX Crew Dragon, they still had Starliner to lean on, as well as the Russian Soyuz. So you would go from one way to access the station with human crews to three. Now we are missing Starliner. It's going to take a while and Boeing is well aware of its mistake.

But I was going to do a poll on who do you think is going to win for the Space Station or win capture the flag, but I think we know who's going to win that race. But I still have hope for Ser. And anyway, back to the episode. (test pattern humming) Let me know in the poll above. Now, let's talk in the comments about commercial human spaceflight and whether you think it's the right way for missions to go further into space. Do you think NASA made the right decisions all those years ago or do you still miss the shuttle?

I'd love to hear your opinion. If you want to learn more about space history and just see cool things about space, feel free to follow me on Twitter. I'm @TJ_Cooney. And feel free to subscribe and follow me on my space storytelling journey here at I Need More Space. I can't wait to see what's coming. Thanks for watching and see you next time. Bye bye. (light and happy music)