US astronaut responds to 'starplane' malfunction:

Recently, American astronauts Wilmore and Williams, who were stranded on the International Space Station for over 9 months due to a malfunction of the "Starliner" spacecraft, successfully returned to Earth on March 18th aboard SpaceX's "Dragon" spacecraft. On March 31st, the two held a press conference at NASA's Johnson Space Center to answer questions from reporters about the malfunction of the "interstellar passenger plane". ​

At the press conference, when asked who should be blamed for the malfunction of the "StarCraft", spacecraft commander Wilmore reflected first, "I will start with myself. As the commander of the spacecraft, I should have asked some questions, but I didn't ask, and I didn't know I needed to ask..." He also pointed out that he didn't like the expression "blame". The responsible party for the problems that occurred during the return to Earth "runs through the entire chain", and NASA and Boeing are equally responsible. ​

Wilmore and Williams both expressed their willingness to embark on another mission aboard an interstellar aircraft. We need to fix all the problems we encounter and solve them. They plan to meet with Boeing leadership on April 2nd to further discuss spacecraft related issues. ​

Looking back at the incident, on June 5th last year, Wilmore and Williams boarded a Boeing "StarCraft" and flew to the International Space Station to carry out the spacecraft's first manned test flight mission. The spacecraft arrived at the space station on June 6th and was originally scheduled to return on June 14th. However, due to issues such as propulsion failures and helium leaks, the return time has been repeatedly postponed. For safety reasons, NASA  The final decision was to have the 'interstellar passenger plane' leave the space station on September 6th last year and return to Earth without carrying anyone. Two astronauts returned to Earth in March of this year aboard SpaceX's Dragon spacecraft and stayed in space for a total of 286 days. ​

In addition, according to Reuters, NASA is working with Boeing to solve the propulsion system malfunction of the "StarCraft". NASA  Steve Stitch, the manager of the commercial manned spaceflight program, stated that the plan is to complete the manned flight certification of the Boeing CST-100 "StarCraft" later this year or early 2026. Currently, both parties are finalizing the testing plan and schedule for the propulsion system, and plan to conduct testing and analysis in the spring and summer seasons to prepare for the next flight of the "StarCraft".