LIVE: SpaceX Dragon COTS Demo (C2+) FD2 and FD3 UPDATES

[Chris Bergin]

Questions.

Today when very close to how we planned it.

Notes this is still a demo flight, feeling positive but a lot of new things to perform.

All RWS monitors back into a nominal condition.

Philip's there!
Asking about burns and timeline.

RNDZ will still be on time tomorrow.  Was a joint decision to manage the mission. Long day for the crew tomorrow so want to start on time.

Option to leave Dragon in the overnight park position on the end of the SSRMS, if required, but there's several hours of margin.

Heh, Robert asking about the crew's willingness about working a longer day. Ms Ridings understands they've done that many times before but notes preference not to.

[corrodedNut]

SpaceX FD Couluris is a quote machine, very good answers.

[Lee Jay]

hope they ask about fuel reserves and if they have concerns about "running low" ...
jb

They have more fuel than planned pre-flight, no concerns.

He said 36kg more, to be exact.

[corrodedNut]

I believe Couluris has confirmed that mission C2 is in the books.

[Chris Bergin]

36kg above the preflight plan on the prop levels. Protects for an extension or come back around again.

Will have video of station on approach, but it will be IR.

May 31 is normal depature day. Couple of days after to work with, maybe longer.

John has been working with NASA on this mission for five years, past 18 months being more intense. 20 sims with NASA, 40 internally. Train like you fly, fly like you train - mantra.

Sims ironed out work on the hardware and the operation. Notes how they are all under one roof, so a sim problem leads to a conversation with someone at Hawthrone.

Sim people have enjoyed torturing them (heh).

The C2 objective completion is a big confidence boost. Very proud of putting an American spacecraft into space.

The fly under provided the first go/no go for the steps to berthing. More decision points to come.

Bloomberg guy asking for a summary of what happened today, heh. Holly cleverly allows John to take the question to give him version of events.

[jabe]

He said 36kg more, to be exact.

how much did they have preflight?  curious percentage..
jb

[Jason1701]

hope they ask about fuel reserves and if they have concerns about "running low" ...
jb

They have more fuel than planned pre-flight, no concerns.

He said 36kg more, to be exact.

That implies a spare delta-v of about 20 m/s.

[Chris Bergin]

Dragon has more burns to come. Two more shifts to come before the Dragon RNZN ops.

Crew for the rest of the day will continue with preps, conferences for cargo transfer.

Berthing looking at 10:30 Central (15:30 GMT) - may be earlier or later.

John is lead mission director, to avoid confusion with NASA flight director on the loop.

Thermal imagers and LIDARS for Prox ops, but they have a normal camera on board.

John noting that now there's no longer Shuttle, only Dragon can bring back downmass, bar small amounts of Soyuz.

Tomorrow is more intense. Today allowed for some getaheads such as checking out the LIDARs. This is still a test flight.

Over.

[Chris Bergin]

[Lee Jay]

John from SpaceX handled that exceptionally well.

[corrodedNut]

So that's 5 cameras on Dragon, one inside, 2 pointing at solar arrays (one for each, also provides views of Earth), and 2 thermal imagers in the GNC bay.

[Silmfeanor]

Minor point overlooked:
3 camera's on board and 2 thermal imagers.
This confirms that the previously discussed glass sphere is indeed a camera - we've seen pictures - but because of this detailed list of camera's I doubt it is also a thermal imager for reentry temperatures on the docking port.

Also said - They'll release some pretty pictures taken by the solar deploy camera's of the earth. Looking forward to those!

John from SpaceX handled that exceptionally well.

I'll second that. I was very impressed by this conference- loads of information given out, intelligent questions and answers, nice back and forths. And the dragon in the background was a nice touch.
and of course the excellent coverage here on NSF and the question from our very own psloss 

Now - 36 kg more fuel then planned at this time. All systems check out. Let's berth this dragon.

[Chris Bergin]

So far so good. And yes, John was relaxed and on the ball.

Latest article - as always with a bit of an additional angle (CUCU history) so we're not just reporting what everyone else is.

http://www.nasaspaceflight.com/2012/05/dragon-completes-iss-comm-test-ahead-berthing-opportunity/

Will give it a post-presser dust down, but thanks to these live threads, nothing is missed.

New thread for RNDZ and berthing late tonight GMT.

[psloss]

Maybe I'm duplicating from L2, but Ms. Ridings confirmed that the IMMT will meet tonight at 8 pm local (Central) to give their formal 'go'.

[John44]

SpaceXDragon Mission Status Briefing - May 24
http://www.space-multimedia.nl.eu.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=7601

[Chris Bergin]

Good to know. Great work again at Houston representing the site, Philip!

[Rex Chan]

My notes.

Holly: Very, very successful. Joint ops. Fly under 2.5km. Comms between ISS + Dragon. Shakeout process working together. Felt exactly like training. Detail & understanding. ISS preparing rendevous & capture. Robot arm training. CCP. See Dragon. Crew *could* see the strobe. NASA excited.

John Couluris: up and over station. Dragon go for berthing acros the board.

Q and A

Reporter 1: Training and caution

Holly: very close to training. Test flight.

Monitors?

H: All nominal now. RWS froze - reboot - function properly. Calibrating external cams (longer than expected due to first time for Dragon, done before for HTV)

NSF (2): HA2 burn delay?

Will not propagate. Targeted a later time (~50 mins according to John) to involve crew (Holly).

Reporter 3: Hard Time Limit?

Holly: yes - crew timeline. Can park overnight with Dragon on arm (planned & analysed already). Hours of margin in the day.

Reporter 3?

Charles Atkinson (4) Fuel level?

Above pre-flight plan (I wrote 63kg, but think I wrote it down wrong...)

Cams on Dragon?

J: need ground station - IR spectrum

NASA TV?

J: yes, NASA has the feed
H: May 31st nominal undocking

Jason from Wired (5) How many sims?

J: 20 sims with NASA, 40 internally across 4 flight teams. Mission going just like sims

Hump?

J: crack team, Hardware in Loop in CA for any problems. Sim directors enjoyed torturing us.

AP (6) for SpaceX: Mood?

J: helps with confidence to meet C2 objectives. Get team to bed, well rested. Proud to have AMerican spacecraft in orbit.

Space.com (7) for Holly
[this person asked a stupid question]
[Holly proceeds to school reporter on Go/No-GO and polling]

Spacenews ( has fallen asleep

Bloomberg (9)
1. Highlights?
2. Racetrack/current ops?
3. Berthing time?

J:Spacecraft checkout, abort, freedrift
Flyby - COTS UHF close link with Dragon (design 23-28km, actually worked at >90km). GPS. Crew turned strobe ON/OFF/

H: UHF comms - ISS attitude (same as other visiting supply). Relative navagation data (RGPS) currently being reviewed by NASA/SpaceX. ISS crew conference prep. Berthing 10AM CT

Reuters for John: Title and tweak?

John: they call me Lead Mission Director (to distinguish from Flight/NASA). CUCU close so far out, don;t expect tweak

Thermal IR?

J: 2 video cameras on solar arrays, 3rd cam inside. 2 thermal for proximity (with LIDAR), can hook into video (no need to though)

Some reporter dude

John: Dragon can return (vs. Soyuz) a lot of stuff. 12 more CRS missions, faster rate than competition. Expect Friday to be more difficult, more intense day. Pwered thermals and LIDAR = retired risk. Dragon has auto protect (for ISS) in case of new/unusual faults. Test flight.

[psloss]

Good to know. Great work again at Houston representing the site, Philip!

Thanks.  Fun to be here again and see familiar faces.

A little more expansion on the "delay" to today's HA2 burn, Ms. Ridings noted that the approx. one hour move the right was predicted preflight and could have been taken out.  But, as they said in the briefing they opted not to, as there wasn't any driving need.

[Norm38]

I had to miss the press conference due to a work conference call.  No replay is listed on the NTV schedule.  Will a video be posted sometime today?

[Jason1701]

I had to miss the press conference due to a work conference call.  No replay is listed on the NTV schedule.  Will a video be posted sometime today?

Yes:

SpaceXDragon Mission Status Briefing - May 24
http://www.space-multimedia.nl.eu.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=7601