(NewsNation) — NASA astronaut Butch Wilmore radioed Mission Control on Saturday about strange noises coming from the Boeing Starliner’s speakers.
“I’ve got a question about Starliner. There’s a strange noise coming through the speaker … I don’t know what’s making it,” he said in a recording of the audio shared by Michigan-based meteorologist Rob Dale.
Via “hardline,” operators at Johnson Space Center in Houston were able to listen in on Starliner’s pulsating soundtrack with Wilmore.
“Alright Butch, that one came through,” Mission Control responded. “It was kind of like a pulsing noise, almost like a sonar ping.”
The sounds triggered social media buzz about everything from international trouble to further complications with the troubled Boeing craft and even possible signs from aliens, former NASA astronaut José Hernández said he thinks it’s just interference.
“It’s probably picking up some noise from the International Space Station and transmitted it through the speaker system,” he told “NewsNation Now.” “I mean, there’s been cases where if we have our speaker system configured wrong, we can even pick up a short-wave sound and conversations from Earth onto our speaker system.”
He explained that the ISS is far from quiet, with equipment, pumps and other machines emitting frequencies at all hours.
“It doesn’t sound like feedback. It sounds like it’s picking up something from some type of motor or or, or device that’s nearby within the capsule or within the International Space Station.” Hernández said.
Wilmore and colleague Suni Williams’ stay at the ISS is scheduled to last roughly eight months following problems with the craft’s thrusters and helium leaks.
Those technical difficulties, Hernández emphasized, are not at all related to these mysterious noises.
“I think this is something completely independent, and not going to affect the performance of the Starliner,” he said. “This is more of a calm problem.”
The Starliner is set to return to Earth without its crew Sunday, while Williams and Wilmore will return home aboard a SpaceX craft in February.
