NASA news conference on Artemis II mission to the moon

[0:00] Charlie Blackwell-Thompson, Launch Director, John Huddycutt, Chair of the Artemis II Mission Management Team, [0:09] and Emily Nelson, Chief Flight Director. [0:13] We'll be taking questions shortly from media here in the room and through our phone bridge, [0:17] but before we get started, we will kick it off with some opening remarks from our panel. Amit. [0:22] Afternoon. Let's see, we just wrapped up our L-2 Mission Management Team review [0:26] and the team pulled go to proceed towards the planned April 1st launch attempt. [0:31] The MMT walked through the usual readiness items, vehicle status, ground systems, flight hardware, [0:37] and the integrated launch operations timeline. [0:39] We also reviewed the most recent engineering assessments, program level preparedness, [0:43] and any open items from early reviews, in particular the agency FRR. [0:48] After thoroughly walking through each of these areas, the team concluded that everything continues to look good [0:51] and there are no issues preventing us from pressing ahead at this point. [0:55] As we enter the pre-launch phase, the teams are in a strong posture and the mission remains on track. [1:00] See, over the last 10 weeks, [1:02] the agency has prepared a crewed lunar test vehicle for flight [1:05] and also restructured the program that it belongs to. [1:08] This was done deliberately. [1:10] A crew that understands the campaign flies with greater purpose. [1:14] A workforce that sees the road ahead holds a higher standard. [1:17] This flight and the future reinforce each other. [1:19] This is how Apollo worked and this is how we will work. [1:22] Through all of it, the signal of truth and rigor came through clean [1:25] from the teams working on the machine to the decision makers. [1:28] Nobody lost focus. [1:30] Nobody cut a corner. [1:31] The people in this room and in the control rooms, [1:33] and on the pad, and in every center across the agency, [1:35] you are all instrumental. [1:37] The skills that you carry, the judgment you have built, the knowledge you hold, [1:40] these are the things that are in the lifeblood of the agency. [1:43] This mission is going to fly on Wednesday because you are here. [1:47] As I said, the vehicle is ready, the system is ready, the crew is ready, [1:50] and behind this flight stands a campaign. [1:52] Landings, a lunar base, a nuclear propulsion into deep space, [1:57] that begins, not ends, with what happens on Wednesday evening. [2:00] I have complete confidence in this team and the NASA workforce. [2:03] For everybody else, [2:04] and Synopsis is my home, [2:07] project增 was born 10 years ago and whatever we few 부탁aton [2:09] in John Leo Antwren's world is straightforward. [2:12] classes and we do it for the greater good. [2:17] Shakespeare was written to be a lesion ofI chocolate merchant [2:20] and he watched [2:22] English andorex. [2:25] When 1653 years ago, humanity left the Moon and did not return or now we go back. [2:30] The great challenges of the last century will run not in the command centers alone, [2:34] it is buildable so when you watch artemis artemis 2 think about it when it lands come and build it [2:38] with us with that i'll hand it over to the launch director thanks amit appreciate that um and uh [2:45] you know it is really good to be here in the room with you today and i think i said this when we [2:50] came over for wet dress i said i really enjoyed being here because generally it's something big [2:56] is getting ready to happen um so thanks for all of you for being here today and thanks for coming [3:01] along with us on this journey and helping to tell our story um i am thrilled uh to say that [3:07] our countdown clock picked up just a little bit ago and began counting at 4 44 pm so while many [3:16] of us have felt for the last several days and weeks and and even months that we have a countdown [3:22] clock and we were moving toward a targeted launch day now the countdown clock uh shows that and [3:29] we are just about two days away from our targeted launch date [3:32] our team has worked extremely hard to get us to this moment and i am so very proud of the work [3:39] that they have done when we went through wet dress the rollback turning the vehicle around getting [3:44] back out to the pad and then performing to plan and really being ahead of plan uh as we rolled [3:50] into this weekend i think sean mentioned yesterday that we rolled back out on the 20th and since [3:57] we've been back out at the pad uh over these last 10 or so days we've got the uh all of our [4:03] planned work is complete launch countdown preps are complete we had all of them essentially done [4:08] on saturday emergency egress system is configured ready to go crew access arm configured [4:15] we are now into like i said our launch countdown operations so we'll power up orion a little bit [4:22] later this evening and then core stage a little bit later after that and then icps will will [4:29] follow we'll begin the configurations of the vehicle the checkouts that we do [4:34] prior to getting deeper into our countdown and all of this will take us over the next day or so [4:40] we do have our airdag into changeover will happen early in the morning on the first and as you know [4:46] that kind of sets the pace for when we can tank the vehicle our ld go for cryo load is at 07 34. [4:59] hold uh or we extended the hold a little bit in the countdown just before tanking so if [5:03] the work is done and the team is ready we may tank a little bit before that we'll make that decision [5:08] on console but um the the tanking is planned for 0734 and that puts us if everything goes to plan [5:15] with all stages replenish and the closeout crew ready to head to the white room uh somewhere after [5:21] one o'clock our flight crew will depart the onc uh just before uh two o'clock in the afternoon [5:30] and we'll count down we'll get them in the ship we'll do com checks make sure all of that's good [5:35] get the crew module configured and we will count down to our team on this 10 minute hold [5:41] once we finish up that 30 minute hold and every all systems are go we'll pick up the count and [5:46] we'll count down to our t0 so that's a little bit about our our milestones and kind of where we are [5:53] it is an exciting time it's an exciting time for uh this team and our crew and really [6:00] our nation [6:00] and the world um so we'll uh as many have said even yesterday and and as we talk about in all [6:08] of our management meetings you know we'll fly when this hardware is ready um and uh you know [6:13] we'll see if uh it's ready to go in just a couple of days but certainly all indications are right [6:19] now we are in excellent uh excellent shape uh as we get into count and with that um i'll hand it [6:25] over to john thank you charlie uh let's see it's l minus two i'm glad you're here [6:32] to be back with you folks uh ahmed gave you a good overview of the l minus two mission management [6:39] team meeting today so i'm going to talk to you a little bit about uh why we do it and what the [6:44] process is so it's a it's an important checkpoint uh following the agency flight readiness review [6:52] it's not intended to be a rerun of the flight readiness review rather it's a chance for us to [6:58] get together and do three things you know it's walk through the work uh that we've closed since [7:04] our walk through the work that we're we're still doing and then discuss any new issues that are [7:11] out there so today we took a focused disciplined look at to validate the work we've done and make [7:19] sure that the path to the next milestone is clean deliberate and fully aligned before we [7:26] polled the mission management team for go we had a verbal round table allowing all the program [7:32] managers and advisors an opportunity to ask any remaining questions there were none [7:38] um before i polled the team we took about a 10 minute break i like to do that to let folks uh [7:47] that are a little bit might be a little bit intimidated get questions to folks that are [7:51] willing to speak up on their behalf um folks we got folks to get back together uh again there [7:58] were no questions and then uh finally we conducted the readiness poll and for launch operations and [8:06] uh we had full concurrence and we were a go so with that i'll turn it over to emily [8:11] and again i'll thank everybody for coming we really appreciate your support [8:18] our teams in mission control and our crew members have been spent the last over a year two years [8:26] dedicated to training for this particular mission developing all of the products associated with [8:29] this flight and they are ready to go our crew members reed victor christina and jeremy they [8:36] spent the last couple of days here at the cape since they got here on friday getting [8:40] an opportunity for some rest before we work them very hard [8:44] they are getting an opportunity to spend some time with their families tomorrow they'll get [8:49] a few last minute briefings and meetings with some of their with some of the team before they [8:55] head into launch day as charlie spelled out for you um as we come to this really exciting moment [9:03] the this the opportunity is is immense for us to finally get the opportunity to send our crew [9:10] farther than anyone's gone before and um it's it's an incredible moment for the [9:15] artemis generation and we're excited and we are ready to press i got the opportunity to talk with [9:20] reed earlier today and when the teams are ready and when the spacecraft is ready the [9:25] crew is ready and excited to go so with that i'll hand it back over to cory we will go ahead and [9:31] kick off our q a portion of the briefing if you have a question here in the room please raise [9:35] your hand and we will get the microphone over to you we'll start right here in the front hi thank [9:46] you uh for being this uh being here with us today and my name is jim siegel i'm with uh [9:52] florida media now and um i'm curious about the kinds of cargo whether it is food or experiments [10:03] or whatever that have been loaded on the the um on the spacecraft last and when was that and if if [10:15] there is a delay in launching for say a week or two does any of that cargo have to be replaced thank [10:24] i can take that um so um our turnover for our last stow so we do have a stow in in launch countdown [10:33] it happens somewhere between about l minus 30 and about l minus 24. um we have the avatar that will [10:41] go in and of course that is uh provides us insight into uh effects on on tissue um we also have the [10:49] zero gravity indicator and then some other late stow items and we have four bags that are going in [10:55] and then certainly if we end up in an extended scrub then there are change outs associated with [11:02] some of that and that's pretty standard for our timelines we look at all of our [11:07] scrub schedules we have uh desto and restow ops okay we'll take another question here in the room [11:16] let's go hi ken kramer space up close thank you thanks for all the work that you're doing [11:24] it's fantastic the question is for ahmed uh since you mentioned the future architecture a little bit [11:32] i'm curious you guys were planning to do uncrewed test flights of these lunar landers the human [11:38] landers about a year ahead of time in the past i'd like to know what what is the plan now how [11:44] is that all going to work out we still need to make sure we can land robotically with those [11:50] machines before we decide to commit the crew to them but we're trying to get early data on the [11:54] export systems the rest of their systems ahead of time which is why we want to do earth orbit [11:58] activity to make sure we can shake that out before they're while they're concurrently pressing towards [12:03] doing landing attempts as well so we haven't taken that off the plan right now we're planning on [12:10] uncrewed landings next year in 27. we're working with the vendors to bring those in i think that's [12:15] that's been the baseline plan for a little while we think we can hold to that but again it's going [12:18] to depend on a lot of milestones coming up like propellant transfer etc so that's where we're [12:23] uh we're working with them to do everything we can to get side by side with them to help them but [12:28] we will we have to land uncrewed before we're willing to commit the crew to a landing mission [12:33] to a landing mission yep okay we'll take one [12:36] more in the room right here and then we'll head to our phone bridge yes frederick castell with the [12:41] france 24 television you mentioned that the crew was uh resting with a family is there something [12:47] similar like the beach house they had in the past have been to the beach or something of this kind [12:54] thank you this evening they'll get the opportunity to have dinner with their families at the beach [12:58] house um so they've gotten to spend most of today uh with their families and tonight they happen to [13:04] be at the beach house okay we'll head over to our phone bridge our next question is [13:09] from bill harwood with cbs news yeah hi um i've got a really trivial question for emily [13:16] um you know a lot of folks are calling this a 10-day mission and the flight plan that i've seen [13:20] shows it a nine day one hour and 40-something minute mission and i just wonder if you'd set [13:26] the record straight do you round up nine days one hour to ten uh or should we be calling this [13:31] a nine-day mission thanks so we're going to keep calling it a 10-day mission um in general though [13:37] if we launch on the first we're going to land probably on the 10th [13:41] i don't want to i don't i don't want to dare the space gods by trying to say i know exactly what's [13:46] going to happen and exactly how the burns are going to go because obviously things change in [13:50] flight but yeah generally our planned launch for a planned launch on april 1st we come down on april [13:56] 10th so if you just do basic math that's maybe not a whole 10 days but i'm going to round up [14:03] okay our next question is from christopher mick with hudson star observer taking my question and [14:10] for you all for your time today i just had a couple follow-ups i think that were mentioned [14:14] at the briefing yesterday i think dr [14:16] has mentioned about some outstanding medical equipment that needed to be secured at the [14:21] different kind of abort locations and that that was ongoing and then uh just maybe with uh charlie [14:27] blackwell thompson maybe to follow up on just uh if there's been any update on the some of the [14:31] comms issues that were happening before are those kind of ironed out working well yeah so actually [14:41] this is a wonderful this is why it's great to be in america because we're literally during this [14:45] during this presser like sorry your question got walked on because there's another launch going on [14:48] right now we we all looked at each other like i don't think there's earthquakes in florida [14:52] it's definitely launched so anyway we'll maybe just we have to wait for the boom too but i don't [14:57] know that's coming down the boom will be quick though what can you repeat your question online [15:02] i think we're clear now yes just asking uh kind of following up from yesterday i think dr glaze [15:10] mentioned um some of the medical equipment that still needed to be secured at some of the abort [15:14] locations was just checking on the status on that and then maybe for uh charlie blackwell thompson [15:20] we just wanted to see if there's any update on the the comms issues uh since you have people on the [15:26] house that's uh been ironed out working well okay i'll take the first one yeah one of the actions [15:31] we took from frr i think this what you're referring to there's also some late stow medical kits [15:35] because we want to make sure we maximize the efficacy of those i think that's maybe in the [15:40] last four bags but typically we add those things late we also did want to make sure that our trans [15:44] atlantic abort regions had the right um equipment just in case we had to divert and during one of [15:49] those longer abort scenarios and so we did jd polk and uh our health and medical team has been [15:54] an active negotiations with a lot of our partners across on the other side of the atlantic [15:57] state to make sure that those uh facilities are ready that was an action coming out of fr and that [16:02] was closed today with which we're holding open maybe a signature or two but but separately we [16:06] have made contact with all those facilities all their understand their capability and procedures [16:10] and they're ready to support us so you want to take the other one yeah i'll take the one on the [16:14] com um so we've done a number of things uh relative to the comms the com system to make sure that [16:20] we're in the best configuration that we can be in we actually did a big uh com test before rollout [16:28] and we've done a number of things with the comms as well we didn't have any issues as part of that [16:32] we did a system load had the firing room full of folks just to make sure that it wasn't related to [16:37] how much load you had on the system we've also added some rigor into the the network that we [16:43] have and the ability in the event that we have an issue that we can go isolate that node of the [16:48] network and so that was a change that that we put in place and we tested that out and so when it [16:54] comes to the communications issues each and every one of the items that we have found that we've [16:58] had that have contributed to com challenges all of those have been addressed and so based on what [17:04] we know today we we expect to have nominal com throughout the countdown certainly you know you [17:10] can have hardware that breaks and so if something else or something new were to happen we will do [17:14] what we always do and we'll assess it and we'll address it in real time and then also during wet [17:19] dress we did utilize a contingency procedure that we have for utilization of radios within [17:26] the launch control center for [17:28] certain types of operations until you could get a com fully functional again so i think we're in a [17:33] good spot relative to com but there has been significant work on it uh over the last several [17:38] weeks okay we'll take some more questions here in the room let's head to the back on this side [17:43] jackie hi thanks for doing this a quick question for mr honeycutt i just wanted to know if were [17:53] there any details you could share from the meeting today about specifically what items you were [17:57] discussing um and then i know you mentioned in a previous news conference that not all decisions [18:02] have to be used in a way that is relevant to the work that you're doing so i just wanted to know if [18:03] you have any thoughts on how you're working on these things because i think it's been a really [18:08] interesting conversation and i'm just curious if there's been a lot of discussion around what [18:13] you're doing and whether it's going to be unanimous and you have the final call i'm [18:17] just curious if you've run into any instances yet where things haven't been unanimous well the only [18:24] ones that i can recall that were not unanimous was um when we were working when when charlie [18:32] brought some mmt things to us during the sim they were only sim related but none of the other stuff [18:40] pretty pretty easy i haven't mentioned one of them relative to getting a signature on a piece [18:45] of paper so we're carrying that open we got some work going on uh with one of our remote satellites [18:52] to uh get the mechanism that tilt that tilts the satellite repaired and getting it back up and [19:01] running that work was ongoing while we were in the meeting so we got we'll get notified later on [19:07] i'm pretty sure that that that get that that got worked out um we talked uh we talked a little bit [19:16] about uh a gas analyzer that was that's on on the that's that's on the orion capsule um got [19:32] satisfied with the minor challenges that we had with that so those kinds of things this wasn't [19:39] anything big no no showstoppers no nothing that gave us pause for concern said hey we got to come [19:45] back tomorrow [19:45] okay let's take a question from this side right here on the second row hi phillips loss i think [19:56] this is for charlie um previously uh you talked about a part two of the countdown demonstration [20:01] test were you able to do that with the crew out of the pad um so part two of the countdown [20:07] demonstration test was intended to be a walk down of the emergency uh egress system and just a [20:14] refresher we are doing a refresher with them uh this evening actually in a briefing format and [20:19] they have been back out at the pad uh [20:21] and have had an opportunity to take a look at it but in terms of calling it a cdd part two [20:28] we did not do that do the cdt part two procedure but we certainly will be covering uh the material [20:35] with the crew tonight just to make sure that uh it's exactly as they remembered it and they have [20:39] had an opportunity uh to be out at the pad let's come up to the front up here thank you very much [20:51] uh tarik malik with uh space.com i think for charlie it sounds from uh what you're saying that [20:57] everything seems to be going extremely smoothly i'm curious are there any open items with the [21:02] vehicle at all right now and if not like what are the key i guess checks between now and and tomorrow [21:08] you know that you're looking for to make sure that all the the boxes are checked the the eyes [21:13] are dotted etc you know for that it's a great question um this pad flow has gone extremely [21:19] smooth and we have been on plan or ahead of schedule um or the whole entire time and so we [21:27] essentially were able to pull in [21:29] our launch countdown perhaps for an entire day and and it worked out great because we finished up [21:34] most of our work on saturday we were carrying one weather day this was intended to be a 12-day pad [21:40] flow one weather day and we when we when we finish the work up by saturday and we're sitting on this [21:47] weather day happened to be on the day where we expected bad weather so it gave most of the team [21:52] or a good part of the team an opportunity to take a breath get ready for launch countdown so that [21:59] was a very good start for us and we've been doing that for the past couple of years and it's been [22:04] really great work for us and it's been really helpful for the team as well in terms of [22:07] constraints um i've been in this business a long time as many of you know and i've been through a [22:13] lot of launch countdown pre-test briefings and we had a launch countdown pre-test briefing on [22:18] saturday it went a full three plus hours a very thorough review and out of that we were tracking [22:25] exactly one constraint one um it was on the uh lh2 flare stack on the pilot light and uh we have three of them we need one to [22:31] to light the flare stack but we wanted to have full redundancy going into this countdown even [22:36] for something as small as uh as the flare stack and so i'm happy to report at this time that we [22:43] were able to find the issue with that and correct it and we are three of three and that paper's [22:48] closing and the last call to the firing room before i came to this briefing um the most uh [22:56] significant issue that was being worked at the time was uh they had a couple of monitors in the [23:01] spare console that we don't use very often but when they powered everything up and they were [23:05] going through all the checks they found that they had two monitors that needed to be replaced so [23:10] um you know those are the those are well welcomed issues uh if that's what we're talking about you [23:18] know over the next few days that'd be great in terms of what's coming up i mean there's a lot [23:23] of vehicle checks coming up so uh you know we've done we've powered all the [23:27] you know we've done we've powered all the we've done we've powered all the [23:27] these vehicle elements up we've checked them out rf's been checked out we've done commanding [23:34] during wet dress with the flight control team i mean wet dress is as close to launch as you get [23:40] without it being launch day and we had a had a very successful wet dress so in terms of what am [23:47] i watching well i'm watching everything um all the way until uh we get to tanking and then all [23:52] the way through tanking so um every check is significant when you're in launch countdown but [23:58] you know i do feel good about where we are based on having a good wet dress and knowing that all [24:02] of these elements have been powered up during the pad flow they've all been checked out and maybe [24:08] not quite put into the launch configuration exactly but they've all been checked so okay [24:16] we'll take another question on this side right here uh yes uh bert dict from ad astra magazine [24:26] national space society a question for emily uh at a previous news conference it was mentioned that 25 [24:32] years of operations in low earth orbit doesn't really prepare us for going to the moon so i'm [24:39] just wondering what types of additional things have your mission controllers done to prepare [24:44] and i'm sure looking at artemis one but does uh looking back at apollo data offer any guidance or [24:50] insight absolutely so artemis one is of course a first step there um some of the lessons that [24:58] we learned there just the the navigation in the vicinity of the moon was like [25:04] a little different than what we expected so we had really great learning there [25:08] the how to operate this spacecraft in its space environment you know in when you're orbiting the [25:13] earth you get a lot more eclipses you get you have a certain type of environment that you're working [25:19] in the environment as we're going out to and around the moon is a very different environment [25:22] so we learned a lot about how this spacecraft will operate in its environment and then yes we [25:27] absolutely refer back to what are our the generations you know the shoulders that we're [25:31] standing on um we've had [25:34] in in preparation not only for artemis 2 but also for the lunar landing missions for the [25:38] opportunities to walk on the surface for all of those lessons learned we we go back and we chat [25:43] with the the leaders of those missions on as often as we can get them to come back and talk to us [25:50] because we we don't want to learn again a thing we've learned in the past there's too many new [25:54] things to learn and so we want to make sure that we've we've incorporated everything [25:58] that they've learned as to the extent that we can and be able to go and explore new territory [26:06] quickly a little bit of your question i think it's the right one i think the [26:10] risk tolerances are different and you know leaving leo is is a different kind of mentality but [26:16] the life support systems were fielding on orion were first fielded on iss the main engine on the [26:20] surface module was first fielded on atv which rendezvoused with with iss the health and medical [26:25] performance all of the suit designs that were that were feeding forward like we 25 years of flying [26:32] space station has given us reliability and understanding of the of the elements of the [26:36] machines that were flying around the exhibit and the controls that the teams are highly которые [26:37] on the moon to a large extent, which is why we're comfortable taking these risks, because [26:41] we have fielded, if not the exact same variants, but a lot of the same pieces of hardware with [26:47] heritage from the station program. [26:50] Okay, we'll take another question on this side, second row right here. [26:57] Thanks very much. [26:57] Ivan Semenik with the Globe and Mail. [26:59] I, you know, for those, this is a question I think for Charlie Blackwell-Thompson, for [27:04] those who are not in the space business, I think countdowns usually start 10, 9, 8. [27:08] Here we are, 50 hours or so ahead of the launch. [27:13] I was wondering if you could unpack what determines why it's that amount of time, and what's the [27:18] difference between being in countdown, not being in countdown at this stage, what that [27:23] means for everyone and for the crew, too? [27:25] Yeah, absolutely. [27:27] And, you know, you could start a countdown, you could decide, and we made a decision based [27:33] on, I would say, a little bit on heritage, but you could say that countdown started at [27:38] 10. [27:38] And some folks do that, and then it would be from, you know, about that last 12 hours or so. [27:45] For us, we, the decision for when countdown started, it was when are we starting to configure [27:52] the ground systems and the flight elements for countdown. [27:56] And when you, you know, when you start from scratch, you go and you look at how long is it [28:01] going to take to do, and you lay it out step by step, and it turns out that it was about two [28:05] days long. [28:06] If you laid that side by side with the ground systems, it was about two days long. [28:09] The shuttle show was about three days long, so it was longer. [28:13] If you look at it next to some of the commercial missions, you'll find that they're, you know, [28:18] a day or less. [28:20] So we're somewhere right there in the middle, but it's really driven by the work. [28:24] You could draw that line anywhere you wanted, really, and say it's going to be the last [28:28] 10 minutes, and all this other stuff is going to be called preps. [28:32] But for us, what we decided was that it's when you start doing that final configuration of [28:37] the ground systems and the flight systems. [28:40] But you're right. [28:41] Most folks think about that last 10 minutes and those poles and getting into those dynamic [28:47] systems and the final countdown. [28:52] Right there. [28:52] Good afternoon. [28:54] Nelson Castro from Channel 13 Argentina from Argentina. [28:58] Artemis is taking an Argentinian-made satellite. [29:04] My question is, two questions. [29:06] What are the main goals for you for the whole mission and concerning the information that [29:13] that satellite could provide? [29:15] And also, does that mean that in the future, this cooperation with foreign countries in [29:23] order to take part in the mission is going to be a trend? [29:27] Thank you very much. [29:29] I'll take the second part, and then when he yelled it, just to payload stuff. [29:34] This crew is an international crew for a reason. [29:39] Our cooperation will, one of the, for your previous question, one of the most amazing [29:45] things is that we're going to be able to do a lot of things. [29:45] One of the things about Space Station, I think the most amazing thing was the partnership [29:49] that was developed to operate that machine. [29:51] As I said in my opening, we're going to need the free nations of the world to collaborate [29:55] to build even more ambitious architectures as we expand our range of action throughout [30:00] the solar system. [30:01] There's no question in my mind. [30:02] It's a partnership that's fundamental to that, and we're very, very proud to be flying with [30:06] an Argentine payload on this mission. [30:08] In terms of the details, I think it's co-manifested, but Emily, do you have that? [30:12] I don't have the details on each of the co-manifested payloads. [30:15] I'll have to go and look that one up for you. [30:17] It's a unique experiment because in this particular case, on Artemis 1, we had co-manifested payloads [30:22] as well. [30:23] Those had a little bit more benefit because they were riding along with the, basically [30:27] propelled by the ICPS. [30:30] The ICPS for Artemis 1 was heliocentric disposal, in which case those payloads are put on that [30:35] trajectory. [30:36] In this case, we're doing earth disposal of the ICPS, and so unless the hardware has some [30:41] propulsive components, they pretty much have to, they're going to be coming home with that. [30:44] But that doesn't mean you can't do it. [30:45] I think it's interesting things with the payload as we go forward. [30:48] So in terms of the actual details, we know that our Exploitation Operations Office has [30:52] been collaborating with them to make sure that they are loaded. [30:56] We held extra time in the plan so that we could provide additional accommodation in [31:00] the stage adapters in order to do it, and our partners delivered the hardware on time. [31:05] And if it succeeds, we're very hopeful that it does, but the success of those CubeSats [31:09] is also not integral to the success of Artemis 2 as a test activity. [31:12] But every chance we send mass to space. [31:16] We want to take as much advantage of any extra room we have. [31:21] Okay, we'll take our next question on the phone, and then we'll come back here to the room. [31:24] Our next question is from Marcia Smith with SpacePolicyOnline.com. [31:30] Thanks so much for taking my question. [31:32] There was a powerful solar flare today, and I had a couple of questions about that. [31:37] I'm not sure if it's Ahmed or Emily or who would answer it, but I'm curious as to how much [31:42] advance notice NASA had of the solar flare and whether or not that matters in terms of the [31:49] planning for the rest of the mission, and what would happen if this intensity of a solar [31:55] flare happened while the crew was out there. [31:59] And I gather it's not going to have any effect on this mission, and you would have mentioned [32:01] it already, but I did just want to ask. [32:04] Yeah, so, Marcia, it was today, but UTC, it was actually last night. [32:09] It was the flare. [32:11] We were just talking to Joe Westlake before we came over here, and we talked to him a [32:15] little bit before that. [32:16] We're not expecting the CME to cause any effects. [32:18] There's going to be a light kind of G2 level. [32:20] The event in the southern hemisphere should dissipate by the 31st in the evening, I think [32:25] is what Joe said, so we're not tracking concerns for the mission in general. [32:28] We do have solar weather constraints for launch, depending on the sensitivities of various avionics [32:32] as we go, so we watch those as we go. [32:34] We have some of the best teams in the world, both at Goddard and at NOAA, that are watching [32:38] those things all the time. [32:39] The Space Radiation Analysis Group reports directly to MCC Houston. [32:44] We also take advantage of the NOAA SWPC group to go and do the monitoring for us. [32:48] Of course, we have an incredible telescope. [32:50] I'm staring at the sun all the time. [32:52] I always give the Helio guys a hard time because I'm waiting for them to tell me when and exactly [32:55] they can predict these flares to occur because I really, really want that. [32:59] But again, what we have is pretty quick notification and observation of these events. [33:03] We can quickly triangulate the direction of any mass ejection and see if it's going to [33:06] impact the mission. [33:08] In terms of in-flight radiation response? [33:11] One of our test objectives is actually to set up the radiation shelter, so we'll be [33:15] doing that anyway, even without a radiation event. [33:17] But basically, we've got a section of the spacecraft that we're going to be using to [33:21] set up, and the crew would stay in that area until we gave them the all-clear that the [33:26] radiation event had passed, sort of like what we do in LEO if we need the crew to shelter [33:31] there as well. [33:32] We do have LCCs on space weather, and those are monitored by our launch weather officer [33:39] and reported just like any other weather constraint. [33:42] It starts at tanking and goes down to six minutes. [33:47] Okay, we'll take another question in the room right here, third row on the inside. [33:50] Hi, Lauren Grush with Bloomberg. [33:57] Thanks so much. [33:58] I was just wondering if you could. [33:59] I was just wondering if you could walk us through the various abort scenarios and the [34:02] contingencies for this mission, both during launch and during the major milestones during [34:06] a flight. [34:07] For instance, is there a contingency plan if there's a technical issue during the [34:11] PROX OPS demo, for instance? [34:12] And are there any portions of this flight that really just cannot support an abort or [34:16] a contingency? [34:17] Thank you. [34:19] You go ahead. [34:21] So let me do the PROX OPS one first, because that one's fairly straightforward. [34:25] If we run into any issues, then the crew is just going to begin to back away, and we'll [34:29] separate from that. [34:30] Separate the Orion from the ICPS and continue on with the mission. [34:34] So that one's fairly straightforward. [34:36] It's a really good demonstration for us to get, again, building blocks for future missions. [34:42] We really would like to get that rendezvous, but if we, for any reason, have technical [34:45] difficulties, it's a pretty straightforward call to be able to back out of that one. [34:50] In terms of aborts throughout the mission, if we have an issue with the launcher, we've [34:56] got the ability to either abort into the Atlantic or we can abort into the Pacific. [35:00] Which we would call an abort once around, because you get almost all the way around the planet. [35:06] And so pre-launch, we'll be monitoring the weather in all of those locations so that [35:10] we can best position ourselves to keep the crew in a good config if they ended up in [35:14] one of those situations. [35:17] Post-launch, we will spend the first day evaluating all of the critical systems on the spacecraft [35:22] to decide whether we're go for TLI or not. [35:25] If we decide we are not go for TLI, then we can start setting ourselves to come back from [35:29] the high Earth orbit. [35:30] Which, I don't really think of as an abort, that's more of an alternate mission, because [35:36] we'll be very deliberate about that. [35:38] That's not a situation that we'd need to rush. [35:40] We would go figure out, is there anything else we need to do while we're in high Earth [35:43] orbit, and then we'll head home. [35:45] Once we hit TLI, from there you can abort to come home, but you get very rapidly to [35:51] a point of diminishing returns where you're not going to shave that many days off the [35:56] mission. [35:57] After about 24, 36 hours after TLI, you're not going to be able to come back. [35:58] You're not going to be able to come back. [35:59] You're not going to be able to come back. [36:00] You're not going to be able to come back. [36:00] You're not going to be able to come back. [36:00] You're not going to be able to come back. [36:00] After TLI, roughly, don't write that down, you really don't get a whole lot out of the [36:06] abort, because it's not like you just turn around and come straight home. [36:09] You're still on a trajectory that needs to make its way back to the Pacific. [36:13] And in almost every situation, when you're doing a risk trade, the risk of a highly dynamic [36:22] burn versus a free return trajectory where we use the gravity of the moon and the Earth [36:28] to get ourselves back for free. [36:30] That's almost always, you're going to air towards the free return trajectory because it's a much less dynamic situation. [36:37] So unless you're in a very time critical situation, you probably don't want to take the risk of the abort. [36:43] Does that answer your question? [36:44] Did I miss any of it? [36:45] Okay. [36:45] Just to be precise, I mean, that really, you have abort coverage. [36:50] Your fastest abort is around the moon rather than turning around and burning for home. [36:54] That's really, that's important. [36:55] But I mean, we could probably spend several days talking through every other system level contingency. [37:01] But this is one of the things that we obsess about, so. [37:04] We'll take another question back row right here. [37:12] All right. [37:13] Excuse me. [37:13] Sorry about that. [37:14] Hi, everybody. [37:14] Greg Pallone, Spectrum News 13. [37:16] Just is the second a viable launch option? [37:20] Is there enough turnaround time to be able to have the second? [37:22] The 45th said in the forecast today it's a 48-hour turnaround. [37:26] Do you guys see the second as a viable option if there is something does happen on the first? [37:31] Yes, I'll take that one. [37:32] We have launch dates that are the first through the sixth. [37:36] They're all, you know. [37:38] They're all available to us. [37:40] When we added the 1.4 million gallon hydrogen sphere, that was the driver in Artemis I, [37:45] the reason that we had to do a 48. [37:47] So it is certainly available to us. [37:51] Somewhere in those days, we set up for four launch attempts across that set of days. [37:55] Somewhere in there, you do have to do a 48, though, because you have to go replenish our locks. [38:03] Okay. [38:03] Let's go second to last row back here. [38:10] Excuse me. [38:10] Thank you. [38:11] Carmen Fuentes, WH&T in Huntsville. [38:13] So I know currently the Wednesday weather conditions show 80% favorability, and I know [38:19] you talked about all the systems and vehicles being good to go. [38:23] Something NASA can't control is the weather. [38:25] So if it stays at 80%, does that mean we'd still be go for a launch? [38:28] And at what point, if it were to drop below 80%, at what point would we consider maybe [38:35] holding off to the next day? [38:37] So what happens with the number there with the 80% is we have a set of criteria. [38:42] Some of them are standard range criteria relative to lightning and other things, and some [38:48] are specific to our vehicle, like winds and that sort of thing. [38:52] So our launch weather officer takes all of those criteria. [38:55] And so when they give us a percentage, that 80% is that there's an 80% chance that we [39:01] are going to be an acceptable criteria across all of them. [39:05] But if we're in violation of any of them, then we're going to wait it out. [39:09] I'll give you. [39:10] And Mark Berger, who's our launch weather officer, he's going to give you a percentage. [39:11] Okay. [39:11] Thank you. [39:12] So our launch weather officer, he'll be here tomorrow, and he can certainly talk all the [39:15] weather in detail, but I'll give you my opinion on the weather. [39:19] So we have a two-hour launch window. [39:22] That's a wonderful thing, because when you look across the forecast, and I was looking [39:28] at it just this morning, and you look at the winds, I think we're going to be okay from [39:33] a wind perspective. [39:34] And really what they're looking at for the most part is cumulus clouds. [39:39] And so, you know, I imagine that over the course. [39:43] I can't guarantee it, but over the course of a two-hour window, you know, weather can [39:47] change and things can move around. [39:49] And so, you know, when I see an 80% chance of go and a two-hour window, I feel pretty [39:57] good about our chances. [39:58] Okay. [40:01] We'll take another question right here. [40:02] Thank you. [40:04] with . [40:05] I was just listening to you, and my question was, well, everything seems to be so, so smoothly [40:10] from rollout, flight readiness review, all the minutes you've had. [40:14] So it seems like there's a lot going on. [40:15] Yeah. [40:16] So this is it. [40:17] And if it's weather cooperates, my question is what percentage can you say, okay, we are [40:23] ready for April 1st? [40:24] I'm just going to make an appeal to the space gods, okay? [40:29] We don't taunt the machine. [40:31] We don't taunt weather. [40:32] We don't do any of those things. [40:34] However, Charlie? [40:37] So, you know, we have over 500 launch commit criteria. [40:47] And in addition to that, we have our weather criteria. [40:50] Okay. [40:51] And we monitor them all the same, regardless of whether you've had a smooth pad flow, whether [40:58] you've had, you know, challenges. [41:01] They're all the same. [41:02] You're going to monitor that data and make sure that that hardware is ready to fly, and [41:07] the same thing on the weather. [41:09] So, you know, we'll keep monitoring them all. [41:15] It'd be nice if we didn't have a whole lot to talk about, but you know what? [41:22] This is the thing that I love about this. [41:23] This team is that when you have a problem, they run to go solve it. [41:29] And I think, you know, if something does come up that we don't expect, or we do get a little [41:37] hiccup along the way, we're just going to work our way through it, like we always do. [41:41] But right now, the hardware is performing well. [41:46] The weather looks, I mean, I would love to look at this weather forecast and see a 95% [41:51] chance it goes. [41:53] But the weather looks like something. [41:55] It's something that we can hopefully work our way through if we do end up with some [41:58] clouds or a little bit of precip along the way. [42:03] And we'll just see what the next couple days bring. [42:08] Okay. [42:11] We'll take another question in the room right here. [42:13] Jonathan Seri with Fox News. [42:16] Question about quarantine procedures as the astronauts visit their families. [42:21] For the families, are the quarantine procedures identical, or is it a little more lenient for [42:26] them? [42:31] Whether they go into quarantine or not. [42:32] And we have three different levels of quarantine. [42:33] So, you know, we're going to look at that. [42:34] We have our three different levels you can be in. [42:37] And so, like, for instance, because I'm here with you and I'm not wearing masks, if I were [42:41] to need to go and talk to the crew, I would have a mask on. [42:44] I would maintain six feet distance. [42:46] These are all rules that we're not all very familiar with after our joint experience. [42:50] And so generally, immediate family members that are capable of it. [42:55] So if you've got teenagers that are in school, they're not going to be able to go into the [42:58] same level of quarantine that maybe little bitty kids would be able to. [43:02] And so it'll be different for every family member. [43:03] And then really how that just affects whether you're masked up, whether you're distant while [43:11] you're with the crew member. [43:12] We have another one right here on the same row. [43:21] David Dinault with About Space Today News. [43:23] My question, Ahmed, you mentioned that the best way to return astronauts is to go around [43:28] the moon and try anything else. [43:31] Yesterday was talking a little bit about the spacesuits that have a six-day lifetime. [43:36] What would trigger the astronauts to go into those spacesuits and survive? [43:41] What would be the examples of what would cause that? [43:45] Clarify that. [43:47] So as only said, we have basically continuous abort coverage through the mission. [43:51] That starts from when we light the debt cords to when we basically are back in the water [43:55] at some point. [43:56] So each mode, so like we said, we have ascent aborts that take us to different landing sites. [44:02] We can abort to orbit. [44:03] We can abort to lower orbital altitudes and then contemplate that. [44:08] We can do second revs of trans-lunar orbit. [44:09] We can do second revs of trans-lunar orbit. [44:10] We can do trans-lunar orbit. [44:11] We can do trans-lunar injection orbits if we want to. [44:13] So we do all those things. [44:14] What I was pulling on earlier was after you commit to the moon, there are direct abort [44:19] options where you can turn Orion around and fire the main engine and bring it home more [44:24] quickly than if you were to proceed along free return. [44:27] At some point, there's a knee in that curve and it's faster to go around the moon than [44:30] it is to turn around. [44:31] Plus, it's safer because you have more confidence in the dispersion of the trajectory as opposed [44:35] to doing a big burn when you're far away. [44:37] So that's thing one. [44:39] The six-day thing you're mentioning? [44:41] What I'm mentioning, I believe, is we have in the program for a long time had a requirement. [44:47] It's not something we rely on, but it is a crew survivability augmentation we made to [44:51] the vehicle that allows the crew to stay in their pressure suits for a long period of [44:56] time. [44:57] And that would typically be triggered by a loss of total cabin pressure. [45:01] We do have some cases where you'd have, if you had atmosphere, if you had a combustion [45:04] event or something like that on the vehicle, you want to take some time to clean it up, [45:07] in which case we put the crew in those suits. [45:11] That provides essentially a clutch. [45:12] It's a closed loop, hermetically sealed way for the crew and their suits to be in communication [45:16] with the raw commodity of the life support system so they can scrub CO2, they can breathe [45:21] down O2, but they don't have to be in communication with a cabin atmosphere. [45:26] We would use that if we needed to, but again, that's a pretty far out case in terms of the [45:31] risks that we're accepting, but we do have that available if we need it. [45:35] Question on this side, right here. [45:38] Hi, Jackie Goddard for the Times of London. [45:45] So we know the vehicles are looking healthy and we know the weather may cooperate. [45:49] But the gremlin in the mix is often the tanking. [45:55] And I wondered if you could take us through what your confidence level is that this time [45:58] we may not see the hydrogen or the helium being that gremlin, what's been done to try [46:04] to preempt that being the case again. [46:06] Thank you. [46:10] Yeah. [46:11] So relative to the check valve on the helium supply to the ICPS, the upper stage tanks, [46:22] we've pounded that one flat. [46:23] We found a design flaw in the check valve and we worked with the supplier and the contractor [46:32] to go fix it. [46:33] And then the ground systems team here did extensive testing on the check valve in the [46:41] environment like it sees at the launch pad. [46:45] And so we've got a high level of confidence that we've got that one knocked dead. [46:52] I know folks are worried. [46:54] I think people in the general public worry about our hydrogen problem. [46:59] Obviously we worry about our hydrogen problem. [47:03] But it really is just a hydrogen problem given the fact that it's such a small molecule. [47:08] But the team did a really good job of removing and replacing that seal at the pad. [47:18] They don't have the fault tree totally closed out on that. [47:23] But I think we're on a good path. [47:26] And I think they're understanding. [47:28] So where we are relative to the quality of the seals, how long the seals can stay in [47:34] that mated configuration without us getting to worry, having to worry about them, I think [47:42] we're in really good shape for the QD on the helium side and for any LH2 leak. [47:49] We had a leak during the countdown last time, I guess it was on the lock side, on wet dress, [47:59] on lock side. [48:00] And we didn't have an LCC for that because it's oxygen and it's mixing with the air. [48:09] So we fixed that while we were back in the VAB as well. [48:15] Charlie, you want to add something? [48:16] Yeah, I was just going to say on that ICPS helium QD, it's in work right now. [48:21] We don't wait until launch to use it. [48:22] I mean, we press those bottles that are on board the ICPS. [48:29] We use them for RL-10 conditioning. [48:30] And I think that's a good thing. [48:31] Yeah. [48:32] We use them in purge and we also use them for pressurant as well. [48:36] So we have those in work every day. [48:39] So we don't envision that, and as John said, we worked really closely between the SLS and [48:44] the EGS team. [48:45] I feel like we got that design change that we made there with the seals has been well [48:52] tested and has been performing well on board the ship. [48:58] And the only thing I would add on the hydrogen is we had a great wet dress rehearsal. [49:04] Relative to those seals, we changed them out at the pad, as you all know, probably had [49:09] the best performing seals and the lowest leak rate that I've ever seen as part of the Artemis [49:16] campaign performed really well. [49:19] And then when we rolled back, we provided some strain relief for the flex hoses that [49:25] are in the tail service mast just to make sure that there was any kind of load that [49:29] was imparted on that QD during the roll. [49:31] Those have since been removed. [49:32] It was never in use. [49:33] It was never intended for them to be in place for launch, but it was just to provide a little [49:37] bit of relief as you rolled. [49:39] We'll take another question. [49:43] Let's go to the back of the room. [49:44] Hi. [49:49] Andrea Leinfelder of the Houston Chronicle. [49:51] The Artemis II crew doesn't like to talk about breaking the Apollo 13 record very much because [49:56] they'll say that that's not very important to them. [49:58] But I'm curious, what is the distance from Earth they will go if they launch April 1st? [50:02] I know it changes by day. [50:03] And is it important to any one of you? [50:05] Are you guys secretly hoping to pass that record? [50:10] So I happen to have the number. [50:12] For April 1st, the max distance from Earth is going to be 252,799 statute miles, which, [50:20] yes, is a little over 4,000 miles farther than Apollo 13. [50:25] I would say, at least for me personally, no. [50:34] You want every mission to keep exploring and keep learning new things, and getting farther [50:38] from Earth than we've ever been before is a fun statistic. [50:41] But there are a lot of other things we're going to learn on this mission that are going [50:44] to be a lot more exciting for me, at least. [50:52] I told you guys a few weeks ago, my main thing is hitting that entry interface right [50:59] down the middle and getting the crew in the Pacific Ocean safely. [51:03] That's important to me, which means everything else worked great or okay, right? [51:09] Okay, we'll take another question here in the room at the front. [51:18] And a follow-up on the SEALs, I mean, our readers, I think, might be interested in, [51:25] like, what did you fix about the SEALs, and is that a permanent fix? [51:29] Like, you believe that... [51:30] I believe that that won't be, that those SEALs in particular won't leak anymore, and [51:35] then, I mean, I know you can't predict that, but... [51:39] And then also, those SEALs have been there since the rocket, since they were traded out [51:46] on the pad, is, do you know how long they can stay in there before they need to be switched [51:51] out again? [51:53] Really being 100% with you, because we're still in the middle of those tests, right? [51:59] So you know, it's a Teflon SEAL. [52:01] Teflon seal. [52:02] Right. [52:03] And Teflon has a tendency to creep when it's under load, so you start putting two and two [52:08] together, right, and say, okay, well, how long can it be? [52:11] So we're in the middle of running those tests. [52:13] We don't believe so far that we're going to have that issue given this short period of [52:19] time, because if you think back in the past, for Artemis I and even for Artemis II on the [52:26] first buildup of the configuration, we set for a pretty good while, 10 months, you know, [52:33] in the VAB with it in that configuration. [52:35] So you can go ride it if you want to, but it's, I mean, we're still trying to get through [52:43] that. [52:44] That's why I'm kind of reserve the right to, do we close out the fault tree? [52:49] And we're learning more, right? [52:52] I mean, same seals you used during Apollo, used during Shuttle, now during SLS, but the [52:56] geometry of the seal has been slightly different. [52:58] We've been riding more on the Teflon than we have metal on metal in the past applications. [53:02] We've done, you know, bench level testing on creep rates, and we think that this may [53:06] be not the dominant mode, you know, in terms of that cold flow of the Teflon away from [53:10] the sealing interface. [53:11] Time under compression is probably the contributor the most, so, but we have to get through all [53:15] that data. [53:16] I can tell you that by the time we do the third core stage, we're going to have this [53:19] thing licked in terms of strain relief and different ways we can make sure we're not [53:23] putting loads in the seals, because every time we do these things, we learn more about [53:26] how they behave under cryogenic load, as well as under compression, and so I think with [53:30] the data we get here, as well as what we'll continue to do on the bench, that hopefully [53:33] this is the last time we have to go through this, but again, like honey, I'll be careful [53:37] and reserve the right to be cautious. [53:40] Okay. [53:42] Thank you. [53:43] We're looking for a couple more in the room. [53:44] We'll go right here. [53:53] Yeah. [53:54] Just as a follow-up, I'm just kind of curious. [53:55] Did we ever figure out the window for splashdown, the time we might look at a return? [54:02] Yes. [54:04] For an April 1st launch on April 10th, we'll be coming home in the evening Pacific time, [54:09] roughly the 5 p.m. timeframe. [54:11] It'll kind of depend on actual performance across the trajectory. [54:15] Okay. [54:19] We'll take our next question, second to last row in the middle, right here. [54:28] Thanks, Joey Roulette for Reuters. [54:30] Anyone who wants to answer. [54:31] Is there a launch opportunity within the April 1st to 6th window that does not involve the [54:36] crew going farther than Apollo 13? [54:38] I know you guys aren't really tracking that milestone that much, but our readers are really [54:43] interested in it. [54:44] And then I had another quick question. [54:45] Can you remind us what kind of the core objectives or objectives for this mission are such that [54:50] not accomplishing them on this mission for any anomalous reason would either lead you [54:55] to repeat it or tweak the parameters for Artemis III? [54:58] Thanks. [54:59] So I can give you the first one. [55:01] By April 4th, it's close enough that it's within the error of our trajectory planning [55:09] tools. [55:10] And so 4th, 5th, and 6th, it's all in the wash, you're not likely to exceed that Apollo [55:15] number. [55:16] And Amit, you want to talk about the tools? [55:17] So, Joey, just to, I know, Honey wants to hit the EI, and that's right, that's his job. [55:22] I will tell you that it is, to me, marking the milestones, it's cool, right? [55:27] It's a fun thing for people to realize that people haven't gone that far. [55:31] I will tell you. [55:32] If you pick a burn plan or take any additional risks with the machine, then make sure that [55:36] we hit that milestone. [55:37] It will just be a happy accident of physics that it turned out that way. [55:42] In terms of what the test objectives we've lined out, you know, one of the instrumental [55:45] kind of viewpoints of thinking about the campaign is an integrated set of test objectives that [55:51] it allows you to answer that question pretty crisply. [55:53] So, you know, the life support system, obviously, the checkout, what we get is a critical objective [55:58] if it turns out that we have to, we don't get the performance we need after the acceleration [56:02] vibe. [56:03] We will, you know, we'll come home. [56:04] We're not going to commit to the moon if we don't have the performance for the docking [56:08] mission. [56:09] We will make changes, but we will probably commit at that point. [56:10] I can't tell you. [56:11] It will depend on the nature of the failure. [56:12] My only point is the closer you are to home, the more risk you're willing to take on some [56:17] of those systems as you do that, so, but that system is critical. [56:21] The integrated performance of the launch abort system we're going to get as we go uphill, [56:24] you know, making sure those signals work the right way. [56:26] The test of the machine and its environment, the, you know, all the different test objectives [56:31] we have in during transit. [56:32] Making sure we can do that navigation, et cetera. [56:35] There's an integrated suite of objectives that I think we can, we picked up a lot on [56:37] Artemis 1 already. [56:38] Recall Artemis 1 actually inserted into lunar orbit and showed us a lot of those things, [56:43] so it's not necessarily that critical. [56:45] The heat shield itself, you know, we want to learn and make sure that our modeling, [56:49] we did so much modeling on the interaction between this version of the heat shield and [56:53] its environment, even though we are being very careful about how we maintain the environmental [56:57] control of that heat shield as we come in, we will still learn more about our modeling [57:02] and make sure that we're doing that. [57:02] We want to make sure that, you know, the fixes we've made for Artemis 3, so any kind of entry [57:07] that puts any, that puts load on the heat shield in different ways will help us parameterize [57:10] the kind of integrated aerothermal and material environment that we're witnessing. [57:15] And so there's a lot that we are going to learn on the flight, but I couldn't tell you [57:18] today that if we didn't get a particular objective, that means we'd have to do free return again. [57:22] All right. [57:24] That's all the time we have for today. [57:26] Our final mission status update will come tomorrow at 1 p.m. Eastern, so we look forward [57:31] to seeing you then. [57:32] In the meantime, you can always reach out to us. [57:33] Thank you. [57:33] And please stay up to date on all the latest mission and news at nasa.gov. [57:38] Thanks for joining.