Quote from: okan170 on 01/26/2017 05:13 pmQuote from: woods170 on 01/26/2017 08:29 amYes. And some of the technical problems that bedeviled Dragon 2 in late 2015 were a direct result of NASA adding additional requirements. The most prominent one being the requirement to have early missions of Dragon 2 land in the ocean under parachutes, in stead of propulsive landing on land. Other technical problems are associated with the fact that both companies are now deep into the "bending metal" phase.When did that change get made? I remember at the intro events in 2014 that NASA talked about where it was generally agreed that it would start with water landings and then move to land landings if it was proven, and I had assumed that was the plan from the outset, but I could easily have been mistaken. I thought that the public Commercial Crew documents showed that they had proposed the water landings at first, perhaps thinking that NASA wouldn't go for land landings at the outset (or maybe that it would've affected their bid for the contract?).Well, they always had to have water landings as almost any abort scenario required it.
Quote from: woods170 on 01/26/2017 08:29 amYes. And some of the technical problems that bedeviled Dragon 2 in late 2015 were a direct result of NASA adding additional requirements. The most prominent one being the requirement to have early missions of Dragon 2 land in the ocean under parachutes, in stead of propulsive landing on land. Other technical problems are associated with the fact that both companies are now deep into the "bending metal" phase.When did that change get made? I remember at the intro events in 2014 that NASA talked about where it was generally agreed that it would start with water landings and then move to land landings if it was proven, and I had assumed that was the plan from the outset, but I could easily have been mistaken. I thought that the public Commercial Crew documents showed that they had proposed the water landings at first, perhaps thinking that NASA wouldn't go for land landings at the outset (or maybe that it would've affected their bid for the contract?).
Yes. And some of the technical problems that bedeviled Dragon 2 in late 2015 were a direct result of NASA adding additional requirements. The most prominent one being the requirement to have early missions of Dragon 2 land in the ocean under parachutes, in stead of propulsive landing on land. Other technical problems are associated with the fact that both companies are now deep into the "bending metal" phase.
Eric Berger has now written an article on what he thinks will be further delays, predicting no crew flight for either Starliner or Dragon before 2019. No real specifics in the article though:http://arstechnica.com/science/2017/01/sources-neither-boeing-nor-spacex-likely-ready-to-fly-crews-until-2019/
Among those flights will be an uncrewed test flight of the Dragon V2 spacecraft, which will likely dock with the space station.
Another clear mistake in Eric's article is the assumption that crews must be assigned 18 months prior to their flight because of the long preparation needed for their stay on the ISS. He overlooks the fact that the first CCP operational mission will have it's astro's on board ISS for just two (2) months, not the usual six (6). No 18 month prep period needed.
Quote from: woods170 on 01/27/2017 03:37 pmAnother clear mistake in Eric's article is the assumption that crews must be assigned 18 months prior to their flight because of the long preparation needed for their stay on the ISS. He overlooks the fact that the first CCP operational mission will have it's astro's on board ISS for just two (2) months, not the usual six (6). No 18 month prep period needed.Duration of visit doesn't negate a lot of the training though. There's less training for specific experiments but all of the emergency, contingency, operations, eva, etc all has to be done, likely in full. They can't do 1/3 of the systems familiarization simply because they'll only be there 1/3 of the time.
Quote from: rayleighscatter on 01/27/2017 08:53 pmQuote from: woods170 on 01/27/2017 03:37 pmAnother clear mistake in Eric's article is the assumption that crews must be assigned 18 months prior to their flight because of the long preparation needed for their stay on the ISS. He overlooks the fact that the first CCP operational mission will have it's astro's on board ISS for just two (2) months, not the usual six (6). No 18 month prep period needed.Duration of visit doesn't negate a lot of the training though. There's less training for specific experiments but all of the emergency, contingency, operations, eva, etc all has to be done, likely in full. They can't do 1/3 of the systems familiarization simply because they'll only be there 1/3 of the time.Every NASA astronaut from day one receives the routine/emergency standard ISS procedures practice/study etc. They only need the refresher course just prior to a mission which should be only a few months.A BTW 6 months of that claimed 18 months of ISS training is actually Soyuz training occurring in Russia. So the unique ISS training is only 12 months.
So in an emergency water landing situation, where they came down in some random ocean because they had no choice, rescue crews are expected to get to them within a few hours. On the other hand, for a planned landing in the ocean where their drop point is predetermined, it might take a full day for the support ship to arrive.Does this seem backwards to anyone else?
Quote from: oldAtlas_Eguy on 01/27/2017 11:20 pmQuote from: rayleighscatter on 01/27/2017 08:53 pmQuote from: woods170 on 01/27/2017 03:37 pmAnother clear mistake in Eric's article is the assumption that crews must be assigned 18 months prior to their flight because of the long preparation needed for their stay on the ISS. He overlooks the fact that the first CCP operational mission will have it's astro's on board ISS for just two (2) months, not the usual six (6). No 18 month prep period needed.Duration of visit doesn't negate a lot of the training though. There's less training for specific experiments but all of the emergency, contingency, operations, eva, etc all has to be done, likely in full. They can't do 1/3 of the systems familiarization simply because they'll only be there 1/3 of the time.Every NASA astronaut from day one receives the routine/emergency standard ISS procedures practice/study etc. They only need the refresher course just prior to a mission which should be only a few months.A BTW 6 months of that claimed 18 months of ISS training is actually Soyuz training occurring in Russia. So the unique ISS training is only 12 months.And instead of 6 months Soyuz training they'll get 6 months Dragon or Starliner training. In fact they'll probably have to get Soyuz, Dragon, and Starliner training because in an emergency they'll have to be familiar with all crewed spacecraft that will be at the station.
Quote from: rayleighscatter on 01/28/2017 02:37 amQuote from: oldAtlas_Eguy on 01/27/2017 11:20 pmQuote from: rayleighscatter on 01/27/2017 08:53 pmQuote from: woods170 on 01/27/2017 03:37 pmAnother clear mistake in Eric's article is the assumption that crews must be assigned 18 months prior to their flight because of the long preparation needed for their stay on the ISS. He overlooks the fact that the first CCP operational mission will have it's astro's on board ISS for just two (2) months, not the usual six (6). No 18 month prep period needed.Duration of visit doesn't negate a lot of the training though. There's less training for specific experiments but all of the emergency, contingency, operations, eva, etc all has to be done, likely in full. They can't do 1/3 of the systems familiarization simply because they'll only be there 1/3 of the time.Every NASA astronaut from day one receives the routine/emergency standard ISS procedures practice/study etc. They only need the refresher course just prior to a mission which should be only a few months.A BTW 6 months of that claimed 18 months of ISS training is actually Soyuz training occurring in Russia. So the unique ISS training is only 12 months.And instead of 6 months Soyuz training they'll get 6 months Dragon or Starliner training. In fact they'll probably have to get Soyuz, Dragon, and Starliner training because in an emergency they'll have to be familiar with all crewed spacecraft that will be at the station.Unlike Soyuz the Starliner and crew Dragon are highly automated. Much less involvement of the crew to get the vehicle to the station and back down to earth again. Particularly crew Dragon is very, very much a hands-off vehicle. So, less training required.
Quote from: meberbs on 01/27/2017 03:34 pmSo in an emergency water landing situation, where they came down in some random ocean because they had no choice, rescue crews are expected to get to them within a few hours. On the other hand, for a planned landing in the ocean where their drop point is predetermined, it might take a full day for the support ship to arrive.Does this seem backwards to anyone else?Only to you. Neither crew Dragon, nor Starliner, were foreseen to ever have "random ocean landings due to not having a choice".The give-away is the fact that NASA did not order water-landings for Starliner as the baseline for early missions. It only applies to crew Dragon because NASA is uncomfortable with propulsive (assisted) landing for early missions. What remained was parachute landing. However, unlike Starliner, the crew Dragon does not have airbags to cushion a land landing. So, that left parachuting into water as the only option. The result we know: lot's of extra requirements.But before all this played out, the only scenario having Starliner or crew Dragon land in water was pad-abort or launch-abort. In which case the crew and capsule would be out of the water within a few hours.
And a crew will be only trained for their vehicle - they will never come down on a vehicle different than they went up on.
Quote from: FutureSpaceTourist on 01/27/2017 02:38 pmEric Berger has now written an article on what he thinks will be further delays, predicting no crew flight for either Starliner or Dragon before 2019. No real specifics in the article though:http://arstechnica.com/science/2017/01/sources-neither-boeing-nor-spacex-likely-ready-to-fly-crews-until-2019/There is a little too much use of "may", "likely", "probably" and "could" in that article. The give-away that this article is to be taken with several pinches of salt is the bolded part in the quote below:Quote from: Eric BergerAmong those flights will be an uncrewed test flight of the Dragon V2 spacecraft, which will likely dock with the space station.It is not "likely". It is in fact the plan.Another clear mistake in Eric's article is the assumption that crews must be assigned 18 months prior to their flight because of the long preparation needed for their stay on the ISS. He overlooks the fact that the first CCP operational mission will have it's astro's on board ISS for just two (2) months, not the usual six (6). No 18 month prep period needed.
Quick check , is this program slipping about 6 months every 6 months?