Planning For Space Rescue

Starliner in orbit The Starliner saga has helped highlight the need to develop practices and procedures for space rescue. (credit: NASA) Planning for space rescue by Jeff Foust Monday, January 6, 2025 The Starliner astronauts will spend even more time in orbit. Last month, NASA announced that it was postponing the launch of the Crew-10 mission to the International Space Station from late February to late March, giving SpaceX more time to complete the new Crew Dragon spacecraft—the fifth and final one in the company’s fleet—that will fly the mission. That will push back the departure of the Crew-9 Crew Dragon to perhaps early April. “What’s missing in all this is an explicit requirement to prepare for and develop capabilities to perform rescues,” Cates said. “That’s what we’re trying to advocate for.” Crew-9 will return, among others, NASA astronauts Suni Williams and Butch Wilmore, who have been on the station since early June. They arrived on Starliner’s crewed test flight, but remained on the station when NASA decided in August to return Starliner uncrewed on safety grounds (see “Whither Starliner?”, The Space Review, September 9, 2024). The two, once projected to spend as little as eight days on the ISS, will instead be there close to ten months. NASA has, throughout this process, rejected claims that Wilmore and Williams are “stuck” or “stranded” on the station, noting that throughout their time on the station they have had the ability to return to Earth in the event of an emergency, either on Starliner—which made a safe uncrewed landing in September—or on Crew Dragon. That did, though, require some creativity during the time in September after Starliner’s departure and the arrival of the Crew-9 Crew Dragon, when the station crew created temporary accommodations in the Crew-8 Crew Dragon for Wilmore and Williams should that spacecraft need to evaluate, since its four seats were already assigned to its original crew. Whether or not one considers the two Starliner astronauts stranded or not, the situation has raised awareness of the challenges of space rescue. Some believe that now is the time to start addressing those issues before an actual rescue is needed. “This is by far the most exciting time in human spaceflight,” said Steve Isakowitz, president and CEO of The Aerospace Corporation, in a recent interview. “With all of that excitement, it’s really an opportune time to examine where we’ve been and where we need to go in crew safety.” Aerospace has been one of the organizations highlighting the need to consider space rescue issues now. In its 2024 Space Safety Compendium report published in December, it highlighted what it called the “in-space rescue capability gap” that exists today for missions to low Earth orbit or beyond. “Neither the U.S. government nor commercial spaceflight providers currently have plans in place to conduct a timely rescue of a crew or participants from a distressed spacecraft in LEO or anywhere else in space,” the report stated. Grant Cates, senior project leader at The Aerospace Corporation, noted in a briefing about the report that the Outer Space Treaty and other agreements direct nations to provide assistance in the event astronauts are in distress. “What’s missing in all this is an explicit requirement to prepare for and develop capabilities to perform rescues,” he said. “That’s what we’re trying to advocate for.” The report made several recommendations about in-space rescue, from broad steps to address the gap to technical specifics like the use of common docking adapters. “The rescue of people in distress or imminent danger is something that all nations can cooperate on,” he said. “We need to give thought about how rescues can be done ahead of time rather than in response to a realtime crisis.” While the report provided several recommendations, Isakowitz and others said the biggest near-term priority is one of awareness. “At the moment, we’re in the call-to-action phase of this,” said Brian Weeden, systems director at Aerospace’s Center for Space Policy and Strategy. “We’re trying to highlight the need for more global attention to this issue in part because it is a massive challenge.” “This is an opportunity for new leadership in Washington to take the initiative on an issue that has been long overlooked,” Culbertson said. “It’s an opportunity to do some good for the community.” That includes an op-ed published in October by the Orlando Sentinel authored by three previous NASA administrators—Charles Bolden, Jim Bridenstine, and Sean O’Keefe—as well as Isakowitz and former astronauts Frank Culbertson and John Grunsfeld. They called for the development of “international capabilities and collaboration for in-space rescue to support the breadth of emerging international private and public sector crewed activities in Earth orbit and out to cislunar space.” One of the first steps, they said, is to see who in the US government would be responsible for at least coordinating in-space rescue. “We need to figure out who is going to take the lead,” Culbertson said in an interview. “We need to make sure we as a nation come up with a good plan for executing a rescue if necessary.” Aerospace, though, has stopped short of recommending what agency—NASA, the Space Force, or someone else—should be in the lead. “I don’t know how long it would take to identify an agency,” Isakowitz said, but added that there was work that could be done in the meantime to develop voluntary guidelines and standards associated with rescue. “We do need a government agency to do some coordination, but there are things to do absent it,” Weeden said. He cited the example of CONFERS, the industry group that has developed voluntary standards for satellite servicing, as a mechanism for efforts like establishing standards for docking or spacesuits. The issue with suit compatibility was seen on Starliner. The Boeing-developed pressure suits that Williams and Wilmore wore to the station were compatible only with Starliner; their interfaces were incompatible with SpaceX’s Crew Dragon, just as Crew Dragon pressure suits would be incompatible with Starliner. Having a government agency with the lead on in-space rescue could help with international coordination. That could be done through something like the Artemis Accords, Isakowitz suggested, which more than 50 countries have now signed. “It’s an opportunity for the US to lead,” he said. “We shouldn’t be waiting for a Kursk disaster to be the impetus” for in-space rescue, Isakowitz said. Ultimately, Weeden said any international agreement on standards for in-space rescue would need to go to the United Nations and its Committee on the Peaceful Uses of Outer Space (COPUOS). The issue is not on the COPUOS agenda and it can take time to add it, but one option would be to incorporate it into an “action team” formed last year devoted to lunar activities consultation. There’s no need, he added, for a treaty-level agreement since the principles for rescue are included in the Outer Space Treaty and subsequent Rescue Agreement. The focus should instead be on implementing those principles. Another factor for the timing of the discussions, they said, is a change in administrations. “This is an opportunity for new leadership in Washington to take the initiative on an issue that has been long overlooked,” Culbertson said. “It’s an opportunity to do some good for the community.” Isakowitz noted that Aerospace has been looking at in-space rescue issues for a few years, including a workshop held about a year ago that brought in experts from government and industry. “We want to continue this discussion,” he said. “We think a new administration can take steps here.” He and other emphasized the need to get in front of the in-space rescue challenge before there is an emergency. He noted that the 2000 accident involving the Russian submarine Kursk “got nations talking about the need to have equipment that is compatible” for a rescue. “We shouldn’t be waiting for a Kursk disaster to be the impetus” for in-space rescue, he said. “It’s still the early days, and this is the most efficient point to factor those things into designs.” “I don’t want the first serious accident to take place before you have a lifeboat,” Culbertson said. Jeff Foust (jeff@thespacereview.com) is the editor and publisher of The Space Review, and a senior staff writer with SpaceNews. He also operates the Spacetoday.net web site. Views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the author alone.