Pad Abort Test of Boeing's Starliner Spacecraft, Nov. 4, 2019

have a good day good morning everyone and welcome to our live coverage of the

boeing

pad

abort

test

we're coming to you live from the desert at the white sands missile range in new mexico i'm dan hewitt from nasa and today i'm privileged to be joined by jessica landa with

boeing

for what's going to be a very exciting and dynamic morning that's right janet it's an absolute pleasure to be here with you i mean it's such a beautiful morning in the desert today and it could be a little warmer, it could definitely be a little warmer, we were struggling a couple of days ago, weren't we, but we couldn't ask for a more beautiful morning for the first flight

test

platform

abort

of Starliner, which is really one of the last major milestones ahead. crew flight and a lot of things are going to happen very quickly and again it's going to be a very dynamic test so let's paint a picture of what people are going to see today yeah so at this point we're about nine miles Our far from takeoff and uh dan and I here we are about five miles west of the test bed and the mission director center is another 500 feet or so west of us so we did our launch minus 30 poles it was 20 minutes ago all good everything going across the board the wind at this point that windsock behind us really just barely moves the winds slightly out of the east so we are looking great and there are a couple of key targets we are going to be looking today what are we really because obviously we're going to see those launch abort motors on that's going to be the first one to start a really fast sequence of this paddleboard yeah so absolutely the pad abort test is really a test of

starliner

's comprehensive functionality of our abort system so you know we need to make sure we can keep the crew safe in the unlikely event there is an emergency and the

starliner

abort system is actually designed to be able to abort successfully in all phases of flight, so not just on the platform, but on the entire climb profile and you know we've tested the system at the component level, we've tested it at the subsystem level, and now we're testing on the integrated system performance level so we really want to make sure that all of these systems work together so that we can keep our crews safe so some of the things that you really want to keep in mind is that we really want those launch abort engines be able to propel that spaceship um away from the launch vehicle adapter which is actually right there on the pad uh today it's replacing the United Launch Alliance Atlas V rocket so we have four launch plate main engines that are 40,000 pound thrust each and we have a dozen omacs which are 1500 pound orbital maneuvering and attitude control thrusters each, so we really want to see them propel that spaceship away safely in the unlikely event of an emergency.

It's okay, it's guidance, navigation and control. You know we really have to be in control of that

spacecraft

all the time and it has to go in the general direction that we need it to go well, especially on launch day if this was the real one. we have to be able to get to the atlantic ocean and then you know all of our separation events have to work correctly you have to see the parachute sequence that you know how to throw and initiate correctly and then really each other The main separation events I just want to mention to you is you're going to see the service module separate from the crew module and that's a really critical separation event and I'll walk you through an animation here in just a minute but before you do just keep in mind that the module service vehicle will separate from the crew module, fall freely to the ground, and some of the residual propellant remaining in that vehicle may ignite and burn slightly.

I actually see a trail of colored smoke huh but that's exactly what we expect to happen huh keep in mind if this was real you'd be landing in the ocean but today you're landing in the desert so if we see some additional fireworks today expected and that's you'll see what we expect yeah then why don't we go through the animation So those launch abort engines will fire. Those LEDs will light up for about five seconds. Those omacs will continue to fire intermittently for another five seconds. it will all go pretty fast before you know it the

spacecraft

will start to do its pitch maneuver which is positioned in the proper orientation of the earth you will see the ascent shroud and forward heat shield throw off together afterwards Due to the sequence of the parachutes, two drop parachutes followed by three pilot parachutes, whose job is really just to take out the power grid and then you'll see three main parachutes deploy and you really know that the parachutes are really doing double duty here because they're not just designed to carry the crew module safely and slowly to the ground, but they're also jettisoned at the right time they deploy at the right time to make sure the spacecraft is in the proper orientation to properly separate that service module from the crew module crew, but like I said, you want to keep your eye on that crew module because that's where of course our Our precious cargo is about 60 seconds into the flight, that base heat shield is going to be jettisoned and that allows those great landing airbags to deploy.

Keep in mind that Starliner will be the first US-made orbital crew capsule to land on the ground and you'll get a sneak peek of that today. that's right and we've been here a couple of times doing those landing tests, one of the main landing zones for the Starliner style will be here at the Whitestone spaceport, right next to an old runway that the shuttle landed on once time on your show at sts-3 so there's a lot of exciting stuff happening today it's important to note that i want to say this is a challenging test we're really putting the vehicle in one of the most dynamic situations it could possibly be in Europa you are pretending to get the crew out of an extremely dangerous situation and at NASA we have a fairly recent history with the importance of systems like these our astronaut nick hague last year in october was on a russian soyuz spacecraft and miscarried while he was in way uphill but was able to land successfully thanks to an abort system together with his crewmate Alexei from China, so the The really important tests here today are a really important system, but it just feeds into what we need to do to make sure that when we're ready to go put the crew on one of these spacecraft, they'll be in a safe place, oh, absolutely, you know, I think the Boeing team thinks about that all the time, you know we're constantly thinking about safety and how can we absolutely make sure that our crew is in the safest vehicle that we can let you know I just want you to know to show you a video actually uh from the starliner production facility in florida uh when they were signing the spaceship um you know this the gentleman you see signing it here his name is kevin and he's one of our lead techs he told me earlier you know hey jess yeah something's not okay i'm not going to sleep tonight i'm going in the next day and we'll do it we'll do it right um and you know you see here you have our president of boein g and boeing executive director defense space and security leanne corette who is signing the spaceship now you can see her signing a little note to her father the other person who actually worked on the apollo program so leanne was born on the space coast so what space heritage is in his family and you know the whole boeing team is behind space on this particular show yeah and we're actually listening on our loops right now that they're going to be on hold for a second, we're going to take a few moments and figure out what's going on but we're still getting great views of starliner on their platform with that service module so stick with us for just a couple of moments we'll get a new time update on what our count was regressive yes and again we're currently on hold we're just waiting to see what problem the teams are working on we'll get a new t-zero tie Time for you hopefully in a bit but we have a three hour window today so the seven o'clock mountain was right at the beginning of our window so plenty of time for the teams to take it easy . make sure they're not working on any problems before we see Starliner take to the air is right and you know, let's go ahead and talk about that team a little bit.

Our flight director for today is actually alicia evans. alicia led the team through the starliner environmental rating testing a campaign you know we really passed with flying colors so we're incredibly proud of alicia excited to hear her on the flight loop today um and then you'll be hearing jim louder too he it's our flight dynamics officer you'll hear him come here in a moment ahead and and and give us all the milestones as they happen during the test you know but you know why we wait I actually want to take us back and show a video here of the team which deploys the spacecraft in preparation for launch so this was actually and we'll give our production team a second here to get that video ready but you know what was really amazing about this operation is it's one of the more dangerous and complicated operations than The team will see the spacecraft here leaving the Fittiff, which is our test facility here on site at the compl launch axis 32, and you'll see her come out of that building. on the morning clock it took them until about 10 o'clock to get it into place but just think about it this is a fuel filled vehicle that they are dropping here and I think it was a hundred ton crane they used to get it up onto the gantry and then they had to hand-tighten 278 bolts to get it in place, uh, very, very proud of the team there, they knew they had practiced for a couple of weeks. jeff bertelsen, who was our recovery.

The leader of this test told us about it the other day and you know they practiced with some of what we call our boilerplate vehicles, which are the ones we use to practice our landing airbags and parachutes, so we're very proud of them and they really got the job done yeah the r Most of the team have been on consoles since at least 10 last night so they've been working through the night to get everything ready for our test today again we have a three-hour window that just opened at seven. the teams if they're just coming together are looking at a couple of things on the spaceship so we're expecting a t z t minus zero but as soon as we hear that we'll let you know but we'll still qualify for great views let's go to have views through some tracking cameras of the white sands, the people here in Wismer do a lot of missile testing and things like that, so they have things, they have these cameras that can track things that are going very fast through the air, like this which is perfect for a test like today and this will also be one of the main if not the main landing sites for Starliner once it's flying you know I have to say the missile range of White Sands and White Sands are just amazing partners of ours.

The US Army really couldn't do it without them. You know they are such an integral part of the Starliner team. Like you said, we have two landing zones here at White Sands. This is also where we do our parachute testing. the other side of the mountain here, on top of that, this is where we did our service module hot fire test and of course our paddleboarding test today so we couldn't do it without the US military. and white sands, uh, their amazing partners of ours and from what I understand, uh, you're pretty familiar with white sands as well, right?

Yeah we actually used the exact same stand for our orion spacecraft paddleboard a few years back and I've had the chance to go out with the boeing crews a couple of times now to do these practices for landing and recovery it's really exciting I got something from experience doing it in kazakhstan with the russian soyuz this is completely different environment completely different equipment completely different but it's really exciting it's usually a little bit hotter when we're here i think it usually goes up to around 100 during the summer because we've been here in july and august it's a little bit colder this morning but not too bad and we haven't had weather constraints like we previously heard no we haven't. the right temperature overnight and you know we have a little bit of a 15 knot wind restriction but that's really just we can move the gantry back um so thatyou know the weather has been good and and um you know I'm very excited to see how this test plays out because you know we're going to be going 650 miles per hour and probably about five seconds.

There will be so many dynamic events that we are going to get data. during this two minute test and I know this is a particular r that the team is very excited to see happen that's right and again if you just joined us we're expecting a new t-minus zero so the new release time for platform abort sounds like we're getting close we're going to pause for a moment listen and then we should be able to give you that new release time in just a moment okay okay we're here and we've got a new t-minus zero time now we're looking at 715 mountain 9 15 yeah it looks like the team was taking another look at propellant pressurization when I looked back at what they saw on the screen and they said hey you know still we're good so we're going to go ahead and just reset to 7 15 and that's take a look at the clock here which isn't too far off right?

Yeah, we should be over and over again if you're just joining our original zero t. to go at 7 15. if you want, why don't we show them again? Because it's going to be a very dynamic test, very fast, like Jessica said, 650 miles. an hour in just five seconds for that thing to shoot off that platform real quick, yeah, and why doesn't one more lead us again and that's exactly what we want to see? shoot with those omaxes and we want to see the spacecraft actually shoot off that launch pad like you said 650 miles per hour in about five seconds we're going to reach apogee here pretty quickly I think we hit it in about 19 seconds we're going to start to doing that pitch maneuver which just puts the spacecraft in the correct orientation to open that landing sequence and that really kicks in when once you see the ascent shroud and forward heat shield come off which really allows start the parachute sequence you're going to see two drogue parachutes followed by three pilot shots and that really bring out the power grid over and over again those parachutes are really doing double duty here for this test not only do they have ex the weight of the chute service connected right and your main job is really to make sure they get that crew module down slowly and steadily. ra, but on top of that, they're deploying at a certain time that pushes the spacecraft back and into a proper orientation to safely release that service module and then you'll see that you know the bucket handle releases as just see that's also pretty critical that lets us know it goes down really well in a stable one that's right on top of our airbags um and then you'd see the base heat shield come undone which allows those airbags to uh and I have to tell you I'm really looking forward to seeing that today you know our team has worked really hard to make sure that we can design a system that's safe and also reusable and lands on the ground you know these modules Starliner crew crews are reusable spaceships and one of the ways we can do that is because landing on the ground, yes, and important to add again for people, the mod service aircraft will break off and impact the ground and there will be some residual fuel on board that can ignite so if you see that it's totally expected and as we're talking about they're going to land on dry land but if we were in a crash scenario paddleboarding on a real day, you have the atlantic ocean that you would be riding over, so the service module will fall into the water. followed soon after by the crew capsule under the parachutes that's correct and we can also talk a bit about how the team plans to do some of the recovery after today's testing is complete for the crew module, of course recover. taken back to launch complex 32 for evaluation and analysis and we really want to make sure we get all the data back from that crew module we do we're flying an anthropomorphic test dummy there and we want to get all the data back from our in d as well and those data is really critical, so we're going to go out, we're going to recover it, we're going to bring it back to the launch site for evaluation and analysis, now the service module is a little bit different, uh, and combined. the boeing team, uh, the united states military and an industrial and environmental services company called clean arbors are actually going to come out, we're going to salvage the vehicle and then dispose of it properly and i think it's going to be a process that will probably take two or three days, you know we have some data that we're also hoping to get from the service module, but I guess that will depend on what state it's in, yes, but we're less than five minutes away again. that the launch time right now is set for 715 mountain 915 eastern time in just a couple of minutes we're going to show the actual launch control loop where you'll be able to listen to the flight director and some of the other folks again explain to us who's who we're going to hear on these loops this morning yeah so once again you're going to hear from alicia evans she's our flight director today and alicia as i said before environmental qualification test campaign letter and That was a really critical test campaign for us because what we do is we go ahead and build an entire spacecraft and then we ship it out to California our people on the second one were just amazing in terms of our environmental qualification campaign and what they we do is shake it and bake it kind of like what we say in the world of spaceships where we make sure we put it through the exact same conditions we v It was going to be in orbit we made sure that you know you can handle the oscillations and the temperature you know the radiation and all that kind of stuff and like I said in the past with great success Alicia led that campaign, now she's leading the first flight test from starliner we couldn't be more proud of her and once again you're going to hear from jim tougher as well he's our flight dynamics officer today so you'll hear the takeoff line coming from alicia and then the rest of the events in this sequence you'll hear from jim so at this point we're at t minus two minutes and Proceeding to launch so Dan and I are going to go ahead and listen while you go the Starliner light is slippery.

All commands are complete. and counting 20 seconds and counting nine eight seven six five four three two one zero lift off road full led cut off on track oh man cut tone around 40 kill parachute sm says two nets fully distribute these heat shield get rid of bags of air inflating cm touchdown all good Well we have Starliner taking off for the first time and touching down safely and beautifully on the desert floor that was just amazing but it's kind of hard not to get a little excited here. I'm watching it, but that was phenomenal. The initial indication is that we've had a very successful paddleboard test today. watch it lift off the pad and then the sound hits you about five or six seconds later you just hear that rumble on the desert floor when Starliner is already going absolutely across the sky and to see it land like that now you saw the landing under two good mains um which is certainly well within acceptable acceptable limits for this particular test we've tested with two good mains and qualifying and that's acceptable for our landing sequence so this was just awesome it was awesome to see this test and it was absolutely amazing, just a little look at a replay here again, i hope you didn't blink, because 650 miles per hour in five seconds, that thing sure triggered a test. and it didn't um you got those launch abort engines firing uh those four launch port engines 40,000 lbs of thrust from the omax mount uh another 1500 lbs of thrust each on those that continue to fire you saw them pilot parachutes taking out mains power there after that pitching maneuver and then of course you saw the service module at some point go down and I'm just referring to how absolutely beautiful it really is the site parachutes doing their job here in terms of making sure that they can get the spacecraft in the correct orientation to safely release that service module to the ground and of course they know we want to keep an eye on that crew module, you know, I think our people, uh, up there in florida are going to be really interested to see the data that comes out of this test today for sure and again we did see two out of three parachutes but that's a stable condition and that's just go into what we have in spaceflight r redundancy yeah if you've ever been absolutely close to anyone from NASA or Boeing or any of the space companies redundancy redundancy we have backups for our backups of all of that and that's really a great example of how it can work don't go exactly as your design yeah and actually we could have um you know our fault tolerance on that really you know one went out and also a parent so we have redundancy like you said incorporated and it's just again it's so amazing to see those landing airbags on our spacecraft landing you know it's going to be amazing to see it on a mission return right here right around the corner December 17th, yes, absolutely, you know, I know.

I just want to give a quick hello to our people at the starliner production facility in florida who I know are watching right now also to our people in houston who are watching and our people across the country know you've done such an amazing job It's very hard for this moment today and seeing a spaceship that you built on a launch pad for the first time means the world and i'll tell you what you guys were just as beautiful in person as you would. as you'd imagine yeah but i mean there it is we'll continue to give some of these give you some of these great views and maybe even a couple of reruns we're going to hang out for a while we know a couple of people were here watching, including our first Starliner team, that's right, we hope to get you here in just a couple of minutes, absolutely yes, and you know, let me again, remind people how we're going to be. recovering the spacecraft today that crew module you see there that is going to be recovered brought back to launch complex 32 for assessment analysis again we know we want to make sure we get all the data from that spacecraft of course the Initial indication here is that we've had a successful test b but you know we really want to take a hard look at all the data and hand it over to NASA and of course make sure that everything worked as well as it seemed to us and the service module um is another one is going to be recovered a little bit differently like I said we're going to get a little bit of information from that service module if we can depending on what condition it's in but a combined team from Boeing the US military U.S. and an industrial and environmental services company called clean gazebos, they're going to go out and we're going to insure that vehicle and we're going to go ahead and dispose of it properly, so it's really exciting the crew module, of course we're going to keep the reusability possible, you know? of course there is flight hardware in there that we could reuse if we needed to but you know once again the key here is that those crew modules are reusable vehicles you know we have two additional spacecraft in our production facility in florida of course , the Starliner that's going to launch here in December for our first uncrewed orbital flight test to the international space station and then we have the uh spacecraft that's going to launch crew, it was actually the first spacecraft that we've ever built sent out for tests of environmental qualification that Alicia was a part of and um and we also have that spacecraft in the factory actually you may have seen some pictures of our complete and fully built orbital flight test vehicle actually rolling into one of our hazardous processing areas for fueling preparing to deploy on the platform rma all is on track for the first two space starliner flight to the international space station we already posted some news on that right now we are targeting december 17th so if you are going to be on the space coast over the holidays i might It would be a good idea to go out for a rocket launch, yes, and I will tell you that this liner is the first human being. spaceships built and launched in florida so if you live on the space coast we really hope to see you come out and support your hometown girl and see her fly because that's going to be really awesome yeah there's a couple things coming up . for the next few weeks starliner itself will be powered at that c3pf, that right production facility where it is beingbuilding the starliner, it will then move to the ula vertical integration facility.

I'm trying to get all my acronyms correct. hey you're doing a good job huh ula actually stacking the rocket today so getting it ready again we're targeting December 17th for that launch it'll be a flight up to the space station it'll get there in about a day I think which is the last dynamic that can change depending on where the altitude of the station is over time it will be about a day up there it will dock it will be the first successful Starliner docking you will have it there for a couple of days and then we'll meet back here just a couple of days after yeah absolutely uh you know it's really amazing to take another look here at this crew module on the desert floor you know it's the first time starliner has taken off uh i just wanna say i gotta say you know to see it go down huh and land in the in the desert there under those landing airbags it's just we're going to make history when it does on a return to space mission. o uh here in december like you said uh but watching it today is hard not to get a little excited just knowing the people back home who just put their hearts and souls into this you know it's funny because we show a little bit of spaceship footage that was signed in florida before and i know i talked about kevin a little bit.

I don't think I mentioned Jonna, who was also in that archive file. And here's a really fun fact about her. You know your daughter actually says the spaceship is her little brother because her mom just spends and the stars and the people at the production factory in florida people in houston and across the country that have helped us and have just put their hearts and souls into this show um it's full of people like kevin and jonna and they really hope they're smiling ear to ear this morning and getting ready to celebrate and again if you're just now tuning in you're watching starliner is on the desert floor that paddleboarding successfully made our t-zero our launch time was 7 15 am. m. mountain 9 15 a. m. this one was over in a flash I think it was from start to finish it's only about a 95 second or so test so it was over fast but we could see all the events happened in sequence those four launch abort engines they lit up and threw starliner into the air away from om the platform and then get in the right orientation launching around using those thrusters on the side getting good shots there are good drugs out of the service modules separating correct everything looked fantastic this morning two good entrees so still in a stable setup yes their bags inflating and touching the desert floor and as we said those two good entrees are certainly well within the acceptable limits of this test. which at this point you know you see the pitch maneuver occur um and those as he prepares to go ahead and start the parachute sequence um you saw those uh it looks like those two drugs followed by those three pilots here come the main ones and uh how we'll continue reproducing that here i'm just going to go ahead and get people excited here getting ready to welcome the flight test crew to the boeing and starliner astronauts that just stopped w we're going to go ahead and talk to them go ahead and catch them hey come on guys come on yeah let's get them all to come on okay come on mikey come here with me nicole go ahead and get in the middle of these guys um ok so um just awesome test me and dan were here I know you guys were looking at, uh, the test near, um, this of course is the boeing starliner crew flight test equipment, we have the boeing astronaut. chris ferguson nasa astronaut nicole mann and mike fink and let me start with this guy because this is really this here is the legend of space flight uh mike fink this will be his fourth time in space on starliner here coming soon on our test crew flight , but on top of that, this will be your third vehicle, so as weird as it is to be an astronaut, it's even weirder to fly in your third vehicle, so what were your impressions today from today's test? i hope we never need to use this system b But in case we ever have any problems on board the beautiful atlas 5 on the launch pad, we noted after today's test that we will be able to take off safely and then come back and try again a different day so this shows that Boeing is committed to safety and we're looking forward to flying a safe spacecraft and today really showed that it's beautiful so how will it feel for NASA to have a transportation system of crew one more time?

It's been a long time since we did it. I launched outside of the United States. We really appreciate our friends in Russia for having the launch vehicle on the Soyuz. I flew on it twice. It's a great launch vehicle. Great spaceship and uh but it's time for more options and uh The commercial crew program is opening up a new industry for the United States and it's an exciting time. moment when you were in the seat huh and you were looking at the panels and you know our human factor systems engineer huh selena was there and you turned to her and you said ya see what you guys are doing here and it looks good with the panels and I know that she was really moved by that comment. team thank you im glad to be a part of the team as well and of course nasa astronaut nicole mann this will be her first time in space marine fighter pilot so at this point like i told you Where were you in our recovery area for the mission dress rehearsal?

We saw you in Florida. Do you start to feel like it's thrown around the corner at this point? the chance to be in the rover a few times but at the cape last week we were in the spaceship and it was all finished and all the final panels were on and it looks a lot like our trainers and that's good news we've been through a lot of training , so it's nice to see the final products online and big milestones like today's test just show that we're getting really close and then chris for you very quickly so you closed the transportation program and then you came to boeing shortly after and I mean it.

The show has been a part of your life for the past two years. What is it like to be here now after Starliner took off for the first time? Hey, so I've imagined what this day would be like. this trajectory of what this pad abort would look like for a long time huh and actually seeing it happen was just fantastic and it worked uh pretty much the way i had always envisioned uh and i really have to uh i have to have to hats off to the boeing team u m you know as we speak uh of course we have this big test going on uh today uh on the east coast we are fueling our vehicle for the uh platform for the uh orbital flight test which is taking place in december so in both coasts we have major operations to restore manned spaceflight from the united states of america this is a very proud moment for me it should be a very proud moment for the whole boeing team that made this happen and you know hopefully our customers from NASA are equally happy with the progress we've made and, uh, you know it's a great day for the United States of America. ca that's right yeah as a nasa guy it was great to be here with the boeing team i know we're all very excited too our nasa astronauts the boeing team really a fantastic day we don't want to keep you guys too long i'm sure you all want to start celebrating this is a really successful day so thank you for running so fast and having a couple of f minutes with us i really appreciate it thank you really thank you thank you excited to be here great absolutely thank you thank you guys so much so that's a tv that's right so at this point you know what's next for starliner our uncrewed flight uh test to the international space station scheduled for december 17th i can't wait for that i'm so excited i hope it Everybody tune in and watch us and like we said if you're on the space coast you better come out and support your hometown girl that's right and com Or we said, there's a couple of milestones leading up to the spacecraft being powered very soon, deploying to the ula law vehicle integration facility, and actually stacking on top of the rocket that we're looking at that on. the next two weeks so stay tuned again you can follow boeing on social media at owingspace.boeing.com and then nasa nasa.gov and our various social media sites including the business team on twitter, facebook, instagram, we are everywhere so keep following thanks for waking up and seeing this first starliner test flight today its the first time taking the successful paddleboarding to the skies this morning thank you so much see you all out there.