Bullet-point summary of what’s going on, for anyone who isn’t aware:
Following the scrub of the first launch attempt (due to a leaky valve in ULA’s Centaur upper stage – nothing to do with the spacecraft) an unrelated problem was found: a helium link in Starliner’s propulsion system
This leak was well within safety tolerances, and after some analysis they decided to go ahead with launch without attempting a repair
Eventually, after another scrub (due to a power supply failure for one of the launch sequencers – again, nothing to do with the spacecraft), Starliner got off the ground and docked to the ISS.
During the approach phase of the docking, two more helium leaks were discovered, and then a fourth leak was discovered.
Also during the approach phase, several of Starliner’s RCS thrusters failed. Mission controllers managed to restore all but one of these failed thrusters.
None of these failures have breached safety margins.
Because this is a TEST FLIGHT, NASA and Boeing have repeatedly postponed the end of the mission in order to, y'know, TEST THE SPACECRAFT. (These failures occurred in Starliner’s service module (which is discarded upon re-entry), the only place they can test it is in situ.)
The crews of Starliner and Expedition 71 are well-provisioned for this extension. They aren’t just gonna let everyone run out of food or over-saturate the CDRA or whatever.
These events have been reported on (by idiots) as “Starliner is stranded on the ISS??????????????? SpaceX will have to save Starliner because broken and stranded?????????????????? Boeing spacecraft not safe to fly not safe to return to Earth???????????”
And thus you get comment threads full of horseshit like this:
TL;DR Boeing’s new crew capsule has suffered some minor malfunctions and has been asked to stay in space for longer so they can figure out the whys and the hows, because this is a test flight and that’s what you do on test flights – you test the spacecraft.
