Up Close with the Atlas V

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hello from nasa's kennedy space center
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where we are gearing up to launch the
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goes-t weather satellite. noaa's
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geostationary operational environmental
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satellites monitor the entire western
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hemisphere all of the time and GOES-T is
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getting ready to join that proud fleet
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i'm katy mersmann from nasa and we are
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taking you behind the scenes of
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launching a weather satellite so we're
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starting in what you might argue is one
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of the most exciting places during a
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launch which is
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the rocket itself and i'm here with some
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of the people who actually make this
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launch happen we're going to hear what
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it takes and how they do it first up we
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have manny alfaro who is the spacecraft
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integration engineer with united launch
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alliance hey manny how's it going i'm
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doing well how are you i'm doing really
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good i'm excited so am i i would hope so
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all right so tell me where are we and
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what happens here so we are inside of
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ula's vertical integration facility uh
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this facility is basically used to stack
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the atlas 5 rocket
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once the rocket is complete we do
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make the spacecraft on top of the rocket
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here as well
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once the entire launch vehicle is
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complete we do run a series of
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integrated tests as well to ensure
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compatibility between the spacecraft and
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the launch vehicle
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that all happens inside of this facility
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here uh prior to uh giving the go-ahead
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to roll out to the pad for launch
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that's pretty exciting so we're getting
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into the fun part oh yes we are all
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right how do you prepare for a lunch uh
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so preparing for a rocket launch
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actually starts uh several years in
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advance with a lot of the mission design
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and requirements and verification
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reviews
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once that phase is complete we move into
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the phase of receiving all of our flight
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hardware here at the cape
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getting the rocket established and
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prepared to receive the spacecraft
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from the payload processing facility
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and then once that's received once we
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get made it here we do run like i
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mentioned a series of integrated system
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tests to ensure compatibility between
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the spacecraft and the rocket itself
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we run that to make sure that there's no
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incompatibilities that could cause any
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issues on the way up to on the right up
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to space
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once all that is completed and the
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testing is
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finalized we run into the final
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review meetings which are
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things such as the launch readiness
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review to ensure that the entire mission
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team is ready to support launch
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that includes spacecraft space force
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nasa teams as well as obviously the ula
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launch team
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once the final review is held
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we proceed on to rolling out of this
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facility over to uh launch complex 41
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which is where we launched from
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so that's kind of like the sprint at the
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end of the marathon getting ready to
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launch this rocket yes all right so how
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many launches have you worked on manny
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uh so in my three years at ula uh i have
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supported various missions in uh in a
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supporting role as a spacecraft
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integration engineer however this is my
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first mission as a primary spacecraft
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integration engineer and i'm very
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excited i've learned a lot along the way
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uh and it'll help me further my career
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uh with the future launches that i'll be
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working with that is really exciting i'm
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now even more excited than i already was
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okay so last question what is your
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favorite part of launching a rocket i
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would have to say my favorite part is
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actually the launch itself you know you
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invest so much time over the years from
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when you first perform the mission
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kickoff all the work that goes in and to
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finally see the uh spacecraft in the
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rocket lift off and fly into space is
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quite an exciting
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moment you feel it in your chest and you
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feel it in your heart right sure do all
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right well we'll be thinking of you this
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week manny as you get closer to launch
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and we're really excited wishing you
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luck so go atlas 5 and go ula
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all right thank you so much appreciate
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it thank you very much so next up we're
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going to check in with michelle rizzo
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who goes to program mission assurance
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lead and she's joining me in just a
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second to talk about the mission
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how's it going good how are you i'm good
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i'm excited
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i'm excited as well i would hope so so
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tell me what is your job on ghost team
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so i am the cso or the chief safety and
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mission assurance officer um so i am
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responsible for managing the mission
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assurance effort here for the ghost team
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project
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so what that means is our mission
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insurance team provides independent
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oversight and support
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for a variety of different disciplines
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to make sure that we achieve the mission
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safely and successfully that sounds like
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a really important job it's
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a great part of a team to work on and i
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enjoy doing it so how do you ensure that
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a satellite is ready for launch so from
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a mission assurance perspective we start
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early on in the program um at the very
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beginning we'll develop what's called a
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set of mission assurance requirements um
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we develop those requirements to make
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sure our hardware is built and selected
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to the appropriate standards so that we
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can do this safely and successfully
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throughout the program once we actually
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start getting that hardware in we'll go
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ahead and make sure that it's been built
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correctly we'll monitor operations we'll
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do inspections
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and then eventually we'll get to testing
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and when we do testing you know we go
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through a lot of testing to make sure
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that the hardware is working
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appropriately and also that it can
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survive the environments that we expect
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to be in
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so we do test to make sure we can
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survive launch we also do tests to make
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sure that we can survive in our expected
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location on orbit so making sure we can
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survive those temperature extremes and
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everything that we anticipate to see in
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the vacuum of space and there's a lot of
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changing temperature extremes from here
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on the ground to launch to space right
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yes there are so and then of course
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anytime we have an anomaly during that
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testing or during the build
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my team is on the front lines really
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making sure that we resolve those
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anomalies we drill down to root cause
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and we have a corrective action in place
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so that we don't have that anomaly occur
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again well that's really good we want it
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to happen during testing and yeah much
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rather find it out in testing so we have
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a successful flight yes so tell me uh
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what will you be doing during the actual
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launch so during the actual launch um i
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will actually be over in the control
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room with the spacecraft team
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i will be helping monitor the telemetry
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as it comes in and making sure
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everything is going to plan
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and also making sure that we're in the
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green and ready to go for launch so some
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folks may not know what is telemetry uh
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so the telemetry is basically all the
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data that we have that comes back from
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the spacecraft that tells us what are
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our heaters doing uh what are our
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different boxes reading is everything uh
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where it needs to be and is everything
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normal that makes sense all right so
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thank you so much for joining i'm so
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excited to see the launch
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and i'm excited to see you know the
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satellite in orbit too yes absolutely
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all right well thanks for joining us
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michelle um good luck this week gogo's
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tea thank you very much all right and
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thank you all for joining us we're this
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is just the first in a series of taking
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behind the scenes of launching the ghost
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t weather satellite keep tuning in and
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we'll show you so much more that goes
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into this spacecraft launch and in the
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meantime go atlas 5 and go goes-t