Meet Rosie, Boeing’s First Anthropometric Starliner Commander
Rosie the Rocketeer, Boeing’s anthropometric test device, claimed her spot once again in the commander’s seat inside the company’s CST-100 Starliner spacecraft for its second uncrewed Orbital Flight Test (OFT-2) for NASA’s Commercial Crew Program. Rosie’s first flight, OFT, provided hundreds of data points about what astronauts will experience during flight. For OFT-2, she will help maintain Starliner’s center of gravity during ascent, docking, undocking and landing. OFT-2 is scheduled to lift off at 6:54 p.m. ET Thursday, May 19, from Space Launch Complex 41 at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in Florida bound for the International Space Station. Photo credit: Boeing/John Proferes
Though no crew will be onboard the spacecraft for NASA’s Boeing Orbital Flight Test-2, the Starliner commander’s seat will be occupied by Rosie the Rocketeer, Boeing’s anthropometric test device. During OFT-1, Rosie was outfitted with 15 sensors to collect data on what astronauts will experience during flights on Starliner. For OFT-2, spacecraft data capture ports previously connected to Rosie’s 15 sensors will be used to collect data from sensors placed along the seat pallet, which is the infrastructure that holds all the crew seats in place.
