Boeing Starliner LIVE | Starliner Returns To Earth Without Sunita Williams And Barry Wilmore | N18G

again uh we did see uh Starliner deorbit or uh performance deorbit burn on time at 10:17 p.m. central Time and then quickly turned around and jettisoned its surface module now that it has performed its Duty over the course of the mission we are still about uh 20 minutes away from entry interface but things will start to happen quickly after that about 4 minutes after we go into the entry interface the heat from Starliner reinjury will become so intense that the plasma will begin to form around the spacecraft causing a blackout in Communications with Starliner for about 4 and 1/2 minutes and after that we'll see Starliner Starliner jettison its forward heat shield that's been protecting the parachutes during GRE entry then when Starliner is around 30,000 ft above the ground the spacecraft's parachute sequence will begin two drone par drogue parachutes rather will uh start slowing Starliner down and then they'll detach and three main parachutes will deploy and inflate at about 3,000 ft off the ground the base heat shield jettison exposing the airbags and then at touchdown those airbags absorb the initial force of Landing cushioning the spacecraft for a soft safe return to Earth e currently Starliner is about 213 miles above the uh South Pacific Ocean it's just past the southernmost portion of this final orbit coming around the uh southern coast of Australia and now is going to begin making its way northward towards uh the west coast of the United States for that um landing at 11:00 p.m. central Time midnight eastern time at wh sand space Harbor in New Mexico again we've had the deorbit burn that took place just as planned at 1017 a 59c burn that uh changed the uh Starliner speed by about uh 290 mph 130 m/s that made way for the service module separation and the next Milestone we'll be watching for is the entry interface coming up around 10:45 still about 10 minutes away live view here of the uh recovery forces staged uh near The Landing site ready to move in when Starliner touches down we are taking off Milestones as expected for that uh 11:00 p.m. central midnight Eastern or 10:00 p.m. mountain time touchdown today in New Mexico again Starliner performed its deorbit burn about 12 minutes ago the thrusters performed nominally and the flight home is going smooth e e we're still about uh 14 minutes away from the entry interface which is our next Milestone I think I said earlier that we were 10 minutes away that was a mistake um but about 14 minutes now we'll be experiencing the uh the atmosphere for the first time since Starliner launched and since we do have a little time we're going to check back in with the landing team Lee and Josh how are things going out there thanks Brandy yeah that was a great view of the uh Landing Convoy all lined up I was just watching some of the gold team members getting suited up as you mentioned earlier that's going to be the first team to come in and inspect the vehicle they're sniffing for those um hyper gools or any of those dangerous fumes before the rest of the teams get to go to move in and approach the capsule of course it's kind of a waiting game right now as we are still waiting to spot Starliner uh coming from the southwest so a lot of us are outside of the Convoy right now and keeping our eyes on the skies yeah that's right we're we've got about just under probably three dozen vehicles I all lined up in three rows just waiting to get that touchdown signal again going through that Convoy list that you guys went through already so well behind that gold team after starliners declared safe the silver team moves in and they do the electrical grounding they'll also stabilize the vehicle just in case the airbags start deflating we make sure that the hatch has uh a good stable orientation for red team to come in and they're the ones with the hatch orientation uh and once uh the red team establishes hatch access actually the silver team has a fun job tonight in the dark they're going to go start looking for the pieces that came off of Starliner those heat shields uh some of those Lids from those those parachute mortars uh and then after that after red team has hatch access and opens up the hatch uh NASA's ISS program folks are going to come in for the cargo inspection so again we are expecting to start seeing Starliner coming across the Horizon around the time that entry interface begins but until then just wanted to give you guys a hit from The Landing site and the latest that we have going on here so we'll toss it back over to you in Mission Control Houston thanks so much Le and Josh we are watching for that entry interface as well we're now about uh 12 minutes away Starliner continuing to make good progress uh following at 10:17 p.m. central Time de orbit burn again we're looking at the landing and Recovery team set up at the holding Zone there at White Sands Josh and Leah are embedded with that Convoy and they will make a very strategic move toward the spacecraft after touchdown first stopping at about the 500t mark and then they'll get the go to move forward to the 150 ft Mark and then once the vehicle is considered safe they will move in with the new orbit burn complete and uh the service mod module separated the spacecraft heat shield is now exposed and ready to begin experiencing the atmosphere again uh the Starliner is going to make some final attitude adjustments that keep that heat shield pointing at exactly the right angle and next step after that is entry interface again just coming up in a few minutes at 400,000 ft above Earth Starliner faces temperatures of 3000° fah from the plasma created by air friction around the spacecraft but Starliner can handle that heat with its heat shield which is made of an blade of material designed to keep the inside of the spacecraft at about 70° few minutes later Starliner will experience an expected blackout in Communications and that will last for about 4 and 1/2 minutes at 30,000 ft in just 11 minutes before landing Starliner jettison its forward heat shield exposing the spacecraft's parachute system then two drog shoots will deploy in increasing drag and significantly slowing down Starliner then three pilot parachutes will pull out the main shoots allowing the spacecraft to continue its slow and steady descent for another 8,000 ft towards the landing Zone and once the main parachutes are fully inflated Starliner bucket handle releases and what that does is it just basically levels out the spacecraft ahead of touchdown and then the base heat shield that protected Starliner through re-entry will separate at about 3,000 ft un covering the landing airbags those airbags of course will fill with nitrogen allowing for star liner to land softly and safely there in the sand less than 10 minutes to go now before we do get to that entry interface point and uh now just 20 24 and 1/2 minutes away from The Landing at wh sand space Harbor everything's pretty quiet in the room which is a good sign things are continuing to go smoothly as Starliner begins making it way making its way back to Earth you're taking a look there at flight directors Rick henfling on the left speaking with Mike Lamers on the right Rick is the flight director for this Landing operation Mike is weather flight director there tag teaming this operation team has been keeping a close eye on weather at the Landing site but everything uh looks pretty good for tonight's touchdown yeah about 79° Fahrenheit out there they reported 10 mies visibility the winds are within the limits so we are looking good for a touchdown coming up right about 11:00 p.m. Central Time 7 minutes to go now in tool entry interface and then uh that intense heating will start about minutes after we do begin the Ender Bas that'll last about 4 and 1/2 minutes during which time we'll be in a blackout starlander is currently about 130 miles 149 miles rather above uh the Pacific Ocean heading northward towards the western coast of the United States and it's touchdown in New Mexico we're taking a look here at the Landing trajectory there on the left of your screen you can see that line that crosses over the Baja Peninsula and that is the track Starliner will take as it makes its way into New Mexico as it gets closer to the ground people living in the area might get a a bright shot of Starliner coming back through the atmosphere and Landing there in White Sands New Mexico you can also see there the center of the screen the uh to-do list basically before before we do get to Landing the service module separations highlighted in green because that one's already taken place and next up is the entry interface about 5 minutes away from now and flight controllers here in the room are reporting good ude for that entry interface coming up again in just under 5 minutes e e e there two and a half minutes left before Starliner begins to fill the effects of the Earth's atmosphere again everything uh continuing to go smoothly flight controllers here in the room are quiet as they're working through their steps but all uh going well so far Starliner in position to begin experiencing that heat from re-entry now less than 100 miles above the Earth and uh heading towards the Baja Peninsula we'll be flying over that before landing in New Mexico just 17 minutes to go until Landing e less than a minute now until we begin uh entry interface again about 2 minutes after entry interface starts we'll begin seeing the heating uh really get intense and we'll go into a 4 and 1/ half minute blackout e team here in the ground reporting entry interface has begun they're seeing a good range seeing another view from the uh Landing site or the the team's uh getting ready to move out to The Landing site here a little better idea from this view of exactly how dark it is out there with all the lights of the vehicle shining a minute and a half until we move into the blackout period for Starliner and 14 and 1/2 minutes until we land in White Sands New Mexico the star lanter enters Earth's atmosphere at 17 times the speed of sound which could create a Sonic Boom for folks living in the area it will then be slowed down by parachutes to a speed very similar to what you might experience while going down an elevator inside a high-rise building the vehicle then comes to a safe comfortable stop at Landing 30 seconds now until the uh blackout period begin due to the compression of friction and friction of the air the molecules generate a very hot plasma that uh causes the red orange glow you often see appear in postflight imagery on Min spacecraft although we won't get to see that tonight uh it will happen causes an expected communication Dropout this one will last 4 and a half minutes as the vehicle uh goes through a time when plasma interferes with a satellite signal we expect that to blank out to end around 10:52 p.m. central now this is also the time that I mentioned earlier where a Starliner in the past two flights has gotten that black um Mark along the sides of it and that just really proves to our team that the ablade of heat shield or the a blade of material um around Starliner is is doing its job and the heat shield is pushing that plasma away it's blackout time again last about 4 and a half minutes we've got uh about 3 and a half left of it uh after that uh the Milestones will'll be watching for include uh Ford heat shield jettison at 1056 when ster liner is about 4.3 Mi above the Earth very soon after that uh almost immediately drug shoots deploy those uh give the give a little bit of an initial slowdown to the vehicle before the really um large main parachutes deploy that happens when the Starliner is about 2 and 1 half miles above the Earth e e this uh is a live view from the International Space Station where we're able to get a view of uh Starliner track as it comes in we are now less than 10 minutes away from landing at White Sands space Harbor scheduled for uh at 10 or 11:00 p.m. central also uh getting reports that the WB 57 is also able to see Starliner now as it begins coming in for its uh for its Landing we've still got just about a minute left to go before Starliner comes out of its uh blackout period and this is the view from the WB 57 one of NASA's aircraft that is uh at the uh Landing site has been uh been uh staged and ready to pick Starliner or pick up the view of carliner as it comes in and that is what we are seeing now and they're filming this video from about 16,000 ft the bb57 should continue to uh give us a view until the drogue parachutes deploy and then we hope to pick it up with the Cessna that is also in the area and flight controllers in the room are reporting that we are out of that blackout period and everything is looking good Starline are remaining nominal as she returns to Earth again this is a view from the WB 57 Starliner showing a beautiful streak across the sky as she returns to White Sands New Mexico we're about 3 minutes away from the forward heat shield jettison that's the next Milestone we're looking for Starliner is currently about 27 miles above the earth and the team at White Sands reporting that they have seen it we got a tally hole from them uh reported uh remotely that means they are seeing Starliner from the ground there in New Mexico this view is coming from the Cessna that's also in the area picking up uh star now Starliner now from its lower altitude about 6,000 ft above whereas the WB 57 is about 16,000 ft up we are now just uh 6 minutes and 22 seconds away from Landing we should also just be a couple minutes away from the forward heat so jettison which will bring on the drog parachute deploy followed by the main parachutes and the strobe lights on Starliner are now on Starliner is now over the landing site and that strobe light will help the teams actually track Starliner on the ground because it is very dark out there now about 12 miles above uh The Landing site and just 5 minutes away from Landing for watching now for the forward heat shield Jenison that should be coming up uh again making way from for the parachute deployment all right and that action you're seeing in your screen forward heat sheld and drugs out really interesting view of this uh coming down from the WB 57 see those two drug parachutes uh now deployed they slow the uh vehicle down initially until it gets to a uh a safe uh speed for the enormous main parachutes to to follow about 4 minutes to go until touchdown [Music] now back to A View From the Cessna aircraft in the uh vicinity of the landing site again this is a A View From a little lower than the WB 57 we were seeing the next thing we're going to see here is the three main parachutes come out and everything will happen pretty quickly from that point on after those Mains are out we'll see the uh bottom heat shill that has been protecting uh Starliner through its journey through the atmosphere come off that makes way for the landing airbags to deploy and there's the main parachutes there on your screen we see three out currently reefing and the teams at the uh Landing uh recovery teams report that they heard uh booms as those came out three good Mains fully open there you can see Starliner in a slight tilt so we're going to see the rotation handle move here shortly and it will level out Starliner but three good parachutes looking great just a little over 2 minutes until the expected Landing time and we heard the rotational handle has been released so you can see that uh tilt evened out next up is the back heat shield jettison and there it goes that again makes way for the airbag inflation nice to see that you can see the airbags deploying there on on your screen those airbags are filled with nitrogen as they guide Starliner safely back to the desert floor just a beautiful sight as Starliner makes its way to the sand of New Mexico and fight controllers confirming six good airbags few still coming to us from the cesna we've got uh about just about a minute left to go until the expected touchdown be watching for that time for you e just about 15 seconds away from expected touchdown you're seeing the ground there in your screen as we get closer e touchdown Starliner is back on Earth that Landing coming at 1101 and 35 seconds Central Time 10:1 and 31 seconds mountain time at wh sand space armor at the US Army's Missile Range in New Mexico our landing and Recovery teams will now wait for clearance before making their way to the spacecraft one of the changes uh required with no crew on board is that the team here in the flight control room will be the ones to uh command the uh parachute uh to be cut away so that uh the wind doesn't pull the capsule along but uh that's no problem for them so uh now with the with Starliner down they can begin working on some of the post Landing to-do items again uh we saw Starliner touch down at 11:01 p.m. central Time that's uh 1 minute after midnight eastern Time or 10:01 p.m. central at the Landing site in New Mexico This Is A View From the Cessna still watching the drones slowly make their own way down uh those of course the uh the drog parachutes that uh preceded the main parachutes uh first slowing Starliner down before the the large parachutes opened and really just a Flawless and beautiful Descent of Starliner today even heard some cheers and clapping in the background e this again is the drug parachute still uh still making their way to the ground after Starliner has touchdown with its main parachutes touchdown came at 11:01 p.m. central Time the team here uh in Mission Control will be working through some post Landing steps now view here of Starliner at its Landing site in uh White Sands at space Harbor Landing recovery teams will soon begin making its way out to them to uh begin recovering the space spacecraft team here in uh mission control is pulling right now to see if everybody is ready to power off the vehicle that again is a step that the flight control team is taken over with the uh with the uh lack of crew on board once the spacecraft is powered down they will be transitioning control of the spacecraft over to the landing and Recovery team team and it's a little difficult to see in this shot but there is a strobe light on Starliner that will help the teams follow it out [Applause] there and the uh recovery team is on the move but I think Leah chesar and Josh Barrett our colleagues out there may be able to give us one last update Le and Josh can you hear us great landing of calypso I don't think there could obviously we did have really a great show we were able to see the cameras that you were watching too from the wb7 from the cesna from the International Space Station but can I interr yes concur it's been a really amazing day we were hearing a bit from space to ground there uh but I think they've concluded unfortunately uh we'll see if we can get a recording of that for uh folks uh listening at home but Leah go ahead with your update yeah sorry about that couldn't hear that one here so uh but uh MC here Rick just wanted to offer that he's got one more hour here hey it's his birthday once again flight director Rick hling has gotten a go from starliners for star for starers deorbit burn from all of the flight controllers watching over the spacecraft's return tonight and that again means we are officially on for starliners return to Earth at about 11:00 p.m. central time or midnight Eastern the dart burn at uh 10:17 p.m. central Time Is Now just 17 minutes away that'll be a 59 second firing of four of starliners orbital maneuvering and attitude control thrusters on Starliner service module and joining us live from Starliner Landing Zone with wh Sands at Whit Sands space Harbor in New Mexico our colleagues Leah Cheshire from NASA public affairs and Boeing's Josh Barrett Leah and Josh how is it going out there thanks Brandy it is going well out here uh we are out here in White Sands the weather right now is about 75 degrees and very light winds approximately 6 miles per hour uh this looks like potentially a picture from earlier today it is quite dark out here at this point we have a beautiful view of the stars and we are lined up in the Convoy getting ready to roll that's right Leah so I've been out here for both of Starliner previous Landings the first one was very cold the second one was quite warm and this one feels just about right uh we're following along with two command Vehicles we've got the mlcc or the mobile Landing control center uh they're tied in down in Mission Control in Houston with the people that you're seeing on your screen right now uh we also have the mdtv that's the mobile data and tracking vehicle and on top of that it's got a suite of Optics on top there's an infrared camera and two visible cameras one of them with telescopic Focus so those will be the first things that we'll be seeing Starliner with here from The Landing Zone and you should be seeing those on your screens as well and Leah's got a few more things that she'll talk about that should get some cameras on Starliner as well yeah especially the WB 57 NASA plane that took off just a few hours ago uh just as we were heading out here to The Landing site so we arrived here at about 6m local time which is Mountain Time uh and since then have been getting ready lining up uh doing Communications checks between the various teams and just getting ready to eventually drive out to The Landing site once Starliner comes down so uh it is a sea of white gypsum sand out here um and teams are continuing to just prepare as soon as we get into that deorbit burn so they are actually in a uh huddle right now talking through some of the next steps for tonight um getting ready to come and join us here in the Convoy as we await to see the deorbit burn so with that right now we are going to turn it back over to you Brandy and Lauren we are going to stick around though and cannot wait to see Starliner coming straight across the sky thank you thanks so much Leah and Josh we are hoping to get some good views from where you guys are at later today now once we make that final burn to get out of orbit today it'll take about 45 minutes for Starliner to reach its destination again white sand space Harbor in New Mexico where we just spoke with our colleagues from Starliner is currently flying with its solar arrays pointed toward the sun recharging the internal batteries to keep its systems powered through Landing the orbital maneuvering and attitude control thrusters or what we call omx will fire for about a minute to conduct the deorbit burn that maneuver slows the spacecraft down from orbital velocities and allows it to start falling back to Earth in a head down position at the end of that deorbit burn Starliner angles itself for re-entry the deorbit burn is just the first in a series of Milestones we're going to be taking off tonight to give you the full rundown uh deorbit burn is scheduled for 107 p.m. central as uh as we said we just got the go for that a few minutes ago it's going to be followed by the separation of the crew module from the service module at 10:20 p.m. and the crew module will then continue on on its own at 10:45 p.m. Starliner will begin to fill the uh effects of the Earth's atmosphere again for the first time since it's it in June and a few minutes later around 10:47 the heat from Star liner's reinjury will become so intense that the plas that plasma will begin uh to form around the spacecraft causing a blackout in Communications with Starliner for about 4 and A2 minutes once Starliner clears that blackout period things will begin to happen very quickly yeah so then up next at 10:56 when Starliner is about po 4.3 miles above Earth the spacecraft will be done with the forward heat shield that is at the top of the capsule that helped protect it through a re-entry and it will jettison it to make way for the parachutes that are stored underneath and then almost immediately those parachutes will begin to deploy first with two smaller drug parachutes that are meant to take the edge off Starliner speed they open up in stages over the course of about 28 seconds and then at 10:57 p.m. when Starliner is about 6 mil up the drug parachutes are released and three main parachutes are deployed they also open in stages over about 16 seconds but they stay with the spacecraft all the way until touchdown and again we are expecting that touchdown to come at 11:00 p.m. central just before the touchdown however at 10:58 p.m. Starliner also sheds its based heat shield at the bottom of the capsule to make way for the inflation of six Landing airbags hidden underneath it and those will cushion the vehicle as it lands in New Mexico's desert it's probably worth mentioning that we do not have uh video from Starliner if you think back to June on its ascent and journey to the International Space Station um it it's not able to send video down when it's not connected to space station so we won't be getting inflat views from it but we do have several cameras out at the Landing site as well as some aircraft in the area that where you're hoping to get some views from uh but of course it is going to be pretty dark out in the desert that night so um they may be infrared or black and white views um but hopefully we'll we'll get some some good uh camera views to show you and we're taking a live look now from The Landing site but uh the shot is quite dark at the moment you can see just a few lights blinking there uh hopefully as we get uh closer to the ground a star ler gets closer down we will have some better shots e the landing and Recovery teams have been out in the desert preparing for the spacecraft's return for several days I've been speaking with them to catch up on some of the preps that have been taking place they ran through a full mission dress rehearsal where they practi the landing and Recovery operation with all the different groups and functions and they've also been keeping a close eye on the wind direction to establish the best recovery zone out at White Sands they've even sent up some weather balloons to check the wind speeds tracking Vehicles out there are equipped cameras uh so the team has been calibrating those and again although we don't expect any views from Starliner on its way down we're hoping to get some good ones from those tracking cameras as well as aircraft in the area we plan to have the WB 57 getting views while it is um about 16,000 ft above the ground until the drog parachutes uh deploy and then at about 6,000 ft um we hope to see views from a Cessna in the area and this is actually a current view of the Cessna as it makes its way out to The Landing site wh sand space Harbor in New Mexico and this is a shot from one of the ground cameras that we have on site so again although it is dark there we are hoping to to see um to see some good views and in the last few hours the teams there on the ground have been at the holding area loading up their vehicles doing last minute checks making sure all the equipment is ready to go and then shortly they'll begin moving into place to watch Starliner make its Final Approach and then once Starliner lands teams will move closer in a very strategic way they will first stop at about the 500t mark away from the spacecraft and then they'll move in closer to the 150t mark while ground teams safe the vehicle that first team on site with Starliner will be what we call the gold team they start recovery operations by performing what's called a sniff test where they use sensors to check for hydrazine one of the propellants that uh Starliner uses they'll be wearing protective gear known as hazmat suits to prevent exposure to hypergolic propellants hydrazine is used as propellant and it if it turns into a vapor it can be toxic after the snift test they will notify the rest of the Convoy when it's safe to approach and then they're going to check the winds make sure the entire landing and Recovery team is staged up range from the direction the wind is blowing for added protection now everyone out there is part of a different color team and they wear a vest with that color so it's very obvious who does what so the next up is the silver team and their first job is to ground the spacecraft Starliner will be powered down but there could be some residual electricity so before anyone can touch it they will ground it and discharge it teams here on the ground are reporting that um everything is getting into good configuration for the deorbit burn that's now just about um 6 and a half minutes away uh going on uh with the with what we were saying we also will have the blue team that documenting that documents everything that's going on at the Landing site these are photographers from both Boeing and NASA who have situational awareness cameras and again here's a a current view of those teams all um ready to deploy at Landing yeah that's the holding site that we were mentioning and then of course you can see um the mountains there in the background in this black and white View and the Green Team hooks up the HVAC trailers to Starliner to get cooling on it but their first job is to put up an environmental enclosure on the spacecraft and that enclosure looks lot like a big inflatable it wraps around the vehicle to get cool air around it and make sure the critical systems don't overheat then the red team opens the hatch that is mostly uh Boeing fire rescue they will back up the mobile access platform to Star liner's hatch giving the team access and Starliner will be bringing back more than 900 lb of cargo including a nitrogen oxygen recharge system or what we call tank that NASA um will service and refill for future space station needs the teams will unload that cargo before Starliner heads back to Florida just over five minutes to go now until tonight's uh 10:17 p.m. central Time deorbit Burn team here on the ground reports that Starliner has gotten into the right attitude uh kind of the right way it's pointing uh for that burn so everything is looking good we're on track for uh landing at 11:00 p.m. central midnight Eastern with just a couple minutes or four minutes left to go until the deorbit burn we're going to check in once again with the landing team and Leah Cheshire and Josh Barrett thanks Brandy yeah we are out here uh just waiting in the Convoy area now most of the team is taking part in a safety briefing right now as we prepare to uh watch the deorbit burn and the re-entry and then move in toward the spacecraft like you mentioned it's really dark out here Josh and I were just able to take in the really beautiful sight of uh the Milky Way it's so dark so once the capsule starts to reenter the Earth's atmosphere we expect we expect to have a pretty good view of the streak um as that plasma builds up around the capsule itself that's right we should be seeing it come just over the Southwest Horizon right through the saddle of kind of the mountains uh that are just overlooking the mountain range here and uh remembering back to of1 kind of the view that we should be having here is that we'll hear the Sonic booms as well after we see kind of that plasma envelope and then pretty quickly afterward it is pretty remarkable how quickly it does end up over our heads uh we'll see the flashes from uh the mortars uh which deploy those uh Ford heat shield parachutes which take the the fort heat shield off um then we start hearing those mortors those mortars and then the the uh parachutes start to deploy um and then it's kind of slow motion from there as it drifts down and we're seeing a lot of movement as teams have just completed that safety briefing here so they're now all walking to join us at the Convoy uh so it looks like we are just a few minutes away from the deorbit burn and the show is really getting on the road soon so with that we're going to turn it back over to you in Houston we are uh just over two minutes away from the deorbit burn at this point uh Starliner has moved well away from the International Space Station and quite a few kilometers ahead of it as well we had a number of uh smaller Burns to ensure that Starliner was at a safe distance away from the space station before it performs performs the deorbit burn that will bring it out out of orbit and on its Journey back to Earth and flight director Rick henling and his team expect starliners orbital maneuvering attitude control thrusters also called omx to fire around 10:17 central time pushing the spacecraft out of its orbital flight path and onto its journey home this deorbit burn will set us up for a touchdown time of about 11:00 p.m. central or 10 p.m Mountain Daylight time out there in White Sands New Mexico once it's there control teams in Houston will begin powering off starliners radiators and solar rays as the spacecraft now has enough power to get home and sublimator will be taking over cooling they use water to cool the cabin Starliner is also uh as we said now in the correct attitude for performing the deorbit burn and at this point the service module and crew capsule are still attached to each other four of the service modules 12 a facing orbital maneuvering and attitude control engines are going to be powering the deorbit burn allowing them to separate safely and those engines are each 1500b thrusters meaning this burn will take about 6,000 lbs of thrust slowing Starliner from its current orbital velocity and bringing it back to Earth's atmosphere for a smooth Landing the small reaction control system or RCS thrusters assist here in holding Starliner in the correct attitude during this test flight our teams ran roughly a million computer mod model simulations showing all the different thrust Ruster combinations possible for a safe return to Earth today just 20 seconds now until the burn starts to last uh 59 seconds and again you uh be firing those orbital maneuvering and attitude control thrusters four orbital maneuvering and attitude control thrusters on Star lers service module are now firing slowing Starliner down as a capsule againsts its Journey back to Earth this will take about 59 seconds to complete we're hearing a good all good uh all thrusters firing well so far can see here those uh those representation of those thrusters firing Starliner is maintaining its attitude and as those large orbital maneuvering thrusters are firing smaller reaction control system thrusters are also working keeping the spacecraft in the correct position for the burn still looking good and we did see the uh durber burn cut off successfully teams here on the ground reporting a good burn Starliner is now on its way to wh sand space Harbor New Mexico and a planned touchdown at about 11:00 p.m. central midnight Eastern Time next up on the uh to-do list for tonight is the separation of the service module when the service module's job done it'll be disposed of over the Pacific Ocean leaving the uncrewed crew module to carry on alone in addition to all its other jobs the service module has spent the flight protecting the crew module's heat shield jettisoning it uncovers that critical piece of equipment allowing it to shelter the spacecraft as it begins traveling back through the Earth's atmosphere the crew module will then make its final attitude adjustments to make sure the heat shield is at exactly the right angle to provide that protection and those fine-tuned adjust ments are really just a strong capability of Starliner guidance navigation and control system in fact on the two previous flights Starliner made Bullseye Landings thanks to that system Starliner is maneuvering into position for that jettison at this time team here on the ground reporting that uh Starliner in a good attitude pointing the right direction for the service module separation and the service module has just jettisoned separated and is now falling away it will burn up during re-entry over a remote part of the Pacific Ocean and Starliner will continue on its path to New Mexico where the landing and Recovery team is waiting for Touchdown Starliner is now angling itself and its heat shield for re-entry entry interface is coming up in just about 10 minutes that's the hottest part of the re-entry proc process with star liner's heat shield reaching about 3000° to protect Starliner from those heat loads the spacecraft has what's called an ablative heat shield the outer surface of that Shield heats up to a gas which then carries the heat away from the crew module through convection and our team calls this process a game of Threes because during entry interface the heat shield will handle those temperatures of about 3,000 de but it will convert that heat to about 300° with only 3 in of a blader and because of this protection during this hottest part of re-entry the inside of the spacecraft remains at about room temperature when Starliner returned from its last two flights the capsules landed with two black stripes up the sides indicating the heat shield was a bladed as intended so we do expect to see that again today and the team considers that a bit of a badge of honor e to Rob e e once again uh we did see uh Starliner deorbit or uh performance deorbit burn on time at 10:17 p.m. central Time and then quickly turned around and jettison its surface module now that it has performed its Duty over the course of the mission we are still about uh 20 minutes away from entry interface but things will start to happen quickly after that about 4 minutes after we go into the entry interface the heat from Starliner reinjury will become so intense that the plasma will begin to form around the spacecraft causing a blackout in Communications with Starliner for about 4 and 1/2 minutes and after that we'll see Starliner Starliner jettison its forward heat shield that's and protecting the parachutes during GRE entry then when Starliner is around 30,000 ft above the ground the spacecraft's parachute sequence will begin two drone par drog parachutes rather will uh start slowing Starliner down and then they'll detach and three main parachutes will deploy and inflate at about 3,000 ft off the ground the base heat shield jettison exposing the airbags and then at touchdown those airbags absorb the initial force of Landing cushioning the spacecraft for a soft safe return to Earth e currently Starliner is about 213 miles above the uh South Pacific Ocean it's just past the southernmost portion of this final orbit coming around the uh southern coast of Australia now is going to begin making its way northward towards uh the west coast of the United States for that um landing at 11:00 p.m. central time midnight eastern time at wh sand space Harbor in New Mexico again we've had the deorbit burn that took place just as planned at 1017 a 59 second burn that uh changed the uh Starliner speed by about uh 290 mph 130 m/s that made way for the service module separation and the next Milestone we'll be watching for is the entry interface coming up around 10:45 still about 10 minutes away live view here of the uh recovery forces staged uh near The Landing site ready to move in when Starliner touches down we are taking off mil Stones as expected for that 11:00 p.m. central midnight Eastern or 10 p.m. mountain time touchdown today in New Mexico again Starliner performed its deorbit burn about 12 minutes ago the thrusters performed nominally and the flight home is going smooth e e e we're still about uh 14 minutes away from the entry interface which is our next Milestone I think I said earlier that we were 10 minutes away that was a mistake um but about 14 minutes now we'll be experiencing the uh the atmosphere for the first time since Starliner launched and since we do have a little time we're going to check back in with the landing team Le and Josh how are things going out there thanks Brandy yeah that was a great view of the uh Landing Convoy all lined up I was just watching some of the gold team members getting suited up as you mentioned earlier that's going to be the first team to come in and inspect the vehicle they're sniffing for those um hyper gools or any of those dangerous fumes before the rest of the teams get to go to move in and approach the capsule of course it's kind of a waiting game right now as we are still waiting to spot Starliner uh coming from the southwest so a lot of us are outside of the Convoy right now and keeping our eyes on the skies yeah that's right we're we've got about just under probably three dozen vehicles I all lined up in three rows just waiting to get that touchdown signal again going through that Convoy list that you guys went through already so well behind that gold team after Starliner declared safe the silver team moves in and they do the electrical grounding they'll also stabilize the vehicle just in case the airbags start deflating we make sure that the hatch has uh a good stable orientation for red team to come in and they're the ones with the hatch orientation uh and once uh the red team establishes hatch access actually the silver team has a fun job tonight in the dark they're going to go start looking for the pieces that came off of Starliner those heat shields uh some of those Lids from those those parachute mortars uh and then after that after red team has hatch access and opens up the hatch uh NASA's ISS program folks are going to come in for the cargo inspection so again we are expecting to start seeing Starliner coming across the Horizon around the time that entry interface begins but until then just wanted to give you guys a hit from The Landing site and the latest that we have going on here so we'll toss it back over to you in Mission Control Houston thanks so much Le and Josh we are watching for that entry interface as well we're now about uh 12 minutes away Starliner continuing to make good progress uh following at 10:17 p.m. central Time D orbit burn again we're looking at the landing and Recovery team set up at the holding Zone there at White Sands Josh and Leah are embedded with that Convoy and they will make a very strategic move toward the spacecraft after touchdown first stopping at about the 500t mark and then they'll get the go to move forward to the 100 50t Mark and then once the vehicle is considered safe they will move in with the new orbit burn complete and uh the service mod module separated the spacecraft's heat shield is now exposed and ready to begin experiencing the atmosphere again uh the Starliner is going to make some final attitude adjustments that keep that heat shield pointing at exactly the right angle and next step after that is entry interface again just coming up in a few minutes at 400,000 ft above Earth Starliner faces temperatures of 3000° f from the plasma created by air friction around the spacecraft but Starliner can handle that heat with its heat shield which is made of an ablade of material designed to keep the inside of the spacecraft at about 70° few minutes later Starlin will experience an expected blackout in Communications and that will last for about 4 and A2 minutes at 30,000 ft and just 11 minutes before landing Starliner jettison its forward heat shield exposing the spacecraft's parachute system then two drog shoots will deploy in increasing drag and significantly slowing down Starliner then three pilot parachutes will pull out the main shoots allowing spacecraft to continue its slow and City descent for another 8,000 ft towards the landing Zone and once the main parachutes are fully inflated Starliner bucket handle releases and what that does is it just basically levels out the spacecraft ahead of touchdown and then the base heat shield that protected Starliner through re-entry will separate at about 3,000 ft uncovering The Landing airbags those airbags of course will fill with nitrogen allowing for Starliner to land softly and safely there in the sand less than 10 minutes to go now before we do get to that entry interface point point and uh now just 20 24 and 1/2 minutes away from The Landing at wh sand space Harbor everything's pretty quiet in the room which is a good sign things are continuing to go smoothly as Starliner begins making it way making its way back to Earth you're taking a look there at flight directors Rick henling on the left speaking with Mike Lamers on the right Rick is the flight director for this Landing operation Mike is weather flight director they are tag teaming this operation team has been keeping a close eye on weather at the Landing site but everything uh looks but pretty good for tonight's touchdown yeah about 79° fahit out there they reported 10 miles visibility the winds are within the limits so we are looking good for a touchdown coming up right about 11:00 p.m. Central Time e 7 minutes to go now in tool entry interface and then uh that intense heating will start about 2 minutes after we do begin the interace that'll last about 4 and 1/2 minutes during which time we'll be in a blackout star liner is currently about 130 miles 149 miles rather above uh the Pacific Ocean heading northward towards the western coast of the United States and it's touchdown in New Mexico we're taking a look here at the Landing trajectory there on the left of your screen you can see that line that crosses over the Baja Peninsula and that is the track Starliner will take as it makes its way into New Mexico as it gets closer to the ground people living in the area might get um a bright shot of Starliner coming back through the atmosphere and Landing there in White Sands New Mexico you can also see there in the center of the screen the uh to-do list basically before before we do get to Landing the service module separations highlighted in green because that one's already taken place and next up is the entry interface about 5 minutes away from now and flight controllers here in the room are reporting good attitude for that entry interface coming up again in just under 5 minutes e e e e 2 and 1/2 minutes left before Starliner begins to fill the effects of the Earth's atmosphere again everything uh continuing to go smoothly flight controllers here in the room are quiet as they're working through their steps but all uh going well so far starliners in position to begin experiencing that heat from re-entry now less than 100 miles above the Earth and uh heading towards the Baja Peninsula we'll be flying over that before landing in New Mexico just 17 minutes to go into landing e less than a minute now until we begin entry interface again about 2 minutes after entry interface starts we'll begin seeing the heating uh really get intense and we'll go into a 4 and 1/2 minute blackout e team here in the ground reporting entry interface has begun they're seeing good range seeing another view from the uh Landing site or the the team's uh getting ready to move out to The Landing site here a little better idea from this view of exactly how dark it is out there with all the lights of the vehicle shining a minute and a half until we move into the blackout period for Starliner and 14 and 1/2 minutes until we land in White Sands New Mexico the star laner enters Earth's atmosphere at 17 times the speed of sound which could create a Sonic Boom for folks living in the area it will then be slowed down by parachutes to a speed very similar to what you might experience while going down an elevator inside a high-rise building the vehicle then comes to a safe comfortable stop at Landing 30 seconds now until the uh blackout period begin due to the compression of friction and friction of the air the molecules generate a very hot plasma that uh causes the red orange glow you often see appear in postflight imery on Min spacecraft although we won't get to see that tonight it will happen causes an expected communication Dropout this one will last 4 and A2 minutes as the vehicle uh goes through a time when plasma interferes with a satellite signal we expect that blank out to end around 10:52 p.m. central this is also the time that I mentioned earlier where a Starliner in the past two flights has gotten that black um mark Mark along the sides of it and that just really proves to our team that the ablade of heat shield or the ablade of material um around Starliner is is doing its job and the heat shield is pushing that plasma away it's black out time again uh last about 4 and 1/2 minutes we got uh about three and a half left of it uh after that uh the Milestones will be watching for include a Ford heat shield jettison at 1056 when Starliner is about 4.3 Mi above the Earth very soon after that uh almost immediately drug shoots deploy those uh give the give a little bit of an initial slow down to the vehicle before the really uh large main parachutes deploy that happens when the Starliner is about 2 and a half miles above the Earth e that's what every this uh is a live view from the International Space Station where we're able to get a view of uh Starliner track as it comes in we are now less than 10 minutes away from landing at wh Sands space Harbor scheduled for uh 10 or 11:00 p.m. central also uh getting reports that the WB 57 is also able to see Starliner now as it begins coming in for its uh for its Landing we've still got just about a minute left to go before Starliner comes out of its uh blackout period and this is the view from the WB 57 one of NASA's aircraft that is uh at the Landing site has been uh been uh staged and ready to pick Starliner or pick up the view of Starliner as it comes in and that is what we are seeing now and they're filming this video from about 16,000 ft the bb57 should continue to uh give us a view until the drogue parachutes deploy and then we hope to pick it up with the Cessna that is also in the area and flight controllers here in the room are reporting that we are out of that blackout period and everything is looking good Starliner remaining nominal as she returns to earth again this is a view from the WB 57 Starliner showing a beautiful streak across the sky as she returns to White Sand New Mexico we're about 3 minutes away from the forward heat shield jetos scine that's the next Milestone we're looking for Starliner is currently about 27 miles above the earth and the team at uh White Sands reporting that they have seen it we got a Telly hole from them uh reported uh remotely that means they are seeing Starliner from the ground they in New Mexico this view is coming from the Cessna that's also in the area picking up uh star now Starliner now from its lower altitude about 6,000 ft above whereas the WB 57 is about 16,000 ft up we are now just uh 6 minutes and 22 seconds away from Landing we should also just be a couple minutes away from the forward heat still jettison which will bring on the drog parachute deploy followed by the main parachutes and the strobe lights on Starliner are now on Starliner is now over the landing site and that strobe light will help the teams actually track Starliner on the ground because it is very dark out there now about 12 mil above uh The Landing site and just 5 minutes away from Landing watching now for the forward heat shield Jenison that should be coming up uh again making way from for the parachute deployment all right and that action you're seeing in your screen forward heat shield and drugs out really interesting view of this uh coming down from the wb-57 see those two drug parachutes uh now deployed they slow the uh vehicle down initially until it gets to a uh a safe uh speed for the enormous main parachutes to to follow about four minutes to go until touchdown now back to A View From the Cessna air aircraft in the uh vicinity of the landing site again this is a A View From a little lower than the WB 57 we were seeing the next thing we're going to see here is the three main parachutes come out and everything will happen pretty quickly from that point on after those Mains are out we'll see the uh bottom heat shield that has been protecting uh Starliner through its journey through the atmosphere come off that makes way for the landing airbags to deploy and there's the main parachutes there on your screen we see three out currently reefing and the teams at the uh Landing uh recovery teams report that they heard uh booms as those came out three good Mains fully open there you can see Starliner in a slight tilt so we're going to see the rotation handle move here shortly and it will level out Starliner but three good parachutes looking great just a little over 2 minutes until the expected Landing time and we heard the rotational handle has been released so you can see that uh tilt evened out next up is the back heat shield jettison and there it goes that again makes way for the airbag inflation nice to see that you can see the airbags deploying there on your screen those airbags are filled with nitrogen as they guide Starliner safely back to the desert floor just a beautiful sight as Starliner makes its way to the Sands of New Mexico and fight controllers confirming six good airbags spew still coming to us from the cesna we've got uh about just about a minute left to go until the expected touchdown be watching for that time for you just about 15 seconds away from expected touchdown you're seeing the ground there in your screen as we get closer touchdown Starliner is back on Earth that Landing coming at 11:01 and3 35 seconds Central Time 10:01 and 31 seconds mountain time at wh sand space armor at the US Army's Missile Range in New Mexico our landing and Recovery teams will now wait for clearance before making their way to the spacecraft one of the changes uh required with no crew on board is that the team here in the flight control room will be the ones to uh command the uh parachute uh to be cut away so that uh the wind doesn't pull the capsule along but uh that's no problem for them so uh now with the with Starliner down they can begin working on some of the post Landing to-do items again uh we saw Starliner touchdown at 11:01 p.m. central Time that's uh 1 minute after midnight eastern Time or 10:01 p.m. central at the Landing site in New Mexico This Is A View From the Cessna still watching the drones slowly make their own way down uh those of course are the uh the drog parachutes that uh preceded the main parachutes uh first slowing Starliner down before the the large parachutes opened and really just a Flawless and beautiful Descent of Starliner today even heard some cheers and clapping in the background this again is the drug parachute still uh still making their way to the ground after Starliner has touchdown with its main parachutes touchdown came at 11:01 p.m. central Time the team here uh in Mission Control will be working through some post Landing steps now view here of Starliner at its Landing site in uh White Sands at space Harbor Landing recovery teams will soon begin making its way out to them to uh begin recovering the spacecraft team here in uh mission control is pulling right now to see if everybody is ready to power off the vehicle that again is a step that the flight control team has taken over with the uh with the uh lack of crew on board once the spacecraft is powered down they will be transitioning control of the spacecraft over to the landing and Recovery team and it's a little difficult to see in this shot but there is a strobe light on Starliner that will help the teams follow it out [Applause] there and the uh recovery team is on the move but I think uh Leah chesar and Josh Barrett are colleagues out there may be able to give us one last update Josh can you hear us great landing of so I don't think um obviously we did have really a great show we were able to see the cameras that you were watching to from the WB 57 from the cesna from the International Space Station but can inter yes concur been a really amazing day we were hearing a bit from space to ground there uh but I think they've concluded unfortunately uh we'll see if we can get a recording of that for uh folks uh listening at home but Leah go ahead with your update yeah sorry about that couldn't hear that one here so uh but mcch here Rick just wanted to offer that he's got one more hour here hey it's his birth once again flight director Rick henling has gotten a go from starliners four star four starers deorbit burn from all of the flight controllers watching over the spacecraft's return tonight and that again means we are officially on for starliners return to Earth at about 11:00 p.m. central time or midnight Eastern the dart burn at uh 10:17 p.m. central Time Is Now just 17 minutes away that'll be at 59 second firing of four of Starliner orbital maneuvering and attitude control thrusters on Starliner service module and joining us live from Starliner Landing Zone with wh Sands at wh Sands space Harbor in New Mexico our colleagues Leah Chesire from NASA public affairs and Boeing's Josh Barrett Leah and Josh how is it going out there thanks Brandy it is going well out here uh we are out here in White Sands the weather right now is about 75 degre and very light winds approximately 6 milph uh this looks like potentially a picture from earlier today it is quite dark out here at this point we have a beautiful view of the stars and we are lined up in the Convoy getting ready to roll that's right Leah so I've been out here for both of star liner's previous Landings the first one was very cold the second one was quite warm and this one feels just about right uh we're following along with two command Vehicles we've got the mlcc or the mobile Landing control center uh they're tied in down in Mission Control in Houston with the people that you're seeing on your screen right now uh we also have the mdtv that's the mobile data and tracking vehicle and on top of that it's got a sweet of Optics on top there's an infrared camera and two visible cameras one of them with a telescopic Focus so those will be the first things that we'll be seeing Starliner with here from The Landing Zone and you should be seeing those uh on your your screens as well and Leah's got a few more things that she'll talk about that should get some cameras on Starliner as well yeah especially the WB 57 NASA plane that took off just a few hours ago uh just as we were heading out here to The Landing site so we arrived here at about 6 pm. local time which is Mountain Time uh and since then have been getting ready lining up uh doing Communications checks between the various teams and just getting ready to eventually drive out to The Landing site once Starliner comes down so uh it is a sea of white dips some sand out here um and teams are continuing to just prepare as soon as we get into that deorbit burn so they are actually in a h huddle right now talking through some of the next steps for tonight um getting ready to come and join us here in the Convoy as we await to see the deorbit burn so with that right now we are going to turn it back over to you Brandy and Lauren we are going to stick around though and cannot wait to see Starliner coming straight across the sky thank you thanks so much Leah and Josh we are hoping to get some good views from where you guys are at later today now once we make that final burn to get out of orbit today it'll take about 45 minutes for Starliner to reach its destination again white sand space Harbor in New Mexico where we just spoke with our colleagues from Starliner is currently flying with its solar arays pointed toward the sun recharging the internal batteries to keep its systems powered through Landing the orbital maneuvering and attitude control thrusters or what we call omx will fire for about a minute to conduct the deorbit burn that maneuver slows the spacecraft down from orbital velocities and allows it to start falling back to Earth in a head down position at the end of that deorbit burn Starliner angles itself for re-entry the deorbit burn is just the first in the series of Milestones we're going to be taking off tonight to give you the full rundown uh deorbit burn is scheduled for 107 p.m. central as uh as we said we just got the go for that a few minutes ago it's going to be followed by the separation of the crew module from the service module at 10:20 p.m. and the crew module will then continue on on its own at 10:45 p.m. Starliner will begin to fill the uh effects of the Earth's atmosphere again for the first time since its aset in June and a few minutes later around 10:47 the heat from Star liner's re-entry will become so intense that the plas that plasma will begin uh to form around the spacecraft causing a blackout in Communications with Starliner for about 4 and 1/2 minutes once Starliner clears that blackout period things will begin to happen very quickly yeah so then up next at 10:56 when Starliner is about po 4.3 mil above Earth the spacecraft will be done with the forward heat shield that is at the top of the capsule that helped protect it through reentry and it will jet Us in it to make way for the parachutes that are stored underneath and then almost immediately those parachutes will begin to deploy first with two smaller droke parachutes that are meant to take the edge off Starliner speed they open up in stages over the course of about 28 seconds and then at 10:57 p.m. when Starliner is about 6 miles up the drug parachutes are released and three main parachutes are deployed they also open in stages over about 16 seconds but they stay with the spacecraft all the way until touchdown and again and we were expecting that touchdown to come at 11:00 p.m. central just before the touchdown however at 10:58 p.m. Starliner also sheds its based heat shield at the bottom of the capsule to make way for the inflation of six Landing airbags hidden underneath it and those will cushion the vehicle as it lands in New Mexico's desert it's probably worth mentioning that we do not have uh video from Starliner if you think back to June on its ascent and journey to the International Space Station um it it's not able to send video down when it's not connected to space station so we won't be getting INF flat views from it but we do have several cameras out at the Landing site as well as some aircraft in the area that where you're hoping to get some views from uh but of course it is going to be pretty dark out in the desert at night so um they maybe infrared or black and white views um but hopefully we'll we'll get some some good uh camera views to to show you and we're taking a live look now from The Landing site but uh the shot is quite dark at the moment you can see just a few lights blinking there uh hopefully as we get uh closer to the ground as Starliner gets closer down we will have some better shots e The Landing and Recovery teams have been out in the desert preparing for the spacecraft's return for several days I've been speaking with them to catch up on some of the preps that have been taking place they ran through a full mission dress rehearsal where they practiced the landing and Recovery operation with all the different groups and functions and they've also been keeping a close eye on the wind direction to establish the best recovery zone out at wh Sands they've even sent up some weather balloons to check the wind speeds tracking vehicles out there are equipped cameras uh so the team has been calibrating those and again although we don't expect any views from Starliner on its way down we're hoping to get some good ones from those tracking cameras as well as aircraft in the area we plan to have the WB 57 getting views while it is um about 16,000 ft above the ground until the drog parachutes uh deploy and then at about 6,000 ft um we hope to see views from aesta in the area and this is actually a current view of the Cessna as it makes its way out to The Landing site wh sand space Harbor in New Mexico and this is a shot from one of the ground cameras that we have on site so again although it is dark there we are hoping to to see um to see some good views and in the last few hours the teams there on the ground have been at the holding area loading up their vehicles doing last minute checks making sure all the equipment is ready to go and then shortly they'll begin moving into place to watch Starliner make its Final Approach and then once Starliner lands teams will move closer in a very strategic way they will first stop at about the 500t mark away from the spacecraft and then they'll move in closer to the 150t mark while ground teams safe the vehicle that first team on site with Starliner will be what we call the gold team they start recovery operations by performing what's called a sniff test where they use sensors to check for hydrazine one of the propellants that uh Starliner uses they'll be wearing protective gear known as hazmat suits to prevent exposure to hypergolic propellants hydrazine is used as propellant and it if it turns into a vapor it can be toxic after the snift test they will notify the rest of the Convoy when it's safe to approach and then they're going to check the winds make sure the entire landing and Recovery team is staged uprange from the direction the wind is blowing for added protection now everyone out there is part of a different color team and they wear a vest with that color so it's very obvious who does what so the next step is the silver team and their first job is to ground the spacecraft Starliner will be powered down but there could be some residual electricity so before anyone can touch it they will ground it and discharge it teams here on the ground are reporting that um everything is getting into good configuration for the deorbit burn that's now just about um 6 and a half minutes away uh going on uh with the with what we were saying we also will have the blue team that documenting that documents everything that's going on at the Landing site these are photographers from both Boeing and NASA who have situational awareness cameras and again here's a a current view of those teams all um ready to deploy at Landing yeah that's the holding site that we were mentioning and then of course you can see um the mountains there in the background in this black and white View and the Green Team hooks up the HVAC trailers to Starliner to get cooling on it but their first job is to put up an environmental enclosure on the spacecraft and that enclosure looks a lot like a big inflatable it wraps around the vehicle to get cool air around it and make sure the critical systems don't overheat then the red team opens the hatch that is mostly uh Boeing fire rescue they will back up the mobile access platform to Starliner hatch giving the team access and Starliner will be bringing back more than 900 lb of cargo including a nitrogen oxygen recharge system or what we call noris tank that NASA um will service and refill for future space station needs the teams will unload that cargo before Starliner heads back to Florida just over 5 minutes to go now until tonight's uh 10:17 p.m. central Time deorbit Burn team here on the ground reports that Starliner has gotten into the right attitude uh kind of the right way it's pointing uh for that burn so everything is looking good we're on track for uh landing at 11:00 p.m. central midnight Eastern e with just a couple minutes or four minutes left to go until the deorbit burn we're going to check in once again with the landing team and Leah Cheshire and Josh Barrett thanks Brandy yeah we are out here uh just waiting in the Convoy area now most of the team is taking part in in a safety briefing right now as we prepare to uh watch the deorbit burn and the re-entry and then move in toward the spacecraft like you mentioned it's really dark out here Josh and I were just able to take in the really beautiful sight of uh the Milky Way it's so dark so once the capsule starts to reenter the Earth's atmosphere we expect we expect to have a pretty good view of the streak um as that plasma builds up around the capsule itself that's right we should be seeing it come just over the Southwest Horizon right through the saddle of kind of the mountains uh that are just overlooking the mountain range here and uh remembering back to o1 kind of the view that we should be having here is that we'll hear the Sonic booms as well after we see kind of that plasma envelope and then pretty quickly afterward it is pretty remarkable how quickly it does end up over our heads uh we'll see the flashes from uh the mortars uh which deploy those uh Ford heat shield parachut which take the the fort heat shield off um then we start hearing those mortors those mortars and then the the parachutes start to deploy um and then it's kind of slow motion from there as it drifts down and we're seeing a lot of movement as teams have just completed that safety briefing here so they're now all walking to join us at the Convoy uh so it looks like we are just a few minutes away from the deorbit burn and the show is really getting on the road soon so with that we're going to turn it back over to you in Houston we are uh just over two minutes away from the deorbit burn at this point uh Starliner has moved well away from the International Space Station and quite a few kilometers ahead of it as well we had a number of uh smaller Burns to ensure that Starliner was at a safe distance away from the space station before it performs performs the deorbit burn that will bring it out of orbit and on its Journey back to Earth and flight director Rick henfling and his team expect starliners orbital maneuvering at ude control thrusters also called omx to fire around 10:17 central time pushing the spacecraft out of its orbital flight path and onto its journey home this deorbit burn will set us up for a touchdown time of about 11:00 p.m. central or 10: p.m. Mountain Daylight time out there in White Sands New Mexico once it's there control teams in Houston will begin powering off starliners radiators and solar rays as the spacecraft now has enough power to get home and sublimator will be taking over cooling they use water to cool the cabin Starliner is also as we said now in the correct attitude for performing the deorbit burn and at this point service module and crew capsule are still attached to each other four of the service modules 12 AF facing orbital maneuvering and attitude control engines are going to be powering the deorbit burn allowing them to separate safely and those engines are each 1,500lb thrusters meaning this burn will take about 6,000 pounds of thrust slowing Starliner from its current orbital velocity and bringing it back to Earth's atmosphere for a smooth Landing the small reaction control system or RCS thrusters assist here in holding Starliner and the correct attitude during this test flight our teams ran roughly a million computer mod model simulations showing all the different Thruster combinations possible for a safe return to Earth today just 20 seconds now until the burn starts it to last uh 5 9 seconds and again you uh be firing those orbital maneuvering and attitude control thrusters for orbital maneuvering and attitude control thrusters on Star lanter service module are now firing slowing Starliner down as a capsule againsts its Journey back to Earth this will take about 59 seconds to complete we're hearing a good all good uh all thrusters firing well so far can see here those uh those representation of those thrusters firing Starliner is maintaining its attitude and as those large orbital maneuvering thrusters are firing smaller reaction control system thrusters are also working keeping the spacecraft in the correct position for the burn still looking good and we did see the uh durber burn cut off successfully teams here on the ground reporting a good burn Starliner is now on its way to wh sand space Harbor New Mexico and a planned touchdown at about 11:00 p.m. central midnight Eastern Time next up on the uh to-do list for tonight is the separation of the service module when the service module's job done it'll be disposed of over the Pacific Ocean leaving the uncrewed crew module to carry on alone in addition to all its other jobs the service module has spent the flight protecting the crew module's heat shield Jing it uncovers that critical piece of equipment allowing it to shelter the spacecraft as it begins traveling back through the Earth's atmosphere the crew module will then make its final attitude adjustments to make sure the heat shield is at exactly the right angle to provide that protection and those fine-tuned adjustments are really just a strong capability of Starliner guidance navigation and control system in fact on the two previous lights Starliner made Bullseye Landings thanks to that system Starliner is maneuvering into position for that jettison at this time team here on the ground reporting that uh Starliner is in a good attitude pointing the right direction for the service module separation and the service module has just jettison separated and it's now falling away it will burn up during re-entry over a remote part of the Pacific Ocean and Starliner will continue on its path to New Mexico where the landing and Recovery team is waiting for Touchdown Starliner is now angling itself and its heat shield for re-entry an entry interface is coming up in just about 10 minutes that's the hottest part of the re-entry process with Starliner heat shield reaching about 3,000 de to protect Starliner from those heat loads the spacecraft has what's called an ablative heat shield the outer surface of that Shield heats up to a gas which then carries the heat away from the crew module through convection and our team calls this process a game of Threes because during entry interface the heat shield will handle those temperatures of about 3,000 de but it will convert that heat to about 300° with only 3 Ines of a blader and because of this protection during this hottest part of re-entry the inside of the spacecraft remains at about room temperature when Starliner returned from its last two flights the capsules landed with two black stripes up the sides indicating the heat shield was a bladed as intended so we do expect to see that again today and the team considers that a bit of a badge of honor e to rock e e once again uh we did see uh Starliner deorbit or uh performance deorbit burn on time at 10:17 p.m. central Time and then quickly turned around and jettisoned its surface module now that it has performed its Duty over the course of the mission we are still about 20 minutes away from entry interface but things will start to happen quickly after that about 4 minutes after we go into the entry interface the heat from Star liner's reinjury will become so intense that the plasma will begin to form around the spacecraft causing a blackout in Communications with Starliner for about 4 and A2 minutes and after that we'll see starliners Starliner jettison its forward heat shield that's been protecting the parachutes during great entry then when Starliner is around 30,000 ft above the ground the spacecraft's parachute sequence will begin to two drone par drog parachutes rather will uh start slowing Starliner down and then they'll detach and three main parachutes will deploy and inflate at about 3,000 ft off the ground the base heat shield jettison exposing the airbags and then at touchdown those airbags absorb the initial force of Landing cushioning the spacecraft for a soft safe return to Earth e currently Starliner is about 213 mil above the uh South Pacific Ocean it's just past the southernmost portion of this final orbit coming around the uh southern coast of Australia now is going to begin making its way northward towards uh the west coast of the United States for that um landing at 11:00 p.m. central Time midnight eastern time at wh sand space Harbor in New Mexico again we've had the deorbit burn that took place just as planned at 10177 a 59 second burn that uh changed the uh Starliner speed by about uh 290 mph 130 m/s that made way for the service module separation and the next Milestone we'll be watching for is the entry interface coming up around 10:45 still about 10 minutes away e live view here of the uh recovery forces staged uh near The Landing site ready to move in when Starliner touches down we are taking off Milestones as expected for that uh 11:00 p.m. central midnight Eastern or 10:00 p.m. mountain time touch down today in New Mexico again Starliner performed its deorbit burn about 12 minutes ago the thrusters performed nominally and the flight home is going smooth e e we're still about uh 14 minutes away from the entry interface which is our next Milestone I think I said earlier that we were 10 minutes away that was a mistake um but about 14 minutes from now we'll be experiencing the uh the atmosphere for the first time since Starliner launched and since we do have a little time we're going to check back in with the landing team Lee and Josh how are things going out there thanks Brandy yeah that was a great view of the uh Landing Convoy all lined up I was just watching some of the gold team members getting suited up as you mentioned earlier that's going to be the first team to come in and inspect the vehicle they're sniffing for those um hyper gools or any of those dangerous fumes before the rest of the teams get the go to move in and approach the capsule of course it's kind of a waiting game right now as we are still waiting to spot Starliner uh coming from the southwest so a lot of us are outside of the Convoy right now and keeping our eyes on the skies yeah that's right we're we've got about just under probably three dozen vehicles I all lined up in three rows just waiting to get that touchdown signal again going through that Convoy list that you guys went through already so well behind that gold team after Starliner is declared safe the silver team moves in and they do the electrical grounding they'll also stabilize the vehicle just in case the airbags start deflating we make sure that the hatch has uh a good stable orientation for red team to come in and they're the ones with the hatch orientation uh and once uh the red team establishes hatch access actually the silver team has a fun job tonight in the dark they're going to go start looking for the pieces that came off of Starliner those heat shields uh some of those Lids from those those parachute mortars uh and then after that after red team has hatch access and opens up the hatch uh NASA's ISS program folks are going to come in for the cargo inspection so again we are expecting to start seeing Starliner coming across the Horizon around the time that entry interface begins but until then just wanted to give you guys a h hit from The Landing site and the latest that we have going on here so we'll toss it back over to you in Mission Control Houston thanks so much Le and Josh we are watching for that entry interface as well we're now about uh 12 minutes away Starliner continuing to make good progress uh following that 107 p.m. central Time D orbit burn again we're looking at the landing and Recovery team set up at the holding Zone there at White Sands Josh and Leah are embedded with that Convoy and they will make a very strategic move toward the spacecraft after touchdown first stopping at about the 500t mark and then they'll get the go to move forward to the 150 ft Mark and then once the vehicle is considered safe they will move in e with the new orbit burn complete and uh the service mod module separated the spacecraft's heat shield is now exposed and ready to begin experiencing the atmosphere again uh the Starliner is going to make some final attitude adjustments that keep that heat shield pointing at exactly the right angle and next step after that is entry interface again just coming up in a few minutes at 400,000 ft above Earth Starliner faces temperatures of 3000° f from the plasma created by air friction around the spacecraft but Starliner can handle that heat with its heat shield which is made of an ablade of material designed to keep the inside of the spacecraft at about 70° few minutes later Starliner will experience an expected blackout in Communications and that will last for about 4 and 1/2 minutes at 30,000 ft and just 11 minutes before landing Starliner J Med's its forward heat shield exposing the spacecraft's parachute system then two Dro shoots will deploy in increasing drag and significantly slowing down Starliner then three pilot parachutes will pull out the main shoots allowing the spacecraft to continue its slow and C descent for another 8,000 ft towards the landing Zone and once the main parachutes are fully inflated starliners bucket handle releases and what that does is it just basically levels out the spacecraft ahead of touch down and then the base heat shield that protected Starliner through re-entry will separate at about 3,000 ft uncovering The Landing airbags those airbags of course will fill with nitrogen allowing for Starliner to land softly and safely there in the sand less than 10 minutes to go now before we do get to that entry interface point and uh now just 20 about 24 and 1/2 minutes away from The Landing at wh sand space Harbor everything pretty quiet in the room which is a good sign things are continuing to go smoothly as Starliner begins making it way making its way back to Earth you're taking a look there at flight Direct Rick henling on the left speaking with Mike Lamers on the right Rick is the flight director for this Landing operation Mike is weather flight director they are tag teaming this operation team has been keeping a close eye on weather at the Landing site but everything uh looks pretty good for tonight's touchdown yeah about 79° fah out there they reported 10 miles visibility the winds are within the limits so we are looking good for a touchdown coming up right about 11:00 p.m. Central Time e 7 minutes to go now in tool entry interface and then uh that intense heating will start about 2 minutes after we do begin the interface that'll last about 4 and A2 minutes during which time we'll be in a blackout starling is currently about 130 Mi 149 miles rather above uh the Pacific Ocean heading northward towards the western coast of the United States and it's touchdown in New Mexico we're taking a look here at the Landing trajectory there on the left of your screen you can see that line that crosses over the Baja Peninsula and that is the track Starliner will take as it makes its way into New Mexico as it gets closer to the ground people living in the area might get a a bright shot of Starliner coming back through the atmosphere and Landing there in White Sands New Mexico you can also see there in the center of the screen the uh to-do list basically before before we do get to Landing the service module separation highlighted in green because that one's already taken place and next up is the entry interface about 5 minutes away from now and flight controllers here in the room are reporting good attitude for that entry interface coming up again in just under 5 minutes e e e e 2 and a half minutes left before Starliner begins to F the effects of the Earth's atmosphere again everything uh continuing to go smoothly flight controllers here in the room are quiet as they're working through their steps but all uh going well so far Starliner is in position to begin experiencing that heat from re-entry now less than 100 miles above the Earth and uh heading towards the Baja Peninsula we'll be flying over that before landing in New Mexico just 17 minutes to go until Landing e less than a minute now until we begin uh entry interface again about 2 minutes after entry interface starts we'll begin seeing the heating uh really get intense and we'll go into a 4 and 1/2 minute blackout team here in the ground reporting entry interface has begun they seeing good range seeing another view from the uh Landing site or the the team's uh getting ready to move out to The Landing s side here a little better idea from this view of exactly how dark it is out there with all the lights of the vehicle shining a minut minute and a half until we move into the blackout period for Starliner and 14 and 1/2 minutes until we land in White Sands New Mexico the star laner enters Earth's atmosphere at 17 times the speed of sound which could create a Sonic Boom for folks living in the area it will then be slowed down by parachutes to a speed very similar to what you might experience while going down an elevator inside a high-rise building the vehicle then comes to a safe comfortable stop at Landing 30 seconds now until the uh blackout period begin due to the compression of friction and friction of the air the molecules generate a very hot plasma that uh causes the red orange glow you often see appear in postflight imagery on Min spacecraft although we won't get to see that tonight uh it will happen causes an expected communication Dropout this one will last 4 and 1/2 minutes as the vehicle uh goes through a time when plasma interferes with a satellite signal we expect that black out to end around 1052 p.m. central this is also the time that I mentioned earlier where a Starliner in the past two flights has gotten that black um Mark along the sides of it and that just really proves to our team that the ablade of heat shield or the ablade of material um around Starliner is is doing its job and the heat shield is pushing that plasma away it's blackout time again uh last about 4 and 1/2 minutes we've got uh about 3 and 1/2 left of it after that uh the Milestones will'll be watching for include uh forward heat shield jettison at 1056 when Starliner is about 4.3 Mi above the Earth very soon after that uh almost immediately drug shoots deploy those uh give the give a little bit of an initial slow down to the vehicle before the really uh large main parachutes deploy that happens when the Starliner is about 2 and 1 half miles above the Earth e e that's the this uh is a live view from the International Space Station where we're able to get a view of uh Starliner track as it comes in we are now less than 10 minutes away from landing at White Sands space Harbor scheduled for uh 10 or 11:00 p.m. central also uh getting reports that the WB 57 is also able to see Starliner now as it begins coming in for its uh for its Landing we've still got just about a minute left to go before Starliner comes out of its blackout period and this is the view from the wb-57 one of NASA's aircraft that is uh at the uh Landing site has been uh been uh staged and ready to pick Starliner or pick up the view of Starliner as it comes in and that is what we are seeing now and they're filming this video from about 16,000 ft the bb57 should continue to uh give us a view until the drogue parachutes deploy and then we hope to pick it up with the Cessna that is also in the area and flight controllers here in the room are reporting that we are out of that blackout period and everything is looking good Starliner remaining nominal as she returns to Earth again this is a view from the WB 57 TR Starliner showing a beautiful streak across the sky as she returns to White Sands New Mexico we're about 3 minutes away from the forward heat shield jetos scine that's the next Milestone we're looking for Starliner is currently about 27 miles above the earth and the team at uh White Sands reporting that they have seen it we got a t hole from them uh reported uh remotely that means they are seeing Starliner from the ground there in New Mexico this view is coming from the Cessna that's also in the area picking up star now Starliner now from its lower altitude about 6,000 ft above whereas the WB 57 is about 16,000 ft up we are now just uh 6 minutes and 22 seconds away from Landing we should also just be a couple minutes away from the forward heat to jettison which will bring on the drog parachute deploy followed by the main parachutes and the strobe lights on Starliner are now on Starliner is now over the landing site and that strobe light will help the teams actually track star liner on the ground because it is very dark out there now about 12 miles above uh The Landing site and just 5 minutes away from Landing watching now for the forward heat shield Jenison that should be coming up uh again making way from for the parachute deployment all right and that action you're seeing in your screen forward heat shield and drugs out really interesting view of this uh coming down from the wb-57 see those two drug parachutes uh now deployed they slow the uh vehicle down initially until it gets to a uh a safe uh speed for the enormous main parachutes to to follow about four minutes to go until touchdown now back to A View From the Cessna aircraft in the uh vicinity of the landing site again this is a A View From a little lower than the WB 57 we were seeing the next thing we're going to see here is the three main parachutes come out and everything will happen pretty quickly from that point on after those Mains are out we'll see the uh bottom heat shield that has been protecting uh Starliner through its journey through the atmosphere come off that makes way for The Landing airbags to deploy and there's the main parachutes there on your screen we see three out currently reefing and the teams at the uh Landing uh recovery teams report that they heard uh booms as those came out three three good Mains fully open there you can see Starliner in a slight tilt so we're going to see the rotation handle move here shortly and it will level out Starliner but three good parachutes looking great just a little over 2 minutes until the expected Landing time and we heard the rotational handle has been release so you can see that uh tilt evened out next up is the back heat shield Med and there it goes that again makes way for the airbag inflation nice to see that you can see the airbags deploying there on your screen those airbags are filled with nitrogen as they guide Starliner safely back to the desert floor just a beautiful sight as Starliner makes its way to the Sands of New Mexico and fight controllers confirming six good airbags spu still coming to us from the cesna we've got uh about just about a minute left to go until the expected touchdown be watching for that time for you just about 15 seconds away from expected touchdown you're seeing the ground there in your screen as we get closer e touchdown Starliner is back on Earth that Landing coming at 11:01 and 35 seconds Central Time 10:01 and 31 seconds mountain time at White Sand space armor at the US Army's range in New Mexico our landing and Recovery teams will now wait for clearance before making their way to the spacecraft one of the changes uh required with no crew on board is that the team here in the flight control room will be the ones to uh command the uh parachute uh to be cut away so that uh the wind doesn't pull the capsule along but uh that's no problem for them so uh now with the with Starliner down they can begin and working on some of the post Landing to-do items again uh we saw Starliner touchdown at 11:01 p.m. central Time that's uh 1 minute after midnight eastern Time or 10:01 p.m. central at the Landing site in New Mexico This Is A View From the Cessna still watching the drones slowly make their own way down uh those of course are the uh the drog parachutes that uh preceded the main parachutes uh first slowing Starliner down before the the large parachutes opened and really just a Flawless and beautiful Descent of Starliner today we even heard some cheers and clapping in the background this again is the drug parachute still uh still making their way to the ground after Starliner has touchdown with its main parachutes touchdown came at 11:01 p.m. central Time the team here uh in Mission Control will be working through some post Landing steps now view here of Starliner at its Landing site in uh White Sands at space Harbor Landing recovery teams will soon begin making its way out to them to uh begin recovering the spacecraft team here in uh mission control is pulling right now to see if everybody is ready to power off the vehicle that again is a step that the flight control team has taken over with the uh with the uh lack of crew on board once the spacecraft is powered down they will be transitioning control of spacecraft over to the landing and Recovery team and it's a little difficult to see in this shot but there is a strobe light on Starliner that will help the teams follow it out there [Applause] and the uh recovery team is on the move but I think uh Leah chesar and Josh Barrett our colleagues out there may be able to give us one last update Josh can you hear us great landing of calypso I don't think there could birthday um obviously we did have really a great show we were able to see the cameras that you were watching too the wb7 from the sna from the International Space Station but yes concur a really amazing day we were hearing a bit from space to ground there uh but I think they've concluded unfortunately uh we'll see if we can get a recording of that for uh folks uh listening at home but Leah go ahead with your update yeah sorry about that couldn't hear that one here so uh but uh MC here Rick just wanted to offer that uh he's got one more hour here hey it's his birth once again flight director Rick hling has gotten a go from starliners four star four starliners deorbit burn from all of the flight controllers watching over the spacecraft's return tonight and that again means we are officially on for Starliner return to Earth at about 11:00 p.m. central time or midnight Eastern the dart burn at uh 10:17 p.m. central Time Is Now just 17 minutes away that'll be a 59 second firing of four of Starliner orbital maneuvering and attitude control thrusters on Star liner's service module and joining us live from Starliner Landing Zone with wh Sands uh at Whit Sands space Harbor in New Mexico our colleagues Leah Cheshire from NASA public affairs and boeings Josh Barrett Leah and Josh how is it going out there thanks Brandy it is going well out here uh we are out here in White Sands the weather right now is about 75 degrees and very light winds approximately 6 milph uh this looks like potentially a picture from earlier today it is quite dark out here at this point we have beautiful view of the stars and we are lined up in the Convoy getting ready to roll that's right Leah so I've been out here for both of Starliner previous Landings the first one was very cold the second one was quite warm and this one feels just about right uh we're following along with two command Vehicles we've got the mlcc or the mobile Landing control center uh they're tied in down in Mission Control in Houston with the people that you're seeing on your screen right now uh we also have the mdtv that's the mobile data and tracking vehicle and on top of that it's got a suite of Optics on top there's an infrared camera and two visible cameras one of them with a telescopic Focus so those will be the first things that we'll be seeing Starliner with here from The Landing Zone and you should be seeing those uh on your screens as well and Leah's got a few more things that she'll talk about that should get some cameras on Starliner as well yeah especially the WB 57 NASA's plane that took off just a few hours ago uh just as we were heading out here to The Landing site so we arrived here at about 6:00 p.m. local time which is Mountain Time uh and since then have been getting ready lining up uh doing Communications checks between the various teams and just getting ready to eventually drive out to The Landing site once Starliner comes down so uh it is a sea of white gypsum sand out here um and teams are continuing to just prepare as soon as we get into that deorbit burn so they are actually in a uh huddle right now talking through some of the next steps for tonight um getting ready to come and join us here in the Convoy as we await to see the deorbit burn so with that right now we are going to turn it back over to you Brandy and Lauren we are going to stick around though and cannot wait to see Starliner coming straight across the sky thank you thanks so much Leah and Josh we are hoping to get some good views from where you guys are at later today now once we make that final burn to get out of orbit today it'll take about 45 minutes for Starliner to reach its destination again white sand space Harbor New Mexico where we just spoke with our colleagues from Starliner is currently flying with its solar arrays pointed toward the sun recharging the internal batteries to keep its systems powered through Landing the orbital maneuvering and attitude control thrusters or what we call omx will fire for about a minute to conduct the deorbit burn that maneuver slows the spacecraft down from orbital velocities and allows it to start falling back to Earth in a head down position at the end of that deorbit burn Starliner angles itself for re-entry the deorbit burn is just the first in a series of Milestones we're going to be taking off tonight to give you the full rundown uh deorbit burn is scheduled for 10:17 p.m. central as uh as we said we just got the go for that a few minutes ago it's going to be followed by the separation of the crew module from the ser module at 10:20 p.m. and the crew module will then continue on on its own at 10:45 p.m. Starliner will begin to fill the uh effects of the Earth's atmosphere again for the first time since its aset in June and a few minutes later around 10:47 the heat from starlander re-entry will become so intense that the plas that plasma will begin uh to form around the spacecraft causing a blackout in Communications with Starliner for about 4 and 1/2 minutes once Starliner clears that blackout period things will begin to happen very quickly yeah so then up next at 10:56 when Starliner is about po 4.3 Mi above Earth the spacecraft will be done with the forward heat shield that is at the top of the capsule that helped protect it through re-entry and it will jettison it to make way for the parachutes that are stored underneath and then almost immediately those parachutes will begin to deploy first with two smaller drug parachutes that are meant to take the edge off Starliner speed they open up in stages over the course of about 28 seconds and then at 10:57 p.m. when Starliner is about 6 miles up the drug parachutes are released and three main parachutes are deployed they also open in stages over about 16 seconds but they stay with the spacecraft all the way until touchdown and again we are expecting that touchdown to come at 1100 p.m. central just before the touchdown however at 10:58 p.m. Starline also sheds its based heat shield at the bottom of the capsule to make way for the inflation of six Landing airbags hidden underneath it and those will cushion the vehicle as it lands in New Mexico's desert it's probably worth mentioning that we do not have a video from Starliner if you think back to June on its ascent and journey to the International Space Station um it it's not able to send video down when it's not connected to space station so we won't be getting INF flat views from it but we do have several cameras out at the Landing site as well as some aircraft in the area that you're hoping to get some views from uh but of course it is going to be pretty dark out in the desert at night so um they may be infrared or black and white views um but hopefully we'll we'll get some some good uh camera views to show you and we're taking a live look now from The Landing site but uh the shot is quite dark at the moment you can see just a few lights blinking there uh hopefully as we get uh closer to the ground as Starliner gets closer down we will have some better shots e the landing and Recovery teams have been out in the desert preparing for the spacecraft's return for several days I've been speaking with them to catch up on some of the Preps that have been taking place they ran through a full mission dress rehearsal where they practi the landing and Recovery operation with all the different groups and functions and they've also been keeping a close eye on the wind direction to establish the best recovery zone out at wh Sands they've even sent up some weather balloons to check the wind speeds tracking Vehicles out there are equipped cameras uh so the team has been calibrating those and again although we don't expect any views from Starliner on its way down we're hoping to get some good ones from those tracking cameras as well as aircraft in the area we plan to have the WB 57 getting views while it is um about 16,000 ft above the ground until the drog parachutes uh deploy and then at about 6,000 ft um we hope to see views from a Cessna in the area and this is actually a current view of the Cessna as it makes its way out to The Landing site white sand space Harbor in New Mexico and this is a shot from one of the ground cameras that we have on site so again although it is dark there we are hoping to to see um to see some good views and in the last few hours the teams there on the ground have been at the holding area loading up their vehicles doing last minute checks making sure all the equipment is ready to go and then shortly they'll begin moving into place to watch Starliner make its Final Approach and then once star ler lands teams will move closer in a very strategic way they will first stop at about the 500t mark away from the spacecraft and then they'll move in closer to the 150 ft Mark while ground teams safe the vehicle that first team on site with Starliner will be what we call the gold team they start recovery operations by performing what's called a sniff test where they use sensors to check for hydrazine one of the propellants that uh Starliner uses they'll be wearing protective gear known as hazmat suits to prevent exposure to hypergolic propellants hydrazine is used as propellant and it if it turns into a vapor it can be toxic after the snift test they will notify the rest of the Convoy when it's safe to approach and then they're going to check the winds make sure the entire laning and Recovery team is staged uprange from the direction the wind is blowing for added protection now everyone out there is part of a different color team and they wear a vest with that color so it's very obvious who does what so the next up is the silver team and their first job is to ground the spacecraft Starliner will be powered down but there could be some residual electricity so before anyone can touch it they will ground it and discharge it teams here on the ground reporting that um everything is getting into good configuration for the deorbit burn that's now just about um 6 and 1/2 minutes away uh going on uh with the with what we were saying we also will have the blue team that documenting that documents everything that's going on at the Landing site these are photographers from both Boeing and NASA who have situational awareness cameras and again here's a a current view of those teams all um ready to deploy at Landing yeah that's the holding site that we were mentioning and then of course you can see um the mountains there in the background in this black and white View and the Green Team hooks up the HVAC trailers to Starliner to get cooling on it but their first job is to put up an environmental enclosure on the spacecraft and that enclosure looks a lot like a big inflatable it wraps around the vehicle to get cool air around it and make sure the critical systems don't overheat then the red team opens the hatch that is mostly uh Boeing fire rescue they will back up the mobile access plat platform to Star liner's hatch giving the team access and Starliner will be bringing back more than 900 lounds of cargo including a nitrogen oxygen recharge system or what we call noris tank that NASA um will service and refill for future space station needs the teams will unload that cargo before Starliner heads back to Florida just over 5 minutes to go now until tonight's uh 10:17 p.m. central Time deorbit Burn team here on the ground reports that Starliner has gotten into the right attitude uh kind of the right way it's pointing uh for that burn so everything is looking good we're on track for uh landing at 11:00 p.m. central midnight Eastern e with just a couple minute or four minutes left to go until the deorbit burn we're going to check in once again with the landing team and Leah Cheshire and Josh Barrett thanks Brandy yeah we are out here uh just waiting in the Convoy area now most of the team is taking part in a safety briefing right now as we prepare to uh watch the deorbit burn and the re-entry and then move in toward the spacecraft like you mentioned it's really dark out here Josh and I were just able to take in the really beautiful sight of uh the Milky Way it's so dark so once the capsule starts to reenter the Earth's atmosphere we expect we expect to have a pretty good view of the streak um as that plasma builds up around the capsule itself that's right we should be seeing it come just over the Southwest Horizon right through the saddle of kind of the mountains uh that are just overlooking the mountain range here and uh remembering back to of one kind of the view that we should be having here is that we'll hear the Sonic booms as well after we see kind of that plasma envelope and then pretty quickly afterward it is pretty remarkable how quickly it does end up over our heads uh we'll see the flashes from uh the mortars uh which deploy those uh Fort heat shield parachutes which take the the fort heat shield off um then we start hearing those mortors those mortars and then the the uh parachutes start to deoy um and then it's kind of slow motion from there as it drifts down and we're seeing a lot of movement as teams have just completed that safety briefing here so they're now all walking to join us at the Convoy uh so it looks like we are just a few minutes away from the deorbit burn and the show is really getting on the road soon so with that we're going to turn it back over to you in Houston we are uh just over 2 minutes away from the deorbit burn at this point uh Starliner has moved well away from The Intern space station and quite a few kilom ahead of it as well we had a number of smaller Burns to ensure that Starliner was at a safe distance away from the space station before it performs performs the deorbit burn that will bring it out of orbit and on its Journey back to Earth and flight director Rick henling and his team expect starliners orbital maneuvering attitude control thrusters also called omx to fire around 10:17 central time pushing the spacecraft out of its orbital flight path and onto its journey home this deorbit burn will set us up for a touchdown time of about 11:00 p.m. central or 10: p.m. Mountain Daylight time out there in White Sands New Mexico once it's there control teams in Houston will begin powering off starliners radiators and solar rays as the spacecraft now has enough power to get home and sublimator will be taking over cooling they use water to cool the cabin starer is also uh as we said now in the correct attitude for performing the deorbit burn and at this point service module and crew capsule are still attached to each other four of the service modules 12 AF fating orbital maneuvering and attitude control engines are going to be powering the deorbit burn allowing them to separate safely and those engines are each 1,500 lb thrusters meaning this burn will take about 6,000 lb of thrust slowing Starliner from its current orbital velocity and bringing it back to Earth's atmosphere for a smooth Landing the small reaction control system or RCS thrusters assist here in holding Starliner and the correct attitude during this test flight our teams ran roughly a million computer mod model simulations showing all the different Thruster combinations possible for a safe return to Earth today just 20 seconds now until the burn starts it'll last uh 59 seconds and again you uh be firing those orbital maneuvering and attitude control thrusters four orbital maneuvering and attitude control thrusters on Star liner service module are now firing slowing Starliner down is a capsule against its Journey back to Earth this will take about 59 seconds to complete we're hearing a good all good uh all thrusters firing well so far can see here those uh those representation of those thrusters firing star liner is maintaining its attitude and as those large orbital maneuvering thrusters are firing smaller reaction control system thrusters are also working keeping the spacecraft in the correct position for the burn still looking good and we did see the uh durber burn cut off successfully teams here on the ground reporting a good burn Starliner is now on its way to Whit sand space Harbor New Mexico and a planned touchdown at about 11:00 p.m. central midnight Eastern Time next up on the uh to-do list for tonight is the separation of the service module with the service module's job done it'll be disposed of over the Pacific Ocean leaving the uncrewed crew module to carry on alone in addition to all its other jobs the service module has spent the flight protecting the crew module's heat shield Jing it uncovers that critical piece of equipment allowing it to shelter the spacecraft as it begins traveling back through the Earth's atmosphere the crew module will then make its final attitude adjustments to make sure the heat shield is at exactly the right angle to provide that protection and those fine-tuned adjustments are really just a strong capability of star liner's guidance navigation and control system in fact on the two previous flights Starliner made Bullseye Landings thanks to that system starliners maneuvering into position for that jettison at this time team here on the ground reporting that uh Starliner is in a good attitude pointing the right direction for the service module separation and the service module has just J ascented separated and is now falling away it will burn up during re-entry over a remote part of the Pacific Ocean and Starliner will continue on its path to New Mexico Meo where the landing and Recovery team is waiting for Touchdown Starliner is now angling itself and its heat shield for re-entry entry interface is coming up in just about 10 minutes that's the hottest part of the re-entry process with Starliner heat shield reaching about 3,000 de to protect Starliner from those heat loads the spacecraft has what's called an ablative heat shield the outer surface of that Shield heats up to a gas which then carries the heat away from the crew module through convection and our team calls this process a game of Threes because during entry interface the heat shield will handle those temperatures of about 3,000 de but it will convert that heat to about 300° with only 3 in of a blader and because of this protection during this hottest part of re-entry the inside of the spacecraft remains at about room temperature when Starliner returned from its last two flights the capsules landed with two black stripes up the sides indicating the heat shield was a bladed as intended so we do expect to see that again today and the team considers that a bit of a badge of honor get to rock e e e once again uh we did see uh Starliner deorbit or uh performance deorbit burn on time at 10:17 p.m. central Time and then quickly turned around and jettisoned its surface module now that it has performed its Duty over the course of the mission we are still about uh 20 minutes away from entry interface but things will start to happen quickly after that about 4 minutes after we go into the entry interface the heat from starliners injury will become so intense that the plasma will begin to form around the spacecraft causing a blackout in Communications with Starliner for about 4 and a half minutes now after that we'll see starliners Starliner jettison its forward heat shield that's been protecting the parachutes during GRE entry then when Starliner is around 30,000 ft above the ground the spacecraft's parachute sequence will begin two drone par drog parachutes rather will uh start slowing Starliner down and then they'll detach and three main parachutes will deploy inflate at about 3,000 ft off the ground the base heat shield jettison exposing the airbags and then at touchdown those airbags absorb the initial force of Landing cushioning the spacecraft for a soft safe return to Earth e currently Starliner is about 213 miles above the uh South Pacific Ocean it's just past the southernmost portion of the spinal orbit coming around the uh southern coast of Australia now is going to begin making its way northward towards uh the west coast of the United States for that um landing at 11:00 p.m. central Time midnight eastern time at wh sand space Harbor in New Mexico again we've had the deorbit burn that took place just as planned at 1017 a 59 second burn that uh changed the uh Starliner speed by about uh 29 90 mph 130 m/s that made way for the service module separation and the next Milestone we be watching for is the entry interface coming up around 10:45 still about 10 minutes away e live view here of the uh recovery forces staged uh near The Landing site ready to move in when Starliner touches down we are taking off Milestones as expected for that uh 11 p.m. central midnight Eastern or 10 p.m. mountain time touchdown today in New Mexico against Starliner performed its deorbit burn about 12 minutes ago the thrusters performed nominally and the flight home is going smooth e e we're still about uh 14 minutes away from the entry interface which is our next Milestone I think I said earlier that we were 10 minutes away that was a mistake um but about 14 minutes from now we'll be experiencing the uh the atmosphere for the first first time since Starliner launched and since we do have a little time we're going to check back in with the landing team Lee and Josh how are things going out there thanks Brandy yeah that was a great view of the uh Landing Convoy all lined up I was just watching some of the gold team members getting suited up as you mentioned earlier that's going to be the first team to come in and inspect the vehicle they're sniffing for those um hyper gools or any of those dangerous fumes before the rest of the teams get to go to move in and approach the capsule of course it's kind of a waiting game right now as we are still waiting to spot Starliner uh coming from the southwest so a lot of us are outside of the confoy right now and keeping our eyes on the skies yeah that's right we're we've got about just under probably three dozen vehicles I all lined up in three rows just waiting to get that touchdown signal again going through that Convoy list that you guys went through already so well behind that gold team after Starliner is declared safe the silver team moves in and they do the electrical grounding they'll also stabilize the vehicle just in case the airbags start deflating we make sure that the hatch has uh a good stable orientation for red team to come in and they're the ones with the hatch orientation uh and once uh the red team establishes hatch access actually the silver team has a fun job tonight in the dark they're going to go start looking for the pieces that came off of Starliner those heat shields uh some of those Lids from those those pairs Sho mortars uh and then after that after red team has hatch access and opens up the hatch uh NASA's ISS program folks are going to come in for the cargo inspection so again we are expecting to start seeing Starliner coming across the Horizon around the time that entry interface begins but until then just wanted to give you guys a hit from The Landing site and the latest that we have going on here so we'll toss it back over to you in Mission Control Houston thanks so much Le and Josh we are watching for that entry interface as well we're now about uh 12 minutes away Starliner continuing to make good progress uh following that 1017 pm. Central Time D orbit burn again we're looking at the landing and Recovery team set up at the holding Zone there at White Sands J and Leah are embedded with that Convoy and they will make a very strategic move toward the spacecraft after touchdown first stopping at about the 500t mark and then they'll get the go to move forward to the 150 ft Mark and then once the vehicle is considered safe they will move in but the the orbit burn complete and uh the service mod module separated the spacecraft's heat shield is now exposed and ready to begin experiencing the atmosphere again uh the Starliner is going to make some final attitude adjustments that keep that heat shield pointing at exactly the right angle and next step after that is entry interface again just coming up in a few minutes at 400,000 ft above Earth Starliner faces temperatures of 3000° f from the plasma created by air friction around on the spacecraft but Starliner can handle that heat with its heat shield which is made of an ablade of material designed to keep the inside of the spacecraft at about 70° few minutes later Starliner will experience an expected blackout in Communications and that will last for about 4 and 1/2 minutes at 30,000 ft and just 11 minutes before landing Starliner jettison its forward heat shield exposing the spacecraft's parachute system then two Dro shoots will deploy in increasing drag and significantly slowing down Starliner then three pilot parachutes will pull out the main choots allowing the spacecraft to continue its slow and steady descent for another 8,000 ft towards the landing Zone and once the main parachutes are fully inflated Starliner bucket handle releases and what that does is it just basically levels out the spacecraft ahead of touchdown and then the base heat shield that protected Starliner through re-entry will separate at about 3,000 ft uncovering The Landing airbags those airbags of course will fill with nitrogen allowing for Starliner to land softly and safely there in the sand less than 10 minutes to go now before we do get to that entry interface point and uh now just 20 24 and 1/2 minutes away from The Landing at Whit sand space Harbor everything's pretty quiet in the room which is a good sign things are continuing to go smoothly as Starliner begins making it way making its way back to Earth you're taking a look there at flight directors Rick henfling on the left speaking with Mike Lamers on the right Rick is the flight director for this Landing operation Mike is weather flight director they are tag teaming this operation team has been keeping a close eye on weather at the Landing site but everything uh looks pretty good for tonight's touchdown yeah about 79° Fahrenheit out there they reported 10 mies visibility the winds are within the limits so we are looking good for a touch down coming up right about 11:00 p.m. Central Time 7 minutes to go now and Tool entry interface and then uh that intense heating will start about 2 minutes after we do begin the interface that'll last about 4 and a half minutes during which time we'll be in a blackout Starliner is currently about 130 miles 149 miles rather above uh the Pacific Ocean heading northward towards the western coast of the United States and it's touchdown in New Mexico we're taking a look here at the Landing trajectory there on the left of your screen you can see that line that crosses over the Baja Peninsula and that is the track Starliner will take as it makes its way into New Mexico as it gets closer to the ground people living in the area might get um a bright shot of Starliner coming back through the atmosphere and Landing there in White Sands New Mexico you can also see there in the center of the screen the uh to-do list basically before before we do get to Landing the service module separation highlighted in green because that one's already taken place and next up is the entry interface about 5 minutes away from now and flight controllers here in the room are reporting good attitude for that entry interface coming up again in just under 5 minutes e e e e 2 and a half minutes left before Starliner begins to fill the effects of the Earth's atmosphere again everything uh continuing to go smoothly flight controllers here in the room are quiet as they're working through their steps but all uh going well so far Starliner in position to begin experiencing that heat from re-entry now less than 100 miles above the Earth and uh heading towards the Baja Peninsula we'll be flying over that before landing in New Mexico just 17 minutes to go until Landing e less than a minute now until we begin uh entry interface again about 2 minutes after entry interface starts we'll begin seeing the heating uh really get intense and we'll go into a 4 and 1/2 minute blackout e team here in the ground reporting entry interface has begun they're seeing a good range seeing another view from the uh Landing site or the the team's uh getting ready to move out to The Landing s side here a little better idea from this view of exactly how dark it is out there with all the lights of the vehicle shining a minute and a half until we move into the blackout period for Starliner and 14 and 1/2 minutes until we land in White Sands New ago the star lanter enters Earth's atmosphere at 17 times the speed of sound which could create a Sonic Boom for folks living in the area it will then be slowed down by parachutes to a speed very similar to what you might experience while going down an elevator inside a high-rise building the vehicle then comes to a safe comfortable stop at Landing 30 seconds now until the uh blackout period begin due to the compression of friction and friction of the air the molecules generate a very hot plasma that uh causes the red orange glow you often see appear in postflight imagery on Min spacecraft although we won't get to see that tonight uh it will happen causes an expected communication Dropout this one will last 4 and 1/2 minutes as the vehicle uh goes through a time when plasma interferes with a satellite signal we expect that blank out to end around 10:52 2 p.m. central this is also the time that I mentioned earlier where a Starliner in the past two flights has gotten that black um Mark along the sides of it and that just really proves to our team that the ablative heat shield or the ablative material um around Starliner is is doing its job and the heat shield is pushing that plasma away it's blackout time again uh last about 4 and 1/2 minutes we've got uh about 3 and 1/2 left of it uh after that uh the Milestones will be watching for include uh Ford heat shield jettison at 1056 when ster liner is about 4.3 Mi above the Earth very very soon after that uh almost immediately drog shoots deploy those uh give the give a little bit of an initial slowdown to the vehicle before the really um large main parachutes deploy that happens when the Starliner is about 2 and 1 half miles above the Earth e e this uh is a live view from the International Space Station where we're able to get a view of uh Starliner track as it comes in We Are now less than 10 minutes away from landing at White Sands space Harbor scheduled for uh 10 or 11:00 p.m. central also uh getting reports that the wb-57 is also able to see Starliner now as it begins coming in for its uh for its Landing we've still got just about a minute left to go before Starliner comes out of its uh blackout period and this is the view from the WB 57 one of NASA's aircraft that is uh at the uh Landing site has been been uh been uh staged and ready to pick Starliner or pick up the view of Starliner as it comes in and that is what we are seeing now and they're filming this video from about 16,000 ft the bb57 should continue to uh give us a view until the drog parachutes deploy and then we hope to pick it up with the Cessna that is also in the area and flight controllers here in the room are reporting that we are out of that blackout period and everything is looking good Starliner remaining nominal as she returns to Earth again this is a view from the WB 57 Starliner showing a beautiful streak across the sky as she returns to White Sands New Mexico we're about 3 minutes away from the forward heat shield jetsin that's the next Milestone we're looking for Starliner is currently about 27 miles above the earth and the team at uh White Sands reporting that they have seen it we got a Telly hole from them uh reported uh remotely that means they are seen Starliner from the ground there in New Mexico this view is coming from the Cessna that's also in the area picking up uh star now Starliner now from its lower altitude about 6,000 ft above whereas the WB 57 is about 16,000 ft up we are now just uh 6 minutes and 22 seconds away from Landing we should also just be a couple minutes away from the forward heat to jettison which will bring on the drog parachute deploy followed by the main parachutes and the strobe lights on Starliner are now on Starliner is now over the landing site and that strobe light will help the teams actually track Starliner on the ground because it is very dark out there now about 12 miles above uh The Landing site and just 5 minutes away from Landing watching now for the forward heat shield Jenison that should be coming up uh again making way from for the parachute deployment all right and that action you're seeing on your screen forward heat shield and droges out really interesting view of this uh coming down from the WB 57 see those two drug parachutes uh now deployed they slow the uh vehicle down initially until it gets to a uh a safe uh speed for the enormous main parachutes to to follow about four minutes to go until touchdown now back to A View From the Cessna aircraft in the uh vicinity of the landing site again this is a A View From a little lower than the WB 57 we were seeing the next thing we're going to see here is the three main parachutes come out and everything will happen pretty quickly from that point on after those Mains are out we'll see the uh bottom heat shill that has been protecting uh Starliner through its journey through the atmosphere come off that makes way for the landing airbags to deploy and there's the main parachutes there in your screen we see three out currently reefing and the teams at the uh Landing uh recovery teams report that they heard uh booms as those came out three good Mains fully open there you can see Starlin are in a slight tilt so we're going to see the rotation hand move here shortly and it will level out Starliner but three good parachutes looking great just a little over 2 minutes until the expected Landing time and we heard the rotational handle has been released so you can see that uh tilt evened out next up is the back heat shield jettison and there it goes that again makes way for the airbag inflation nice to see that you can see the airbags deploying there on your screen those airbags are filled with nitrogen as they guide Starliner safely back to the desert floor just a beautiful sight as Starliner makes its way to the Sands of New Mexico and fight controllers confirming six good airbags VI still coming at to us from the cesna we've got uh about just about a minute left to go until the expected touchdown be watching for that time for you e just about 15 seconds away from expected touchdown you're seeing the ground there in your screen as we get closer e touchdown Starliner is back on Earth that Landing coming at 11:01 and 35 seconds Central Time 10:01 and 31 seconds mountain time at White Sand space haror at the US Army's Missile Range in New Mexico our landing and Recovery teams will now wait for clearance before making their way to the spacecraft one of the changes uh required with no crew on board is that the team here in the flight control room will be the ones to uh command the uh parachute uh to be cut away so that uh the wind doesn't pull the capsule along but uh that's no problem for them so uh now with the with Starliner down they can begin working on some of the post Landing Tod do items again uh we saw Starliner touchdown at 1101 1 p.m. central Time that's uh 1 minute after midnight eastern Time or 10:01 p.m. central at the Landing site in New Mexico This Is A View From the Cessna still watching the drones slowly make their own way down uh those of course are the the drog parachutes that uh preceded the main parachutes first slowing Starliner down before the the large parachutes opened and really just a Flawless and beautiful Descent of Starliner today even heard some cheers and clapping in the background e this again is the drug parachute still uh still making their way to the ground after Starliner has touched down with its main parachutes touchdown came at 11:01 p.m. central Time the team here uh in missig control will be working through some post Landing steps now view here of Starliner at its Landing site in uh White Sands at space Harbor Landing recovery teams will soon begin making its way out to them to uh begin recovering the spacecraft team here in uh mission control is pulling right now to see if everybody is ready to power off the vehicle that again is a step that the flight control team has taken over with the uh with the uh lack of crew on board once the spacecraft is powered down they will be transitioning control of the spacecraft over to the landing and Recovery team and it's a little difficult to see in this shot but there is a strobe light on Starliner that will help the teams follow it out there [Applause] and the uh recovery team is on the move but I think uh Leah chesar and Josh Barrett our colleagues out there may be able to give us one last update Josh can you hear us great landing of calypso I don't think there could birthday um obviously we did have really a great show we were able to see the cameras that you were watching too from the WB 57 from the cesna from the International Space Station but can you yes concur has been a really amazing day we were hearing a bit from space to ground there uh but I think they've concluded unfortunately uh we'll see if we can get a recording of that for uh folks uh listening at home but Leah go ahead with your update yeah sorry about that couldn't hear that one here so uh but Sunny uh mcch here Rick just wanted to offer that he's got one more hour here hey it's his birthday once again flight director Rick henling has gotten a go from starliners for star for starliners deorbit burn from all of the flight controllers watching over the spacecraft's return tonight and that again means we are officially on for start lers return to Earth at about 11:00 p.m. central time or midnight Eastern the do burn at 101 17 p.m. central Time Is Now just 17 minutes away that'll be a 59 second firing of four of starliners orbital maneuvering and attitude control thrusters on Starliner service module and joining us live from Starliner Landing Zone with wh Sands at Whit Sands space Harbor in New Mexico our colleagues Chesire from NASA public affairs and Boeing Josh Barrett Leah and Josh how is it going out there thanks Brandy it is going well out here uh we are out here in White Sands the weather right now is about 75 degrees and very light winds approximately 6 miles per hour uh this looks like potentially a picture from earlier today it is quite dark out here at this point we have a beautiful view of the stars and we are lined up in the Convoy getting ready to roll that's right Leah so I've been out here for both both of Starliner previous Landings the first one was very cold the second one was quite warm and this one feels just about right uh we're following along with two command Vehicles we've got the mlcc or the mobile Landing control center uh they're tied in down in Mission Control in Houston with the people that you're seeing on your screen right now uh we also have the mdtv that's the mobile data and tracking vehicle and on top of that it's got a suite of Optics on top there's an infrared camera and two visible cameras one of them with a telescopic Focus so those will be the first things that we'll be seeing Starliner with here from The Landing Zone and you should be seeing those uh on your screens as well and Leah's got a few more things that she'll talk about that I should get some cameras on Starliner as well yeah especially the WB 57 NASA plan that took off just a few hours ago uh just as we were heading out here to The Landing site so we arrived here at about 6:00 p.m. local time which is mountain time uh and since then have been getting ready lining up uh doing Communications checks between the various teams and just getting ready to eventually drive out to The Landing site once Starliner comes down so uh it is a sea of white gypsum sand out here um and teams are continuing to just prepare as soon as we get into that deorbit burn so they are actually in a h huddle right now talking through some of the next steps for tonight um getting ready to come and join us here in the Convoy at as we await to see the deorbit burn so with that right now we are going to turn it back over to you Brandy and Lauren we are going to stick around though and cannot wait to see Starliner coming straight across the sky thank you thanks so much Leah and Josh we are hoping to get some good views from where you guys are at later today now once we make that final burn to get out of orbit today it'll take about 45 minutes for Starliner to reach its destination again white sand space Harbor in New Mexico where we just spoke with our colleagues from Starliner is currently flying with its solar arrays pointed toward the sun recharging the internal batteries to keep its systems powered through Landing the orbital maneuvering and attitude control thrusters or what we call omx will fire for about a minute to conduct the deorbit burn that maneuver slows the spacecraft down from orbital velocities and allows it to start falling back to Earth in a head down position at the end of that deorbit burn Starliner angles itself for re-entry the deorbit burn is just the first in a series of Milestones we're going to be taking off tonight to give you the full rundown uh deorbit burn is scheduled for 10:17 p.m. central as uh as we said we just got the go for that a few minutes ago it's going to be followed by the separation of the crew module from the service module at 10:20 p.m. and the crew module will then continue on on its own at 10:45 p.m. Starliner will begin to fill the uh effects of the Earth's atmosphere again for the first time since its aset in June and a few minutes later around 10:47 the heat from Star liner's re-entry will become so intense that the plas that plasma will begin uh to form around the spacecraft causing a blackout in Communications with Starliner for about 4 and 1/2 minutes once Starliner clears that blackout period things will begin to happen very quickly yeah so then up next at 10:56 when Starliner is about po 4.3 Mi above Earth the spacecraft will be done with the forward heat shield that is at the top of the capsule that helped protect it through re-entry and it will jettison it to make way for the parachutes that are stored underneath and then almost immediately those parachutes will begin to deploy first with two smaller drog parachutes that are meant to take the edge off Starliner speed they open up in stages over the course of about 28 seconds and then at 10:57 p.m. when Starliner is about 6 mil up the drug parachutes are released and three main parachutes are deployed they also open in stages over about 16 seconds but they stay with the spacecraft all the way until touchdown and again we are expecting that touchdown to come at 11:00 PM Central just before the touchdown however at 10:58 p.m. Starliner also sheds its based heat shield at the bottom of the capsule to make way for the inflation of six Landing airbags hidden underneath it and those will cushion the vehicle as it lands in New Mexico's desert it's probably worth mentioning that we do not have a video from Starliner if you think back to June on its asent and journey to the International Space Station um it it's not able to send video down when it's not connected to space station so we won't be getting in flat views from it but we do have several cameras out at the Landing site as well as some aircraft in the area that we hoping to get some views from uh but of course it is going to be pretty dark out in the desert at night so um they may be infrared or black and white views um but hopefully we'll we'll get some some good uh camera views to show you and we're taking a live look now from The Landing site but uh the shot is quite dark at the moment you can see just a few lights blinking there uh hopefully as we get uh closer to the ground as Starliner gets closer down we will have some better shots e the landing and Recovery teams have been out in the desert preparing for the spacecraft's return for several days I've been speaking with them to catch up on some of the preps that have been taking place they ran through a full mission dress rehearsal where they practice the landing and Recovery operation with all the different groups and functions and they've also been keeping a close eye on the wind direction to establish the best recovery zone out at White Sands they've even sent up some weather balloons to check the wind speeds tracking Vehicles out there are equipped cameras uh so the team has been calibrating those and again although we don't expect any views from Starliner on its way down we're hoping to get some good ones from those tracking cameras as well as aircraft in the area we plan to have the WB 57 getting views while it is um about 16,000 ft above the ground until the drogue parachutes uh deploy and then at about 6,000 ft um we hope to see views from a Cessna in the area and this is actually a current view of the Cessna as it makes its way out to The Landing site white sand space Harbor in New Mexico and this is a shot from one of the ground cameras that we have on site so again although it is dark there we are hoping to to see um to see some good views and in the last few hours the teams there on the ground have been at the holding area loading up their vehicles doing last minute checks making sure all the equipment is ready to go and then shortly they'll begin moving into place to watch Starliner make its Final Approach and then once Starliner lands teams will move closer in a very strategic way they will first stop at about the 500t mark away from the spacecraft and then they'll move in closer to the 150 ft Mark while ground teams safe the vehicle that first team on site with Starliner will be what we call the gold team they start recovery operations by performing what's called a sniff test where they use sensors to check for hydrazine one of the propellants that uh Starliner uses they'll be wearing protective gear known as hazmat suits to prevent exposure to hypergolic propellants hydrazine is used as propellant and it if it turns into a vapor it can be toxic after the snift test they will notify the rest of the Convoy when it's safe to approach and then they're going to check the winds make sure the entire landing and Recovery team is staged uprange from the direction the wind is blowing for added protection now everyone out there is part of a different color team and they wear a vest with that color so it's very obvious who does what so the next up is the silver team and their first job is to ground the spacecraft Starliner will be powered down but there could be some residual electricity so before anyone can touch it they will ground it and discharge it teams here on the ground reporting that um everything is getting into good configuration for the deorbit burn that's now just about um 6 and A2 minutes away uh going on uh with the with what we were saying we also will have the blue team that documenting that documents everything that's going on at the Landing site these are photographers from both Boeing and NASA who have situational awareness cameras and again here's a a current view of those teams all um ready to deploy at Landing yeah that's the holding site that we were mentioning and then of course you can see um the mountains there in the background in this black and white View and the Green Team hooks up the HVAC trailers to Starliner to get cooling on it but their first job is to put up an environmental enclosure on the spacecraft and that enclosure looks a lot like a big inflatable it wraps around the vehicle to get cool air around it and make sure the critical systems don't overheat then the red team opens the hatch that is mostly uh Boeing fire rescue they will back up the mobile access platform to Starliner hatch giving the team access and Starliner will be bringing back more than 900 lb of cargo including a nitrogen oxygen recharge system or what we call noris tank that NASA um will service and refill for future space station needs the teams will unload that cargo before Starliner heads back to Florida just over 5 minutes to go now until tonight's uh 10:17 p.m. central Time deorbit Burn team here on the ground reports that Starliner has gotten into the right attitude kind of the right way it's pointing uh for that burn so everything is looking good we're on track for uh landing at 11:00 p.m. central midnight Eastern with just a couple minutes or four minutes left to go until the deorbit burn we're going to check in once again with the landing team and Leah Cheshire and Josh Barrett thanks Brandy yeah we are out here uh just waiting in the Convoy area now most of the team is taking part in a safety briefing right now as we prepare to uh watch the deorbit burn and the re-entry and then move in toward the spacecraft like you mentioned it's really dark out here Josh and I were just able to take in the really beautiful sight of uh the Milky Way it's so dark so once the capsule starts to reenter the Earth atmosphere we expect we expect to have a pretty good view of the streak um as that plasma builds up around the capsule itself that's right we should be seeing it come just over the Southwest Horizon right through the saddle of kind of the mountains uh that are just overlooking the mountain range here and uh remembering back to of1 kind of the view that we should be having here is that we'll hear the Sonic booms as well after we see kind of that plasma envelope and then pretty quickly afterward it is pretty remarkable how quickly it does end up over our heads uh we'll see the flashes from uh the mortars uh which deploy those uh Fort heat shield parachutes which take the the fort heat shield off um then we start hearing those mortors those mortars and then the the uh parachutes start to deploy um and then it's kind of slow motion from there as it drifts down and we're seeing a lot of movement as teams have just completed that safe debriefing here so they're now all walking to join us at the Convoy uh so it looks like we are just a few minutes away from the deorbit burn and the show is really getting on the road soon so with that we're going to turn it back over to you in Houston we are uh just over 2 minutes away from the deorbit burn at this point uh Starliner has moved well away from the International Space Station and quite a kilometers ahead of it as well we had a number of uh smaller Burns to ensure that Starliner was a safe distance away from the space station before it performs performs the deorbit burn that will bring it out of orbit and on its Journey back to Earth and flight director Rick henling and his team expect starliners orbital maneuvering attitude control thrusters also called omx to fire around 10:17 central time pushing the spacecraft out of its orbital flight path and onto its journey home this deorbit burn will set us up for a touchdown time of about 11:00 p.m. central or 10: p.m. Mountain Daylight Time time out there in White Sands New Mexico once it's there control teams in Houston will begin powering off starliners radiators and solar rays as the spacecraft now has enough power to get home and sublimator will be taking over cooling they use water to cool the cabin starer is also uh as we said now in the correct attitude for performing the deorbit burn and at this point the service module and crew capsule are still attached to each other four of the service modules 12 AF basing orbital maneuvering and attitude control engines are going to be powering the deorbit burn allowing them to separate safely and those engines are each, 1500lb thrusters meaning this burn will take about 6,000 lbs of thrust slowing Starliner from its current orbital velocity and bringing it back to Earth's atmosphere for a smooth Landing the small reaction control system or RCS thrusters assist here in holding Starliner and the correct attitude during this test flight our teams ran roughly a million computer mod model simulations showing all the different Thruster combinations possible for a safe return to Earth today just 20 seconds now until the burn starts it'll last uh 59 seconds and again you uh be firing those orbital maneuvering and attitude control thrusters four orbital maneuvering and attitude control thrusters on Starliner service module are now firing slowing Starliner down is a capsule against its Journey back to Earth this will take about 59 seconds to complete we're hearing a good all good uh all thrusters firing well so far can see here those uh those representation of those thrusters firing Starliner is maintaining its attitude and as those large orbital maneuvering thrusters are firing smaller reaction control system thrusters are also working keeping the spacecraft in the correct position for the burn still looking good and we did see the uh durber burn cut off successfully teams here on the ground reporting a good burn Starliner now on its way to wh sand space Harper New Mexico and a planned touchdown at about 11:00 p.m. central mid 9 Eastern Time next up on the uh to-do list for tonight is the separation of the service module with the service module's job done it'll be disposed of over the Pacific Ocean leaving the uncrewed crew module to carry on alone in addition to all its other jobs the service module has spent the flight protecting the crew module's heat shield Jing it uncovers that critical piece of equipment allowing it to shelter the spacecraft as it begins traveling back through the Earth's atmosphere the crew module will then make its final attitude adjustments to make sure the heat shield is exactly the right angle to provide that protection and those fine-tuned adjustments are really just a strong capability of Starliner guidance navigation and control system in fact on the two previous flights Starliner made Bullseye Landings thanks to that system starliners maneuvering into position for that jettison at this time e team here on the ground reporting that uh Starliner in a good attitude pointing the right direction for the service module separation and the service module has just jettisoned separated and is now falling away it will burn up during re-entry over a remote part of the Pacific Ocean and Starliner will continue on its path to New Mexico where the landing and Recovery team is waiting for Touchdown Starliner is now angling itself and its heat shield for re-entry entry interface is coming up in just about 10 minutes that's the hottest part of the re-entry process with Starliner heat shield reaching about 3,000 de to protect Starliner from those heat loads the spacecraft has what's called an ablative heat shield the outer surface of that Shield heats up to a gas which then carries the heat away from the crew module through convection and our team calls this process a game of Threes because during entry interface the heat shield will will handle those temperatures of about 3000° but it will convert that heat to about 300° with only 3 in of a blader and because of this protection during this hottest part of re-entry the inside of the spacecraft remains at about room temperature when Starliner returned from its last two flights the capsules landed with two black stripes up the sides indicating the heat shield was a bladed as intended so we do expect to see that again today and the team considers that a bit of a of Honor get to rock e once again uh we did see uh Starliner deorbit or uh performance deorbit burn on time at 10:17 p.m. central Time and then quickly turned around and jettisoned its surface module now that it has performed its Duty over the course of the mission we are still about uh 20 minutes away from entry interface but things will start to happen quickly after that about 4 minutes after we go into the entry interface the heat from starliners re-entry will become so intense that the plasma will begin to form around the spacecraft causing a blackout in Communications with Starliner for about 4 and A2 minutes and after that we'll see starliners Starliner jettison its forward heat shield that's been protecting the parachutes during GRE entry then when Starliner is around 30,000 ft above the ground the spacecraft's parachute sequence will begin two drone par drog parachutes rather will uh start slowing Starliner down and then they'll detach and three main parachutes will deploy and inflate at about 3,000 ft off the ground the base heat shield jettison exposing the airbags and then at touchdown those airbags absorb the initial force of Landing cushioning the spacecraft for a soft safe return to Earth e currently Starliner is about 213 miles above the uh South Pacific Ocean it's just past the southernmost portion of this final orbit coming around the uh southern coast of Australia and now is going to begin making its way northward towards uh the west coast of United States for that um landing at 11:00 p.m. central Time midnight eastern time at Whit sand space Harbor in New Mexico again we've had the deorbit burn that took place just as planned at 10:17 a 59c burn that uh changed the uh Starliner speed by about uh 290 mph 130 m per second that made way for the service module separation and the next Milestone we be watching for is an entry interface coming up around 10:45 still about 10 minutes away live VI here of the uh recovery forces staged uh near The Landing site ready to move in one Starliner touches down we are taking off Milestones as expected for that 11:00 p.m. central midnight Eastern or 10 p.m. mountain time touchdown today in New Mexico again Starliner performed its deorbit burn about 12 minutes ago the thrusters performed nominally and the flight home is going smooth e e we're still about uh 14 minutes away from the entry interface which is our next Milestone I think I said earlier that we were 10 minutes away that was a mistake um but about 14 months from now we'll be experiencing the uh the atmosphere for the first time since star laner launched and since we do have a little time we're going to check back in with the landing team Le and Josh how are things going out there thanks Brandy yeah that was a great view of the uh Landing Convoy all lined up I was just watching some of the gold team members getting suited up as you mentioned earlier that's going to be the first team to come in and inspect the vehicle they're sniffing for those um hyper gools or any of those dangerous fumes before the rest of the teams get the go to move in and approach the capsule of course it's kind of a waiting game right now as we are still waiting to spot Starliner uh coming from the southwest so a lot of us are outside of the Convoy right now and keeping our eyes on the skies yeah that's right we're we've got about just under probably three dozen vehicles I all lined up in three rows just waiting to get that touchdown signal again going through that Convoy list that you guys went through already so well behind that gold team after Starliner is declared safe the silver team moves in and they do the electrical grounding they'll also stabilize the vehicle just in case the airbags start deflating we make sure that the hatch has uh a good stable orientation for red team to come in and they're the ones with the hatch orientation uh and once uh the red team establishes hatch access actually the silver team has a fun job tonight in the dark they're going to go start looking for the pieces that came off of Starliner those heat shields uh some of those Lids from those those parachute mortars uh and then after that after red team has hatch access and opens up the hatch uh NASA's ISS program folks are going to come for the cargo inspection so again we are expecting to start seeing Starliner coming across the Horizon around the time that entry interface begins but until then just wanted to give you guys a hit from The Landing site and the latest that we have going on here so we'll toss it back over to you in Mission Control Houston thanks so much Le and Josh we are watching for that entry interface as well we're now about uh 12 minutes away Starliner continuing to make good progress uh following at 10:17 p.m. central Time D orbit burn again we're looking at the landing and Recovery team set up at the holding Zone there at White Sands Josh and Leah are embedded with that Convoy and they will make a very strategic move toward the spacecraft after touchdown first stopping at about the 500t Mark and then they'll get the go to move forward to the 150 ft Mark and then once the vehicle is considered safe they will move in with the new orbit burn complete and uh the service mod module separated the spacecraft's heat shield is now exposed and ready to begin experiencing the mosphere again uh the Starliner is going to make some final attitude adjustments that keep that heat shield pointing at exactly the right angle and next step after that is entry interface again just coming up in a few minutes at 400,000 ft above Earth Starliner faces temperatures of 3000° fah from the plasma created by air friction around the spacecraft but Starliner can handle that heat with its heat shield which is made of an ablade of material designed to keep the inside of the spacecraft at about 70° few minutes later Starlin will experience an expected blackout in Communications and that will last for about 4 and 1/2 minutes at 30,000 ft and just 11 minutes before landing Starliner jettison its forward heat shield exposing the spacecraft's parachute system then two drug shoots will deploy in increasing drag and significantly slowing down Starliner then three pilot parachutes will pull out the main shoots allowing the spacecraft to continue its slow and St descent for another 8,000 ft towards the landing Zone and once the main parachutes are fully inflated Starliner bucket handle releases and what that does is it just basically levels out the spacecraft ahead of touchdown and then the base heat shield that protected Starliner through re-entry will separate at about 3,000 ft uncovering The Landing airbags those airbags of course will fill with nitrogen allowing for Starliner to land softly and safely there in the sand less than 10 minutes to go now before we do get to that entry interface point and uh now just 2 24 and a half minutes away from The Landing at wh sand space Harbor everything's pretty quiet in the room which is a good sign things are continuing to go smoothly as Starliner begins making it way making its way back to Earth you're taking a look there at flight directors Rick henling on the left speaking with Mike Lamers on the right Rick is the flight director for this Landing operation Mike is weather flight director they are tag teaming this operation team has been keeping a close eye on weather at the Landing site but everything uh looks pretty good for tonight's touchdown yeah about 79° Fahrenheit out there they reported 10 Mi visibility the winds are within the limits so we are looking good for a touchdown coming up right about 11:00 p.m. Central Time e 7 minutes to go now and to entry interface and then uh that intense heating will start about 2 minutes after we do begin the interface that'll last about 4 and 1/2 minutes during which time we'll be in a blackout Starliner is currently about 130 miles 149 miles rather above uh the Pacific Ocean heading northward towards the western coast of the United States and it's touchdown in New Mexico we're taking a look here at the Landing trajectory there on the left of your screen you can see that line that crosses over the Baja Peninsula and that is the track Starliner will take as it makes its way into New Mexico as it gets closer to the ground people living in the area might get a a bright shot of Starliner coming back through the atmosphere and Landing there in White Sands New Mexico you can also see there in the center of the screen the uh to-do list basically before before we do get to Landing the service module separation highlighted in green because that one's already taken place and next up is the entry interface about 5 minutes away from now and flight controllers here in the room are reporting good attitude for that entry interface coming up again in just under 5 minutes that's e e e 2 and 1/2 minutes left before Starliner begins to feel the effects of the Earth's atmosphere again everything uh continuing to go smoothly flight controllers here in the room are quiet as they're working through their steps but all uh going well so far Starliner in position to begin experiencing that heat from re-entry now less than 100 miles above the Earth and uh heading towards the Baja Peninsula we'll be flying over that uh before landing in New Mexico just 17 minutes to go until Landing e less than a minute now until we begin uh entry interface again about 2 minutes after entry interface starts we'll begin seeing the heating uh really get intense and we'll go into a 4 and 1/ half minute blackout e team here in the ground reporting entry interface has begun seeing another view from the uh Landing site or the the team's uh getting ready to move out to The Landing side here a little better idea from this view of exactly how dark it is out there with all the lights of the vehicle shining a minute and a half until we move into the blackout period for Starliner and 14 and 1 12 minutes until we land in White Sands New Mexico the star laner enters Earth's atmosphere at 17 times this of sound which could create a Sonic Boom for folks living in the area it will then be slowed down by parachutes to a speed very similar to what you might experience while going down an elevator inside a high-rise building the vehicle then comes to a safe comfortable stop at Landing 30 seconds now until the uh blackout period begin due to the compression of friction and friction of the air the molecules generate a very hot plasma that uh causes the red orange glow you often see appear in postflight imagery on Min spacecraft although we won't get to see that tonight uh it will happen causes an expected communication Dropout this one will last 4 and A2 minutes as the vehicle uh goes through a time when plasma interferes with a satellite signal we expect that blank out to end around 10:52 p.m. central this is also the time that I mentioned earlier where a Starliner in the past two flights has gotten that black um Mark along the sides of it and that just really proves Star team that the ablative heat shield or the ablative material um around Starliner is is doing its job and the heat shield is pushing that plasma away it's blackout time again uh last about 4 and 1/2 minutes we've got uh about 3 and 1/2 left of it after that uh the Milestones will be watching for include uh Ford heat shield jettison at 1056 when Starliner is about 4.3 Mi above the Earth very soon after that uh almost immediately drug shoots deploy those uh give the give a little bit of an initial slowdown to the vehicle before the really um large main parachutes deploy that happens when the Starliner is about 2 and 1 half miles above the Earth e that's what every this uh is a live view from the International Space Station where we're able to get a view of uh Starliner track as it comes in we are now less than 10 minutes away from landing at the White Sands space Harbor scheduled for uh 10: or 11:00 p.m. central also uh getting reports that the w57 is also able to see Starliner now as it begins coming in for its uh for its Landing we've still got just about a minute left to go before Starliner comes out of its uh blackout period and this is the view from the wb-57 one of NASA's aircraft that is uh at the uh Landing site has been uh been uh staged and ready to pick a Starliner or pick up the view of Starliner as it comes in and that is what we are seeing now and they're filming this video from about 16,000 ft the bb57 should continue to uh give a view until the drogue parachutes deploy and then we hope to pick it up with the Cessna that is also in the area and flight controllers here in the room are reporting that we are out of that blackout period and everything is looking good Starliner remaining nominal as she returns to Earth again this is a view from the WB 57 Starliner showing a beautiful streak across the sky as she returns to White Sands New Mexico we're about 3 minutes away from the forward heat shield jetos that's the next Milestone we're looking for Starliner is currently about 27 miles above the earth and the team at uh White Sands reporting that they have seen it we got a t hole from them uh report Ed remotely that means they are seeing Starliner from the ground there in New Mexico this view is coming from the Cessna that's also in the area picking up uh star now Starliner now from its lower altitude about 6,000 ft above whereas the WB 57 is about 16,000 ft up we are now just uh 6 minutes and 22 seconds away from Landing we should also so just be a couple minutes away from the forward heat to jettison which will bring on the drog parachute deploy followed by the main parachutes and the strobe lights on Starliner are now on Starliner is now over the landing sight and that strobe light will help the teams actually track Starliner on the ground because it is very dark out there now about 12 miles above uh The Landing site and just 5 minutes away from Landing e watching now for the forward heat shield Jenison that should be coming up uh again making way from for the parachute deployment all right and that action you're seeing in your screen forward heat sheld and drugs out really interesting view of this uh coming down from the bb57 see those two drug parachutes uh now deployed they slow the uh vehicle down initially until it gets to a uh a safe uh speed for the enormous main parachutes to to follow about four minutes to go until touchdown [Music] now back to A View From the Cessna aircraft in the uh vicinity of the landing site again this is a A View From a little lower than the WB 57 we were seeing the next thing we're going to see here is the three main parachutes come out and everything will happen pretty quickly from that point on after those Mains are out we'll see the uh bottom heat shield that has been protecting uh Starliner through its journey through the atmosphere come off that makes way for the landing airbags to deploy and there's the main parachutes there on your screen we see three out currently reefing and the teams at the uh Landing uh recovery teams report that they heard uh booms as those came out three good Mains fully open there you can see Starliner in a slight tilt so we're going to see the rotation handle move here shortly and it will level out Starliner but three good parachutes looking great just a little over 2 minutes until the expected Landing time and we heard the rotational handle has been released so you can see that uh tilt evened out next up is the back heat shield jettison and there it goes that again makes way for the airbag inflation nice to see that you can see the airbags deploying there on your screen those airbags are filled with nitrogen as they guide Starlin are safely back to the desert floor just a beautiful sight as Starliner makes its way to the Sands of New Mexico and flight controllers confirming six good airbags spu still coming to us from the Cessna we've got uh about just about a minute left to go until the expected touchdown be watching for that time for you e just about 15 seconds away from expected touchdown you're seeing the ground there in your screen as we get closer touchdown Starliner is back on Earth that Landing coming at 11:01 and 35 seconds Central Time 10:01 and 31 seconds mountain time at Whit sand space haror at the US Army's Missile Range in New Mexico our landing and Recovery teams will now wait for clearance before making their way to the spacecraft one of the changes uh required with no crew on board is that the team here in the flight control room will be the ones to uh command the uh parachute uh to be cut away so that the wind doesn't pull the capsule along but uh that's no problem for them so uh now with the with Starliner down they can begin working on some of the post Landing to do items again uh we saw Starliner touchdown at 11:01 p.m. central Time that's uh 1 minute after midnight eastern Time or 10:01 p.m. central at the Landing site in Mexico This Is A View From the Cessna still watching the drones slowly make their own way down uh those of course are the uh the drog parachutes that uh preceded the main parachutes uh first slowing Starliner down before the the large parachut opened and really just a Flawless and beautiful Descent of Starliner today even heard some cheers and clapping in the background e this again is the drug parachut still uh still making their way to the ground after Starliner has touched down with its main parachutes touchdown came at 11:01 p.m. central Time the team here uh in Mission Control will be working through some post Landing steps now view here of Starliner at its Landing site in uh White Sands at space Harbor The Landing recovery teams will soon begin making its way out to them to uh begin recovering the spacecraft team here in uh mission control is pulling right now to see if everybody is ready to power off the vehicle that again is a step that the flight control team has taken over with the uh with the uh lack of crew on board once the spacecraft is powered down they will be transitioning control of the spacecraft over to the landing and Recovery team and it's a little difficult to see in this shot but there is a strobe light on Starliner that will help the teams follow it out [Applause] there and the uh recovery team is on the move but I think Leah chesar and Josh Barrett our colleagues out there may be able to give us one last update can you hear us great landing of cypo I don't think there obviously we did have really a great show we were able to see the cameras that you were watching too from the WB 57 from the Cessna from the International Space Station but can I interrup you yes concur it's been a really amazing day we were hearing a bit from space to ground there uh but I think they've concluded unfortunately uh we'll see if we can get a recording of that for uh folks uh listening at home but Leah go ahead with your update yeah sorry about that couldn't hear that one so sunny mcch here Rick just wanted to offer that he's got one more hour here hey it's his birthday once again flight director Rick henfling has gotten a go from starliners for star for starliners deorbit burn from all of the flight controllers watching over the spacecraft's return tonight and that again means we are officially on for Starliner return to Earth at about 11:00 p.m. central time or midnight Eastern the dart burn at 10:17 central time is now just 17 minutes away that'll be a 59 second firing of four of Starliner orbital maneuvering and attitude control festers on Starliner service module and joining us live from Starliner Landing Zone with Whit Sands at wh Sands space Harbor in New Mexico our colleagues Leah Cheshire from NASA public affairs and Boeing's Josh Barrett Le and Josh how is it going out there thanks Brandy it is going well out here uh we are out here in White Sands the weather right now is about 75° and very light winds approximately 6 mes per hour uh this looks like potentially a picture from earlier today it is quite dark out here at this point we have a beautiful view of the stars and we are lined up in the Convoy getting ready to roll that's right Leah so I've been out here for both of Starliner previous Landings the first one was very cold the second one was quite warm and this one feels just about right uh we're following along with two command Vehicles we've got the mlcc or the mobile Landing control center uh they're tied in down in Mission Control in Houston with the people that you're seeing on your screen right now uh we also have the mdtv that's the mobile data and tracking vehicle and on top of that it's got a suite of Optics on top there's an infrared camera and two visible cameras one of them with a telescopic Focus so those will be the first things that we'll be seeing Starliner with here from The Landing Zone and you should be seeing those on your screens as well and Leah's got a few more things that she'll talk about that should get some cameras on Starliner as well yeah especially the WB 57 NASA's plane that took off just a few hours ago uh just as we were heading out here to The Landing site so we arrived here at about 600 PM local time which is Mountain Time uh and since then have been getting ready lining up uh doing Communications checks between the various teams and just getting ready to eventually drive out out to The Landing site once Starliner comes down so uh it is a sea of white gypsum sand out here um and teams are continuing to just prepare as soon as we get into that deorbit burn so they are actually in a h huddle right now talking through some of the next steps for tonight um getting ready to come and join us here in the Convoy as we await to see the deorbit burn so with that right now we are going to turn it back over to you and Lauren we are going to stick around though and cannot wait to see Starliner coming straight across the sky thank you thanks so much Leah and Josh we are hoping to get some good views from where you guys are at later today now once we make that final burn to get out of orbit today it'll take about 45 minutes for Starliner to reach its destination again white sand space Harbor New Mexico where we just spoke with our colleagues from Starliner is currently flying with its solar arrays pointed toward the Sun recharging the internal batteries to keep its systems powered through Landing the orbital maneuvering and attitude control thrusters or what we call omx will fire for about a minute to conduct the deorbit burn that maneuver slows the spacecraft down from orbital velocities and allows it to start falling back to Earth in a head down position at the end of that deorbit burn Starliner angles itself for re-entry the deorbit burn is just the first in a series of Milestones we're going to be taking off tonight to give you the full rundown uh deorbit burn is scheduled for 10:17 p.m. central as uh as we said we just got the go for that a few minutes ago it's going to be followed by the separation of the crew module from the service module at 10:20 p.m. and the crew module will then continue on on its own at 10:45 p.m. Starliner will begin to fill the uh effects of the Earth's atmosphere again for the first time since its asent in June and a few minutes later around 10:47 the heat from star liner's re-entry will become so intense that the plas that plasma will begin uh to form around the spacecraft causing a blackout in Communications with Starliner for about 4 and 1/2 minutes once Starliner clears that blackout period things will begin to happen very quickly yeah so then up next at 1056 when Starliner is about po 4.3 Mi above Earth the spacecraft will be done with the forward heat shield that is at the top of the capsule that helped protect it through re-entry and it will jettus in it to make way for the parachutes that are stored underneath and then almost immediately those parachutes will begin to deploy first with two smaller drog parachutes that are meant to take the edge off Starliner speed they open up in stages over the course of about 28 seconds and then at 10:57 p.m. when Starliner is about 6 M up the drug parachutes are released and three main parachutes are deployed they also open in stages over about 16 seconds but they stay with the spacecraft all the way until touchdown and again we are expecting that touchdown to come at 11:00 p.m. central just before the touchdown however at 10:58 p.m. Starliner also sheds its based heat shield at the bottom of the capsule to make way for the inflation of six Landing airbags hidden underneath it and those will cushion the vehicle as it lands in New Mexico's desert it's probably worth mentioning that we do not have a video from Starliner if you think back to June on its asent and journey to the International Space Station um it it's not able to send video down when it's not connected to the space station so we won't be getting infl views from it but we do have several cameras out at the Landing site as well as some aircraft in the area that we you're hoping to get some views from uh but of course it is going to be pretty dark out in the desert at night so um they may be infrared or black W views um but hopefully we'll we'll get some some good uh camera views to show you and we're taking a live look now from The Landing site but uh the shot is quite dark at the moment you can see just a few lights blinking there uh hopefully as we get uh closer to the ground as Starliner gets closer down we will have uh some better shots e e the landing and Recovery teams have been out in the desert preparing for the spacecrafts return for several days I've been speaking with them to catch up on some of the preps that have been taking place they ran through a full mission dress rehearsal where they practice the landing and Recovery operation with all the different groups and functions and they've also been keeping a close eye on the wind direction to establish the best recovery zone out at White Sands they've even sent up some weather balloons to check the wind speeds tracking Vehicles out there are equipped cameras uh so the team has been calibrating those and again although we don't expect any views from Starliner on its way down we're hoping to get some good ones from those tracking cameras as well as aircraft in the area we plan to have the WB 57 getting views while it is um about 16,000 ft above the ground until the drug parachutes uh deploy and then at about 6,000 ft um we hope to see views from aesa and area and this is actually a current view of the Cessna as it makes its way out to The Landing site white sand space Harbor in New Mexico and this is a shot from one of the ground cameras that we have on site so again although it is dark there we are hoping to to see um to see some good views and in the last few hours the teams there on the ground have been at the holding area loading up their vehicles doing last minute checks making sure all the equipment is ready to go and then shortly they'll begin moving into place to watch Starliner make its Final Approach and then once Starliner lands teams will move closer in a very strategic way they will first stop at about the 500t mark away from the spacecraft and then they'll move in closer to the 150 ft Mark while ground teams safe the vehicle that first team on site with Starliner will be what we call the gold team they start recovery operations by performing what's called a sniff test where they use sensors to check for hydrazine one of the propellants that uh Starliner uses they'll be wearing protective gear known as hazmat suits to prevent exposure to hypergolic propellants hydrazine is used as propellant and it if it turns into a vapor it can be toxic after the sift test they will notify the rest of the Convoy when it's safe to approach and then they're going to check the winds make sure the entire Landing and Recovery team is staged uprange from the direction the wind is blowing for added protection now everyone out there is part of a different color team and they wear vest with that color so it's very obvious who does what so the next up is the silver team and their first job is to ground the spacecraft Starliner will be powered down but there could be some residual electricity so before anyone can touch it they will ground it and discharge it teams here on the ground reporting that um everything is getting into good configuration for the deorbit burn that's now just about um 6 and A2 minutes away uh going on uh with the with what we were saying we also will have the blue team that documenting that documents everything that's going on at the Landing site these are photographers from both Boeing and NASA who have situational awareness cameras and again here's a a current view of those teams all um ready to deploy at Landing yeah that's the holding site that we were mentioning and then of course you can see um the mountains there in the background in this black and white View and the Green Team hooks up the HVAC trailers to Starliner to get cooling on it but their first job is to put up an environmental enclosure on the spacecraft and that enclosure looks a lot like a big inflatable it wraps around the vehicle to get cool air around it and make sure the critical systems don't overheat then the red team opens the hatch that is mostly uh Boeing fire rescue they will back up the mobile access platform to Starliner hatch giving the team access and Starliner will be bringing back more than 900 lbs of cargo including a nitrogen oxygen recharge system or what we call noris tank that NASA um will service and refill for future space station needs the teams will unload that cargo before Starliner heads back to Florida just over 5 minutes to go now until tonight's uh 10:17 p.m. central Time deorbit Burn team here on the ground reports that Starliner has gotten into the right attitude uh kind of the right way it's pointing uh for that burn so everything is looking good we're on track for uh Landing at 11:00 p.m. central midnight Eastern with just a couple minutes or four minutes left to go until the deorbit burn we're going to check in once again with the landing team and Leah Cheshire and Josh Barrett thanks Brandy yeah we are out here uh just waiting in the Convoy area now most of the team is taking part in a safety briefing right now as we prepare to uh watch the deorbit burn and the re-entry and then move in toward the spacecraft like you mentioned it's really dark out here Josh and I were just able to take in the really beautiful site of uh the Milky Way it's so dark so once the capsule starts to reenter the Earth's atmosphere we expect we expect to have a pretty good view of the streak um as that plasma builds up around the capsule itself that's right we should be seeing it come just over the Southwest Horizon right through the saddle of kind of the mountains uh that are just overlooking the mountain range here and uh remembering back to of1 kind of the view that we should be having here is that we'll hear the Sonic booms as well after we see kind of that plasma envelope and then pretty quickly afterward it is pretty remarkable how quickly it does end up over our heads uh we'll see the flashes from uh mortars uh which deploy those uh Ford heat shield parachutes which take the the fort heat shield off um then we start hearing those mortors those mortars and then the the uh parachutes start to deploy um and then it's kind of slow motion from there as it drifts down and we're seeing a lot of movement as teams have just completed that safety briefing here so they're now all walking to join us at the Convoy uh so it looks like we are just a few minutes away from the deorbit burn and the show is really getting on the roads soon so with that we're going to turn it back over to you in Houston we are uh just over 2 minutes away from the deorbit burn at this point uh Starliner has moved well away from the International Space Station and quite a colomet ahead of it as well we had a number of uh smaller Burns to ensure that Starliner was at a safe distance away from the space station before it performs performs the deorbit burn that will bring it out of orbit and on its Journey back to Earth flight director Rick henfling and his team expect starliners orbital maneuvering attitude control thrusters also called omx to fire around 10:17 central time pushing the spacecraft out of its orbital flight path and onto its journey home this deorbit burn will set us up for a touchdown time of about 11:00 p.m. central or 10: p.m. Mountain Daylight time out there in White Sands New Mexico once it's there control teams in Houston will begin powering off starliners radiators and solar rays as the spacecraft now has enough power to get home and sublimator will be taking over cooling they use water to cool the cabin star ler is also uh as we said now in the correct attitude for performing deorbit burn and at this point the service module and crew capsule are still attached to each other four of the service modules 12 AF facting orbital maneuvering and attitude control engines are going to be powering the de burn allowing them to separate safely and those engines are each, 1500lb thrusters meaning this burn will take about 6,000 lb of thrust slowing Starliner from its current orbital velocity and bringing it back to Earth's atmosphere for a smooth Landing the small reaction control system or RCS thrusters assist here in holding Starliner in the correct attitude during this test flight our teams ran roughly a million computer mod model simulations showing all the different Thruster combinations possible for a safe return to Earth today just 20 seconds now until the burn starts it'll last uh 59 seconds and again you uh be firing those orbital maneuvering and attitude control thrusters four orbital maneuvering and attitude control thrusters on Starliner service module are now firing slowing Starliner down is a capsule against its Journey back to Earth this will take about 59 seconds to complete we're hearing a good all good uh all thrusters firing well so far can see here those uh those representation of those thrusters firing Starliner maintaining its attitude and as those large orbital maneuvering thrusters are firing smaller reaction control system rusters are also working keeping the spacecraft in the correct position for the burn still looking good and we did see the uh dber burn cut off successfully teams here on the ground reporting a good burn Starliner now on its way to White Sand space Harbor New Mexico and a planned touchdown at about 11:00 p.m. central midnight Eastern Time next up on the uh to-do list for tonight is the separation of the service module with the service module's job done it'll be disposed of over the Pacific Ocean leaving the UN crude crew module to carry on alone in addition to all its other jobs the service module has spent the flight protecting the crew module's heat shield Jing it uncovers that critical piece of equipment allowing it to shelter the spacecraft as it begins traveling back through the Earth's atmosphere the crew module will then make its final attitude adjustments to make sure the heat shield is at exactly the right angle to provide that protection and those fine-tuned adjustments are really just a strong capability of starliners guidance navigation and control system in fact on the two previous flights Starliner made Bullseye Landings thanks to that system starliners maneuvering into position for that jettison at this time team here on the ground reporting that uh starliners in a good attitude pointing the right direction for the service module separation and the service module has just jettisoned separated and is now falling away it will burn up during re-entry over a remote part of the Pacific Ocean and Starliner will continue on its path to New Mexico where the landing and Recovery team is waiting for Touchdown Starliner is now angling itself and its heat shield for re-entry an entry interface is coming up in just about 10 minutes that's the hottest part of the re-entry process with Starliner heat shield reaching about 3,000 to protect Starliner from those heat loads the spacecraft has what's called an ablative heat shield the otter surface of that Shield heats up to a gas which then carries the heat away from the crew module through convection and our team calls this process a game of Threes because during entry interface the heat shield will handle those temperatures of about 3,000 deg but it will convert that heat to about 300° with only 3 in of a Blader and because of this protection during this hottest part of re-entry the inside of the spacecraft remains at about room temperature when Starliner returned from its last two flights the capsules landed with two black stripes up the sides indicating the heat shield was a bladed as intended so we do expect to see that again today and the team considers that a bit of a badge of honor e a rock e e once again uh we did see uh Starliner deorbit or uh performance deorbit burn on time at 10:17 p.m. central Time and then quickly turned around and jettisoned its surface module now that it has performed its Duty over the course of the mission we are still about uh 20 minutes away from entry interface but things will start to happen quickly after that about 4 minutes after we go into the entry interface the heat from Starliner reentry will become so intense that the plasma will begin to form around the spacecraft causing a blackout in Communications with Starliner for about 4 and a half minutes and after that we'll see Starliner Starliner jettison its forward heat shield that's been protecting the parachutes during great entry then when Starliner is around 30 ,000 ft above the ground the spacecraft's parachute sequence will begin two drone par drog parachutes rather will uh start slowing Starliner down and then they'll detach and three main parachutes will deploy and inflate at about 3,000 ft off the ground the base heat shield jettison exposing the airbags and then at touchdown those airbags absorb the initial force of Landing cushioning the spacecraft for a soft safe return to Earth e e currently Starliner is about 213 miles above the uh South Pacific Ocean it's just past the southernmost portion of the spinal orbit coming around the uh southern coast of Australia and now is going to begin making its way northward towards uh the west coast of the United States for that um landing at 11:00 p.m. central Time midnight eastern time at Whit sand space Harbor in New Mexico again we've had the deorbit burn that took place just as planned at 10117 a 59c burn that uh changeed the uh Starliner speed by about uh 290 mph 130 m/ second that made way for the service module separation and the next Milestone we'll be watching for is the entry interface coming up around 10:45 still about 10 minutes away e live view here of the uh recovery forces staged uh near The Landing site ready to move in when Starliner touches down we are taking off Milestones as expected for that uh 11:00 p.m. central midnight Eastern or 10 p.m. mountain time touchdown today in New Mexico again Starliner performed its deorbit burn about 12 minutes ago the thrusters performed nominally and the flight home is going smooth e e we're still about uh 14 minutes away from the entry interface which is our next Milestone I think I said earlier that we were 10 minutes away that was a mistake um but about 14 minutes now we'll be experiencing the uh the atmosphere for the first time since Starliner launched and since we do have a little time we're going to check back in with the landing team Lee and Josh how are things going out there thanks Brandy yeah that was a great view of the uh Landing Convoy all lined up I was just watching some of the gold team members getting suited up as you mentioned earlier that's going to be the first team to come in and inspect the vehicle they're sniffing for those um hyper gools or any of those dangerous fumes before the rest of the teams get the go to move in and approach the capsule of course it's kind of a waiting game right now as we are still waiting to spot Starliner uh coming from the southwest so a lot of us are outside of the Convoy right now and keeping our eyes on the skies yeah that's right we're we've got about just under probably three dozen vehicles I all lined up in three rows just waiting to get that touchdown signal again going through that Convoy list that you guys went through already so well behind that gold team after Starliner is declared safe the silver team moves in and they do the electrical grounding they'll also stabilize the vehicle just in case the airbags start deflating we make sure that the hatch has uh a good stable orientation for red team to come in and they're the ones with the hatch orientation uh and once uh the red team establishes hatch access actually the silver team has a fun job tonight in the dark they're going to go start looking for the pieces that came off of Starliner those heat shields uh some of those Lids from those those parachute mortars uh and then after that after red team has hatch access and opens up the hatch uh NASA's ISS program folks are going to come in for the cargo inspection so again we are expecting to start seeing Starliner coming across the Horizon around the time that entry interf face begins but until then just wanted to give you guys a hit from The Landing site and the latest that we have going on here so we'll toss it back over to you in Mission Control Houston thanks so much Le and Josh we are watching for that entry interface as well we're now about uh 12 minutes away Starliner continuing to make good progress uh following at 10:17 p.m. central Time de orbit burn again we're looking at the landing and Recovery team set up at the holding Zone there at White Sands Josh and Leah are embedded with that Convoy and they will make a very strategic move toward the spacecraft after touchdown first stopping at about the 500t mark and then they'll get go to move forward to the 150 ft Mark and then once the vehicle is considered safe they will move move in with the new orbit burn complete and uh the service mod module separated the spacecraft's heat shield is now exposed and ready to begin experiencing the atmosphere again uh the Starliner is going to make some final attitude adjustments that keep that heat shield pointing at exactly the right angle and next up after that is entry interface again just coming up in a few minutes at 400,000 ft above Earth Starliner faces temperatures of 3,000 de F from the plasma created by air friction around the spacecraft but Starliner can handle that heat with its heat shield which is made of an ablade of material designed to keep the inside of the spacecraft at about 70° few minutes later Starliner will experience an expected blackout in Communications and that will last for about 4 and A2 minutes at 30,000 ft in just 11 minutes before landing Starliner jettison its forward heat shield exposing the spacecraft's parachute system then two drug shoots will deploy in increasing drag and significantly slowing down Starliner then three pilot parachutes will pull out the main shoots allowing the spacecraft to continue its slow and steady descent for another 8,000 ft towards the landing Zone and once the main parachutes are fully inflated Starliner bucket handle releases and what that does is it just basically levels out the spacecraft ahead of touchdown and then the base heat shield that protected Starliner through re-entry will separate at about 3,000 ft uncovering The Landing airbags those airbags of course will fill with nitrogen allowing for Starliner to land softly and safely there in the sand less than 10 minutes to go now before we do get to that entry interface point and uh now just 20 24 and 1/2 minutes away for from The Landing at wh sand space Harbor everything's pretty quiet in the room which is a good sign things are continuing to go smoothly as Starliner begins making it way making its way back to Earth you're taking a look there at flight directors Rick henfling on the left speaking with Mike Lamers on the right Rick is the flight director for this Landing operation Mike is weather flight director they are tag teaming this operation team has been keeping a close eye on weather at the Landing site but everything uh looks pretty good for tonight's touchdown yeah about 79° Fahrenheit out there they reported 10 miles visibility the winds are within the limits so we are looking good for a touchdown coming up right about 11:00 p.m. Central Time e 7 minutes to go now in tool entry interface and then uh that intense heating will start about 2 minutes after we do begin the interface that'll last about 4 and 1/2 minutes during which time we'll be in a blackout starlander is currently about 130 miles 149 miles rather above uh the Pacific Ocean heading northward towards the western coast of the United States and it's touchdown in New Mexico we're taking a look here at the Landing trajectory there in the left of your screen you can see that line that crosses over the Baja Peninsula and that is the track Starliner will take as it makes its way into New Mexico as it gets closer to the ground people living in the area might get um a bright shot of Starliner coming back through the atmosphere and Landing there in White Sands New Mexico you can also see there in the center of the screen the uh to-do list basically before before we do get to Landing the service module separations highlighted in green because that one's already taken place and next up is the entry interface about 5 minutes away from now and flight controllers here in the room are reporting good attitude for that entry interface coming up again in just under 5 minutes e e e e 2 and 1/2 minutes left before Starliner begins to fill the effects of the Earth's atmosphere again everything uh continuing to go smoothly flight controllers here in the room are quiet as they're working through their steps but all uh going well so far Starliner is in position to begin experiencing that heat from re-entry now less than 100 miles above the Earth and uh heading towards the Baja Peninsula we'll be flying over that before landing in New Mexico just 17 minutes to go until Landing e less than a minute now until we begin uh entry interface again about 2 minutes after entry interface starts we'll begin seeing the heating uh really get intense and we'll go into a 4 and 1/2 minute blackout that team here in the ground reporting entry interface has begun they're seeing a good range seeing another view from the uh Landing site or the the team's uh getting ready to move out to The Landing site here a little better idea from this view of exactly how dark it is out there with all the lights of the vehicle Shining a minute and a half until we move into the blackout period for Starliner and 14 and 1 12 minutes until we land in White Sands New Mexico the star lanter enters Earth's atmosphere at 17 times the speed of sound which could create a Sonic Boom for folks living in the area it will then be slowed down by parachutes to a speed very similar to what you might experience while going down an elevator inside a high-rise building the vehicle then comes to a safe comfortable stop at Landing 30 seconds now until the uh blackout period begin due to the compression of friction and friction of the air the molecules generate a very hot plasma that uh causes the red orange glow you often see appear in postflight imagery on Min spacecraft although we won't get to see that tonight uh it will happen caus is an expected communication Dropout this one will last 4 and 1/2 minutes as the vehicle uh goes through a time when plasma interferes with a satellite signal we expect that blank out to end around 10:52 p.m. central this is also the time that I mentioned earlier where a Starliner in the past two flights has gotten that black um Mark along the sides of it and that just really proves Star team that the ablade of heat shield or the ablade of material um around Starliner is is doing its job and the heat shield is pushing that plasma away it's black out time again uh last about 4 and 1/2 minutes we've got uh about 3 and 1/2 left of it uh after that uh the Milestones will'll be watching for include a forward heat shield jettison at 1056 when Starliner is about 4.3 Mi above the Earth very soon after that uh almost immediately drug shoots deploy those uh give the give a little bit of an initial slowdown to the vehicle before the really uh large main parachutes deploy that happens when the Starliner is about 2 and 1 half miles above the Earth e e that's be this uh is a live view from the International Space Station where we're able to get a view of uh Starliner track as it comes in we are now less than 10 minutes away from landing at wh Sands space Harbor scheduled for uh 10 or 11:00 p.m. central also uh getting reports that the WB 57 is also able to see Starliner now as it begins coming in for its uh for its Landing we've still got just about a minute left to go before Starliner comes out of its uh blackout period and this is a view from the wb-57 one of NASA's aircraft that is uh at the uh Landing site has been uh been uh staged and ready to pick a Starliner or pick up the view of Starliner as it comes in and that is what we are seeing now and they're filming this video from about 16,000 ft the bb57 should continue to uh give us a view until the drog parachutes deploy and then we hope to pick it up with the Cessna that is also in the area and flight controllers here in the room are reporting that we are out of that blackout period and everything is looking good Starliner remaining nominal as she returns to earth again this is a view from the WB 57 Starliner showing a beautiful streak across the sky as she returns to White Sands New Mexico we're about 3 minutes away from the forward heat shield jettison that's the next Milestone we're looking for Starliner is currently about 27 miles above the earth and the team at uh Wyatt Sands reporting that they have seen it we got a tally hole from them uh reported uh remotely that means they are seeing Starliner from the ground they New Mexico this view is coming from the Cessna that's also in the area picking up uh star now Starliner now from its lower altitude about 6,000 ft above whereas the WB 57 is about 16,000 ft up we are now just uh 6 minutes and 22 seconds away from Landing we should also just be a couple minutes away from the forward heat still jettison which will bring on the drog parachute deploy followed by the main parachutes and the strobe lights on Starliner are now on Starliner is now over the landing site and that strobe light will help the teams actually track Starliner on the ground because it is very dark out there now about 12 miles above uh The Landing site and just 5 minutes away from Landing watching now for the forward heat shield Jennison that should be coming up uh again making way from for the parachute deployment all right and that action you're seeing on your screen forward heat sheld and drugs out really interesting view of this uh coming down from the WB 57 see those two drug parachutes uh now deployed they slow the uh vehicle down initially clean tool gets to a uh a safe uh speed for the enormous main parachutes to to follow about four minutes to go until touchdown now back to A View From the Cessna aircraft in the uh vicinity of the landing site again this is a a A View From a little lower than the WB 57 we were seeing the next thing we're going to see here is the three main parachutes come out and everything will happen pretty quickly from that after those Mains are out we'll see the uh bottom heat shill that has been protecting uh Starliner through its journey through the atmosphere come off that makes way for the landing airbags to deploy and there's the main parachutes there on your screen we see three out currently reefing and the teams at the uh Landing uh recovery teams report that they heard booms as those came out three good Mains fully open there you can see Starliner in a slight tilt so we're going to see the rotation handle move here shortly and it will level out Starliner but three good parachutes looking great just a little over 2 minutes until the expected Landing time and we heard the rotational handle has been released so you can see that uh tilt evened out next up is the back heat shield jettison and there it goes that again makes way for the airbag inflation nice to see that you can see the airbags deploying there on your screen those airbags are filled with nitrogen as they guide Starliner safely back to the desert floor just a beautiful sight as Starliner makes its way to the Sands of New Mexico and flight controllers confirming six good airbags view still coming to us from the cesna we've got uh about just about a minute left to go until the expected touchdown be watching for that time for you just about 15 expected touchdown you're seeing the around there in your screen as we get closer touchdown Starliner is back on Earth that Landing coming at 1101 and 35 seconds Central Time 10:01 and 31 seconds mountain time at wh sand space armor at the US Army's Missile Range in New Mexico our landing and Recovery teams will now wait for clearance before making their way to the spacecraft one of the changes uh required with no crew on board is that the team here in the flight control room will be the ones to uh command the uh parachute uh to be cut away so that uh the wind doesn't pull the capsule along but uh that's no problem for them so uh now with the with Starliner down they can begin working on some of the post Landing to-do items again uh we saw Starliner touchdown at 11:01 p.m. central Time that's uh 1 minute after midnight eastern Time or 10:01 p.m. central at the Landing site in New Mexico This Is A View From the Cessna still watching the drones slowly make their own way down uh those of course are the uh the drog parachutes that uh preceded the main parachutes uh first slowing Starliner down before the the large parachutes opened and really just a Flawless and beautiful descent of Starliner today even heard some cheers and clapping in the background this again is the drug parachut still uh still making their way to the ground after star laner has touched down with its main parachutes touchdown came at 11:01 p.m. central Time the team here uh in michig control will be working through some post Landing steps now view here of Starliner at its Landing site in uh White Sands at space Harbor Landing recovery teams will soon begin making its way out to them to uh begin recovering the spacecraft team here in uh Michigan control is pulling right now to see if everybody is ready to power off the vehicle that again is a step that the flight control team has taken over with the uh with the uh lack of crew on board once the spacecraft is powered down they will be transitioning control of the spacecraft over to the landing and Recovery team and it's a little difficult to see in this shot but there is a strobe light on Starliner that will help the teams follow it out there [Applause] and the uh recovery team is on the move but I think uh Leah chesar and Josh Barrett our colleagues out there may be able to give us one last update Leah and Josh can you hear us great landing of calypso I don't think there could be birthday obviously we did have really a great show we were able to see the cameras that you were watching too from the wb7 from the cesna from the International Space Station but can I interrupt you yes concur it's been a really amazing day we were hearing a bit from space to ground there uh but I think they've concluded unfortunately uh we'll see if we can get a recording of that for uh folks uh listening at home but Leah go ahead with your update yeah sorry about that couldn't hear that one here so Sunny uh MC here Rick just wanted to offer that he's got one more hour here hey it's his birthday once again flight director Rick hling has gotten a go from starliners for star for starliners deorbit burn from all of the flight controllers watching over the spacecraft's return tonight and that again means we are officially on for Starliner return to Earth at about 11:00 p.m. central time or midnight Eastern the dart burn at uh 10:17 p.m. central Time Is Now just 17 minutes away that'll be a 59 second firing of four of starliners orbital maneuvering and add to control festers on Starliner service module and joining us live from Starliner Landing Zone with Whit Sands in at wh Sands space Harbor in New Mexico our colleagues Leah Cheshire from NASA public affairs and boeings Josh Barrett Le and Josh how is it going out there thanks Brandy it is going well out here uh we are out here in White Sands the weather right now is about 75 degrees and very light winds approximately 6 miles per hour uh this looks like potentially a picture from earlier today it is quite dark out here at this point we have a beautiful view of the stars and we are lined up in the Convoy getting ready to roll that's right Leah so I've been out here for both of star liner's previous Landings the first one was very cold the second one was quite warm and this one feels just about right uh we are following along with two command Vehicles we've got the mlcc or the mobile Landing control center uh they're tied in down in Mission Control in Houston with the people that you're seeing on your screen right now uh we also have the mdtv that's the mobile data and tracking vehicle and on top of that it's got a suite of Optics on top there's an infrared camera and two visible cameras one of them with a telescopic Focus so those will be the first things that we'll be seeing Starliner with here from The Landing Zone and you should be seeing those on your screens as well and Leah's got a few more things that she'll talk about that should get some cameras on Starliner as well yeah especially the WB 57 NASA plane that took off just a few hours ago uh just as we were heading out here to The Landing site so we arrived here at about 600 p.m. local time which is Mountain Time uh and since then have been getting ready lining up uh doing Communications checks between the various teams and just getting ready to eventually drive out to The Landing site once Starliner comes down so uh it is a sea of white gypsum sand out here um and teams are Contin to just prepare as soon as we get into that deorbit burn so they are actually in a huddle right now talking through some of the next steps for tonight um getting ready to come and join us here in the Convoy as we await to see the deorbit burn so with that right now we are going to turn it back over to you Brandy and Lauren we are going to stick around though and cannot wait to see Starliner coming straight across the sky thank you thanks so much Leah and Josh we are hoping to get some good views from where you guys are at later today now once we make that final burn to get out of orbit today it'll take about 45 minutes for Starliner to reach its destination again white sand space Harbor in New Mexico where we just spoke with our colleagues from Starliner is currently flying with its solar arrays pointed toward the sun recharging the internal batteries to keep its systems powered through Landing the orbital maneuvering and attitude control thrusters or what we call maax will fire for about a minute to conduct the deorbit burn that maneuver slows the spacecraft down from orbital velocities and allows it to start falling back to Earth in a head down position at the end of that deorbit burn Starliner angles itself for re-entry the deorbit burn is just the first in a series of Milestones we're going to be taking off tonight to give you the full rundown uh deorbit burn is scheduled for 10:17 p.m. central as uh as we said we just got the go for that a few minut ago it's going to be followed by the separation of the crew module from the service module at 10:20 p.m. and the crew module will then continue on on its own at 10:45 p.m. Starliner will begin to fill the uh effects of the Earth's atmosphere again for the first time since it's aset in June and a few minutes later around 10:47 the heat from Star liner's re-entry will become so intense that the plas that plasma will begin uh to form around the spacecraft causing a blackout in Communications with Starliner for about 4 and a half minutes once Starliner clears that blackout period things will begin to happen very quickly yeah so then up next at 10:56 when Starliner is about po 4.3 Mi above Earth the spacecraft will be done with the forward heat shield that is at the top of the capsule that helped protect it through a re-entry and it will jettison it to make way for the parachutes that are stored underneath and then almost immediately those parachutes will begin to deploy first with two smaller drog parachutes that are meant to take the edge off Starliner speed they open up in stages over the course of about 28 seconds and then at 10:57 p.m. when Starliner is about 6 mil up the drug parachutes are released and three main parachutes are deployed they also open in stages over about 16 seconds but they stay with the spacecraft all the way until touchdown and again we are expecting that touchdown to come at 11:00 p.m. central just before the touchdown however at 10:58 p.m. Starliner also sheds its based heat shield at the bottom of the capsule to make way for the inflation of six Landing airbags hidden underneath it and those will cushion the vehicle as it lands in New Mexico's desert it's probably worth mentioning that we do not have a video from Starliner if you think back to June on its ascent and journey to the International Space Station um it it's not able to send video down when it's not connected to the space station so we won't be getting INF flat views from it but we do have several cameras out at the Landing site as well as some aircraft in the area that we hoping to get some views from uh but of course it is going to be pretty dark out in the desert at night so um they may be infrared or black and white views um but hopefully we'll we'll get some some good uh camera views to show you and we're taking a live look now from The Landing site but uh the shot is quite dark at the moment you can see just a few lights blinking there uh hopefully as we get uh closer to the ground as Starliner gets closer down we will have some better shots e the landing and Recovery teams have been out in the desert preparing for the spacecraft's turn for several days I've been speaking with them to catch up on some of the preps that have been taking place they ran through a full mission dress rehearsal where they practice the landing and Recovery operation with all the different groups and functions and they've also been keeping a close eye on the wind direction to establish the best recovery zone out at White Sands they've even sent up some weather balloons to check the wind speeds tracking Vehicles out there are equipped cameras uh so the team has been calibrating those and again although we don't expect any views from Starliner on its way down we're hoping to get some good ones from those tracking cameras as well as aircraft in the area we plan to have the wb-57 getting views while it is um about 16,000 ft above the ground until the drogue parachutes uh deploy and then at about 6,000 ft um we hope to see views from a Cessna in the area and this is actually a current view of the Cessna as it makes its way out to The Landing site white sand space Harbor in New Mexico and this is a shot from one of the ground cameras that we have on site so again although it is dark there we are hoping to to see um to see some good views and in the last few hours the teams there on the ground have been at the holding area loading up their vehicles doing last minute checks making sure all the equipment is ready to go and then shortly they'll begin moving into place to watch Starliner make its Final Approach and then once Starliner lands teams will move closer in a very strategic way they will first stop at about the 500t mark away from the spacecraft and then they'll move in closer to the 150 foot Mark while ground teams safe the vehicle that first team on site with Starliner will be what we call the gold team they start recovery operations by performing what's called a sniff test where they use sensors to check for hydrazine one of the propellants that Starliner uses they'll be wearing protective gear known as hazmat suits to prevent exposure to hypergolic propellants hydrazine is used as propellant and it if it turns into a vapor it can be toxic after the snift test they will notify the rest of the Convoy when it's safe to approach and then they're going to check the winds make sure the entire landing and Recovery team is staged up range from the direction the wind is blowing for added protection now everyone out there is part of a color team and they wear a vest with that color so it's very obvious who does what so the next up is the silver team and their first job is to ground the spacecraft Starliner will be powered down but there could be some residual electricity so before anyone can touch it they will ground it and discharge it teams here on the ground reporting that um everything is getting into good configuration for the deorbit burn that's now just about um 6 and2 minutes away uh going on uh with the with what we were saying we also will have the blue team that documenting that documents everything that's going on at the Landing site these are photographers from both Boeing and NASA who have situational awareness cameras and again here's a a current view of those teams all um ready to deploy at Landing yeah that's the holding site that we were mentioning and then of course you can see um the mountains there in the background in this black and white View and the Green Team hooks up the HVAC trailers to Starliner to get cooling on it but their first job is to put up an environmental enclosure on the spacecraft and that enclosure looks a lot like a big inflatable it wraps around the vehicle to get cool air around it and make sure the critical systems don't overheat then the red team opens the hatch that is mostly uh Boeing fire rescue they will back up the mobile access platform to Starliner hatch giving the team access and Starliner will be bringing back more than 900 lbs of cargo including a nitrogen oxygen recharge system or what we call noris tank that NASA um will service and refill for future space station needs the teams will unload that cargo before Starliner heads back to Florida just over 5 minutes to go now until tonight's uh 10:17 p.m. central Time deorbit Burn team here on the ground reports that Starliner has gotten into the right attitude uh kind of the right way it's pointing uh for that burn so everything is looking good we're on track for uh landing at 11:00 p.m. central midnight Eastern e with just a couple minutes or four minutes left to go until the deorbit burn we're going to check in once again with the landing team and Leah Chesire and Josh Barrett thanks Brandy yeah we are out here uh just waiting in the Convoy area now most of the team is taking part in a safety briefing right now as we prepare to uh watch the deorbit burn and the re-entry and then move in toward the spacecraft like you mentioned it's really dark out here Josh and I were just able to take in the really beautiful sight of uh the Milky Way it's so dark so once the capsule starts to reenter the Earth's atmosphere we expect we expect to have a pretty good view of the streak um as that plasma builds up around the capsule itself that's right we should be seeing it come just over the Southwest Horizon right through the saddle of kind of the mountains uh that are just overlooking the mountain range here and uh remembering back to of1 kind of the view that we should be having here is that we'll hear the Sonic booms as well after we see kind of that plasma envelope and then pretty quickly afterward it is pretty remarkable how quickly it does end up over our heads uh we'll see the flashes from uh the mortars uh which deploy those uh Fort heat shield parachutes which take the the fort heat shield off um then we start hearing those mdors or those mortars and then the the uh parachutes start to deploy um and then it's kind of slow motion from there as it drifts down and we're seeing a lot of movement as teams have just completed that safety briefing here so they're now all walking to join us at the Conboy uh so it looks like we are just a few minutes away from the deorbit burn and the show is really getting on the road soon so with that we're going to turn it back over to you and Houston we are uh just over 2 minutes away from the deorbit burn at this point uh Starliner has moved well away from the International Space Station and quite a few kilometers ahead of it as well we had a number of uh smaller Burns to ensure that Starliner was at a safe distance away from the space station before it performs performs the deorbit burn that will bring it out of orbit and on its Journey back to Earth and flight director Rick henling and his team expect starliners orbital maneuvering attitude control thrusters also called omx to fire around 17 central time pushing the spacecraft out of its orbital flight path and onto its journey home this deorbit burn will set us up for a touchdown time of about 11:00 p.m. central or 10: p.m. Mountain Daylight time out there in White Sands New Mexico once it's there control teams in Houston will begin powering off starliners radiators and solar rays as the spacecraft now has enough power to get home and sublimator will be taking over cooling they use water to cool the C star ler is also as we said now in the correct attitude for performing the deorbit burn and at this point the service module and crew capsule are still attached to each other four of the service modules 12 AF facting orbital maneuvering and attitude control engines are going to be powering the deor burn allowing them to separate safely and those engines are each 1500lb thrusters meaning this burn will take about 6,000 lbs of thrust slowing Starliner from its current orbital vol velocity and bringing it back to Earth's atmosphere for a smooth Landing the small reaction control system or RCS thrusters assist here in holding Starliner in the correct attitude during this test flight our teams ran roughly a million computer mod model simulations showing all the different Thruster combinations possible for a safe return to Earth today just 20 seconds now until the burn starts it'll last uh 59 seconds and again you uh be firing those orbital man in and attitude control thrusters for orbital maneuvering and attitude control thrusters on Starliner service module are now firing slowing Starliner down is a capsule against its Journey back to Earth this will take about 59 seconds to complete we're hearing a good all good uh all thrusters firing well so far can see here those uh those representation of those thrusters firing Starliner maintaining its attitude and as those large orbital maneuvering thrusters are firing smaller reaction control system thrusters are also working keeping the spacecraft in the correct position for the burn still looking good hey we did see the uh durber burn cut off successfully teams here on the ground reporting a good burn Starliner is now on its way to wh sand space Harbor New Mexico and a planed touchdown at about 11:00 p.m. central midnight Eastern Time next up on the uh to-do list for tonight is the separation of the service module when the service module's job done it'll be disposed of over the Pacific Ocean leaving the uncrewed crew module to carry on alone in addition to all its other jobs the service module has spent the flight protecting the crew module's heat shield Jing it uncovers that critical piece of equipment allowing it to shelter the spacecraft as it begins traveling back through the Earth's atmosphere the crew module will then make its final attitude adjustments to make sure the heat shield is at exactly the right angle to provide that protection and those fine-tuned adjustments are really just a strong capability of star liner's guidance navigation and control system in fact on the two previous flights Starliner made Bullseye Landings thanks to that system starliners maneuvering into position for that jettison at this time team here on the ground reporting that uh Starliner is in a good attitude pointing the right direction for the service module separation and the service module has just jison separated and is now falling away it will burn up during re-entry over a remote part of the Pacific Ocean and Starliner will continue on its path to New Mexico where the landing and Recovery team is waiting for Touchdown Starliner is now angling itself and its heat shield for re-entry an entry interface is coming up in just about 10 minutes that's the hottest part of the re-entry process with Starliner heat shield reaching about 3,000 de to protect Starliner from those heat loads the spacecraft has what's called an ablative heat shield the outer surface of that Shield heats up to a gas which then carries the heat away from the crew module through convection and our team calls this process a game of Threes because during entry interface the heat shield will handle those temperatures of about 3,000 de but it will convert that heat to about 300° with only 3 in of a blader and because of this protection during this hottest part of re-entry the inside of the spacecraft remains at about room temperature when Starliner returned from from its last two flights the capsules landed with two black stripes up the sides indicating the heat shield was a bladed as intended so we do expect to see that again today and the team considers that a bit of a badge of honor e a rock e e once again uh we did see uh Starliner deorbit or uh performance deorbit burn on time at 10:17 p.m. central Time and then quickly turned around and jettisoned its surface module now that it has performed its Duty over the course of the mission we are still about uh 20 minutes away from entry interface but things will start to happen quickly after that about 4 minutes after we go into the entry interface the heat from Starliner reentry will become so intense that the plasma will begin to form around the spacecraft causing a blackout in Communications with Starliner for about 4 and a half minutes and after that we'll see starliners Starliner jettison its forward heat shield that's been protecting the parachutes during GRE entry then when Starliner is around 30,000 ft above the ground the spacecraft's parachute sequence will begin two drone par drog parachutes rather will uh start slowing Starliner down and then they'll detach and three main parachutes will deploy and inflate at about 3,000 ft off the ground the base heat shield jettison exposing the airbags and then at touchdown those airbags absorb the initial force of Landing cushioning the spacecraft for a soft safe return to Earth e currently Starliner is about 23 miles above the uh South Pacific Ocean it's just past the southern most portion of this final orbit coming around the uh southern coast of Australia and now is going to begin making its way northward towards uh the west coast of the United States for that um landing at 11:00 p.m. central Time midnight eastern time at Whit sand space Harbor in New Mexico again we've had the deorbit burn that took place just as planned at 10:17 a 59c burn that uh change the uh Starliner speed by about uh 290 mph 130 m/ second that made way for the service module separation and the next Milestone we'll be watching for is the entry interface coming up around 10:45 still about 10 minutes away e live view here of the uh recovery forces staged uh near The Landing site ready to move in when Starliner touches down we are taking off Milestones as expected for that uh 11:00 p.m. central midnight Eastern or 10 p.m. mountain time touchdown today in New Mexico again Starliner performed its deorbit burn about 12 minutes ago the thrusters performed nominally and the flight home is going smooth e e we're still about uh 14 minutes away from the entry interface which is our next Milestone I think I said earlier that we were 10 minutes away that was a mistake um but about 14 months now we'll be experiencing the uh the atmosphere for the first time since Starliner launched and since we do have a little time we're going to check back in with the landing team Lee and Josh how are things going out there thanks Brandy yeah that was a great view of the uh Landing Convoy all lined up I was just watching some of the gold team members getting suited up as you mentioned earlier that's going to be the first team to come in and inspect the vehicle they're sniffing for those um hyper gools or any of those dangerous skums before the rest of the teams get the go to move in and approach the capsule of course it's kind of a waiting game right now as we are still waiting to spot Starliner uh coming from the southwest so a lot of us are outside of the Convoy right now and keeping our eyes on the skies yeah that's right we're we've got about just under probably three dozen vehicles I all lined up in three rows just waiting to get that touchdown signal again going through that Convoy list that you guys went through already so well behind that team after liner is declared safe the silver team moves in and they do the electrical grounding they'll also stabilize the vehicle just in case the airbags start deflating we make sure that the hatch has uh a good stable orientation for red team to come in and they're the ones with the hatch orientation uh and once uh the red team establishes hatch access actually the silver team has a fun job tonight in the dark they're going to go start looking for the pieces that came off of Starliner those heat shields uh some of those Lids from those those parachute mortars uh and then after that after red team has hatch access and opens up the hatch uh NASA's ISS program folks are going to come in for the cargo inspection so again we are expecting to start seeing Starliner coming across the Horizon around the time that entry interface begins but until then just wanted to give you guys a hit from The Landing site and the latest that we have going on here so we'll toss it back over to you in control Houston thanks so much Le and Josh we are watching for that entry interface as well we're now about uh 12 minutes away Starliner continuing to make good progress uh following at 10:17 p.m. central Time D orbit burn again we're looking at the landing and Recovery team setup at the holding Zone they're at White Sands Josh and Leah are embedded with that Convoy and they will make a very strategic move toward the spacecraft after touchdown first stopping at about the 500t mark and then they'll get the go to move forward to the 150 ft Mark and then once the vehicle is considered safe they will move in e with the new orbit burn complete and uh the service mod module separated the spacecraft's heat shield is now exposed and ready to begin experiencing the atmosphere again uh the Starliner is going to make some final attitude adjustments that keep that heat shield pointing at exactly the right angle and next step after that is entry interface again just coming up in a few minutes at 400,000 ft above Earth Starliner faces temperatures of 3000° Fahrenheit from the plasma created by air friction around the spacecraft but Starliner can handle that heat with its heat shield which is made of an ablade of material designed to keep the inside of the spacecraft at about 70° few minutes later Starliner will experience an expected blackout in Communications and that will last for about 4 and 1/2 minutes at 30,000 ft and just 11 minutes before landing Starliner jettison its forward heat shield exposing the spacecraft's parachute system then two drog shoots will deploy in increasing drag and significantly slowing down Starliner then three pilot parachutes will pull out the main shoots allowing the spacecraft to continue its slow and steady descent for another 8,000 ft towards the landing Zone and once the main parachutes are fully inflated Starliner bucket handle releases and what that does is it just basically levels out the spacecraft ahead of touchdown and then the base heat shield that protected Starliner through re-entry will separate at about 3,000 ft uncovering The Landing airbags those airbags of course will fill with nitrogen allowing for Starliner to land softly and safely there in the sand less than 10 minutes to go now before we do get to that entry interface point and uh now just 20 24 and A2 minutes away from The Landing at wh sand space Harbor everything's pretty quiet in the room which is a good sign things are continuing to go smoothly as Starliner begins making it way making its way back to Earth you're taking a look there at flight directors Rick henfling on the left speaking with Mike Lamers on the right Rick is the flight director for this Landing operation Mike is weather flight director they are tag teaming this operation team has been keeping a close eye on weather at the Landing site but everything uh looks pretty good for tonight's touchdown yeah about 79° Fahrenheit out there they reported 10 mil visibility the winds are are within the limits so we are looking good for a touchdown coming up right about 11:00 p.m. Central Time e 7 minutes to go now in tool entry interface and then uh that intense heating will start about 2 minutes after we do begin the ENT face that'll last about 4 and 1/2 minutes during which time we'll be in a blackout Starliner is currently about 130 miles 149 miles rather above uh the Pacific Ocean heading northward towards the western coast of the United States and it's touchdown in New Mexico we're taking a look here at the Landing trajectory there on the left of your screen you can see that line that crosses over the Baja Peninsula and that is the track Starliner will take as it makes its way into New Mexico as it gets closer to the ground people living in the area might get um a bright shot of Starliner coming back through the atmosphere and Landing there in White Sands New Mexico you can also see there in the center of the screen the uh to-do list basically before before we do get to Landing the service module separations highlighted in green because that one's already taken place and next up is the entry interface about 5 minutes away from now and flight controllers here in the room are reporting good attitude for that entry interface coming up again in just under 5 minutes e e e e 2 and 1/2 minutes left before Starliner begins to feel the effects of the Earth's atmosphere again everything uh continuing to go smoothly flight controllers here in the room are quiet as they're working through their steps but all uh going well so far Starliner in position to begin experiencing that heat from re-entry now less than 100 miles above the Earth and a heading towards the Baja Peninsula we'll be flying over that before landing in New Mexico just 17 minutes to go until Landing e less than a minute now until we begin uh entry interface again about 2 minutes after entry interface starts we'll begin seeing the heating uh really get intense and we'll go into a 4 and 1/2 minute black SC team here in the ground reporting entry interface has begun they're seeing a good range seeing another view from the uh Landing site or the the team's uh getting ready to move out to The Landing site here a little better idea from this view of exactly how dark it is out there with all the lights of the vehicle shining a minute and a half until we move into the blackout period for Starliner and and 14 1/2 minutes until we land in wh Sands New Mexico the star lanter ures Earth's atmosphere at 17 times the speed of sound which could create a Sonic Boom for folks living in the area it will then be slowed down by parachutes to a speed very similar to what you might experience while going down an elevator inside a high-rise building the vehicle then comes to a safe comfortable stop at Landing e 30 seconds now until the uh blackout period begin due to the compression of friction and friction of the air the molecules generate a very hot plasma that uh causes the red orange glow you often see appear in postflight imagery on Min spacecraft although we won't get to see that tonight uh it will happen causes an expected communication Dropout this one will last four and a half minutes as the vehicle uh goes through a time when plasma interferes with a satellite signal we expect that blank out to end around 10:52 p.m. central this is also the time that I mentioned earlier where a Starliner in the past two flights has gotten that black um Mark along the sides of it and that just really proves to our team that the ablade of heat shield or the ablative material um around Starliner is is doing its job and the Shield is pushing that plasma away it's black out time again uh last about 4 and a half minutes we've got uh about 3 and 1 half left of it uh after that uh the Milestones will'll be watching for include a Ford heat shield jettison at 1056 when Starliner is about 4.3 Mi above the Earth very soon after that uh almost immediately drug shoots deploy those uh give the give a little bit of an initial slowdown to the vehicle before the really um large main parachutes deploy that happens when the Starliner is about 2 and 1 half miles above the Earth e e this uh is a live view from the International Space Station where we're able to get a view of uh Starliner track as it comes in we are now less than 10 minutes away from landing at wh Sands space Harbor scheduled for uh 10 or 11:00 p.m. central also uh getting reports that the WB 57 is also able to see Star liner now as it begins coming in for its uh for its Landing we've still got just about a minute left to go before Starliner comes out of its uh blackout period and this is the view from the WB 57 one of n this aircraft that is uh at the uh Landing site has been uh been uh staged and ready to pick a Starliner or pick up the view of Starliner as it comes in and that is what we are seeing now and they're filming this video from about 16,000 ft the bb57 should continue to uh give us a view until the drog parachutes deploy and then we hope to pick it up with the Cessna that is also in the area and flight controllers here in the room are reporting that we are out of that blackout period and everything is looking good Starliner remaining nominal as she returns to Earth again this is a view from the WB 57 Starliner showing a beautiful streak across the sky as she returns to White Sands New Mexico we're about 3 minutes away from the forward heat shield jetsin that's the next Milestone we're looking for Starliner is currently about 27 miles above the earth and the team at White Sands reporting that they have seen it we got a t hole from them uh reported uh remotely that means they are seeing Starliner from the ground there in New Mexico this view is coming from the Cessna that's also in the area picking up uh star now Starliner now from its lower altitude about 6,000 ft above whereas the WB 57 is about 16,000 ft up we are now just uh 6 minutes and 22 seconds away from Landing we should also just be a couple minutes away from the forward heat to jettison which will bring on the drove parachute deploy followed by the main parachutes and the strobe lights on Starliner are now on Starliner is now over the landing site and that strobe light will help the teams actually track star liner on the ground because it is very dark out there now about 12 miles above uh The Landing site and just 5 minutes away from Landing watching now for the forward heat shield Jenison that should be coming up uh again making way from for the parachute deployment all right and that action you're seeing on your screen forward heat sheld and drugs out really interesting view of this uh coming down from the WB 57 see those two drug parachutes uh now deployed they slow the uh vehicle down initially until it gets to a uh a safe uh speed for the enormous main parachutes to to follow about four minutes to go until touchdown now back to A View From the Cessna aircraft in the uh vicinity of the landing site again this is a A View From a little lower than the wb-57 we were seeing the next thing we're going to see here is the three main parachutes come out and everything will happen pretty quickly from that point on after those Mains are out we'll see the uh bottom heat shield that has been protecting uh Starliner through its journey through the atmosphere come off that makes way for the landing airbags to deploy and there's the main parachutes there on your screen we see three out currently reefing and the teams at the uh Landing uh recovery teams report that they heard uh booms as those came out three good Mains fully open there you can see Starlin are in a slight tilt so so we're going to see the rotation handle move here shortly and it will level out Starliner but three good parachutes looking great just a little over 2 minutes until the expected Landing time and we heard the rotational handle has been released so you can see that uh tilt evened out next up is the back heat shield jettison and there it goes that again makes way for the airbag inflation nice to see that you can see the airbags deploying there on your screen those airbags are filled with nitrogen as they guide Starliner safely back to the desert floor just a beautiful sight as Starliner makes its way to the Sands of New Mexico and flight controllers confirming six good airbags you still coming to us from the cesna we've got uh about just about a minute left to go until the expected touchdown be watching for that time for you e just about 15 seconds away from expected touchdown you're seeing the ground there in your screen as we get closer e touchdown Starliner is back on Earth that Landing coming at 1101 and 35 seconds Central Time 10:01 and 31 seconds mountain time at wh sand space armor at the US Army's Missile Range in New Mexico our landing and Recovery teams will now wait for clearance before making their way to the spacecraft one of the changes uh required with no crew on board is that the team here in the flight control room will be the ones to uh command the uh parachute uh to be cut away so that uh the wind doesn't pull the capsule along but uh that's no problem for them so uh now with that with Starliner down they can begin working on some of the post Landing to-do items again uh we saw Starliner touchdown at 11:01 p.m. central Time that's uh 1 minute after midnight eastern Time or 10:01 p.m. central at the Landing site in New Mexico This Is A View From the Cessna still watching the drones slowly make their own way down uh those of course are the uh the drog parachutes that uh preceded the main parachutes uh for slowing Starliner down before the the large parachutes opened and really just a Flawless and beautiful Descent of Starliner today even heard some cheers and clapping in the background e this again is the drug parachut still uh still making their way to the ground after Starliner has touchdown with its main parachutes touchdown came at 11:01 p.m. central Time the team here uh in migan control will be working through some post Landing steps now view here of Starliner at its Landing site in uh White Sands at space Harbor Landing recovery teams will soon begin making its way out to them to uh begin recovering the spacecraft team here in uh mission control is pulling right now to see if everybody is ready to power off the vehicle that again is a step that the flight control team has taken over with the uh with the uh lack of crew on board once the spacecraft is powered down they will be transitioning control of the spacecraft over to the landing and Recovery team and it's a little difficult to see in this shot but there is a strobe light on Starliner that will help the teams follow it out there [Applause] and the uh recovery team is on the move but I think uh Leah chesar and Josh Barrett our colleagues out there may be able to give us one last update Leah and Josh can you hear us great landing of calypso I don't think there could um obviously we did have really a great show we were able to see the cameras that you were watching too from the WB 57 from the Cessna from the International Space Station but yes concur it's been a really amazing day we were hearing a bit from space to ground there uh but I think they've concluded unfortunately uh we'll see if we can get a recording of that for uh folks uh listening at home but Leah go ahead with your update yeah sorry about that couldn't hear that one here so uh but mcch here Rick just wanted to offer that he's got one more hour here he it's his birthday once again flight director Rick henling has gotten a go from starliners for star for starliners deorbit burn from all of the flight controllers watching over the spacecraft's return tonight and that again means we are officially on for Starliner return to Earth at about 11:00 p.m. central time or midnight Eastern the dart burn at uh 10:17 p.m. central Time Is Now just 17 minutes away that'll be a 59 second firing of four of Starliner orbital maneuvering and attitude control thrusters on Starliner service module and joining us live from Starliner Landing Zone with wh Sands in uh at wh sand space Harbor in New Mexico our colleagues Leah Chesire from NASA public affairs and Boeing's Josh Barrett Leah and Josh how is it going out there thanks Brandy it is going well out here uh we are out here in White Sands the weather right now is about 75 degrees and very light winds approximately 6 miles per hour uh this looks like potentially a picture from earlier today it is quite dark out here at this point we have a beautiful view of the stars and we are lined up in the Convoy getting ready to roll that's right Leah so I've been out here for both of Starliner previous Landings the first one was very cold the second one was quite warm and this one feels just about right uh we're following along with two command Vehicles we've got the mlcc or the mobile Landing control center uh they're tied in down in Mission Control in Houston with the people that you're seeing on your screen right now uh we also have the mdtv that's the mobile data and track in vehicle and on top of that it's got a suite of Optics on top there's an infrared camera and two visible cameras one of them with a telescopic Focus so those will be the first things that we'll be seeing Starliner with here from The Landing Zone and you should be seeing those on your screens as well and Leah's got a few more things that she'll talk about that should get some cameras on Starliner as well yeah especially the WB 57 NASA plane that took off just a few hours ago uh just as we were heading out here to The Landing site so we arrived here at about 6: p.m. local time which is Mountain Time uh and since then have been getting ready lining up uh doing Communications checks between the various teams and just getting ready to eventually drive out to The Landing site once Starliner comes down so uh it is a sea of white gypsum sand out here um and teams are continuing to just prepare as soon as we get into that deorbit burn so they are actually in a huddle right now talking through some of the next steps for tonight um getting ready to come and join us here in the Convoy as we await to see the gor bit burn so with that right now we are going to turn it back over to you Brandy and Lauren we are going to stick around though and cannot wait to see Starliner coming straight across the sky thank you thanks so much Leah and Josh we are hoping to get some good views from where you guys are at later today now once we make that final burn to get out of orbit today it'll take about 45 minutes for Starliner to reach its destination again wh sand space Harbor in New Mexico where we just spoke with our colleagues from Starliner is currently flying with its solar arrays pointed toward the sun recharging the internal batteries to keep its systems powered through Landing the orbital maneuvering and attitude control thrusters or what we call omx will fire for about a minute to conduct the deorbit burn that maneuver slows the spacecraft down from orbital velocities and allows it to start falling back to Earth in a head down position at the end of that deorbit burn Starliner angles itself for re-entry the deorbit burn is just the first in a series of Milestones we're going to be taking off tonight to give you the full rundown uh deorbit burn is scheduled for 10:17 p.m. central as uh as we said we just got the go for that a few minutes ago it's going to be followed by the separation of the crew module from the service module at 10:20 p.m. and the crew module will then continue on on its own at 10:45 p.m. Starliner will begin to fill the uh effects of the Earth's atmosphere again for the first time since it's acient in June and a few minutes later around 10:47 the heat from Star liner's re-entry will become so intense that the plas that plasma will begin uh to form around the spacecraft causing a blackout in Communications with Starliner for about 4 and a half minutes once Starliner clears that blackout period things will begin to happen very quickly yeah so then up next at 10:56 six when Starliner is about po 4.3 Mi above Earth the spacecraft will be done with the forward heat shield that is at the top of the capsule that helped protect it through re-entry and it will jettison it to make way for the parachutes that are stored underneath and then almost immediately those parachutes will begin to deploy first with two smaller Dro parachutes that are meant to tick the edge off Starliner speed they open up in stages over the course of about 28 seconds and then at 10:57 p.m. when Starliner is about 6 miles up the drug parachutes are released and three main parachutes are deployed they also open in stages over about 16 seconds but they stay with the spacecraft all the way until touchdown and again we are expecting that touchdown to come at 11:00 p.m. central just before the touchdown however at 10:58 p.m. Starliner also sheds its based heat shield at the bottom of the capsule to make way for the inflation of six Landing airbags hidden underneath it and those will cushion the vehicle as it lands in New Mexico's desert it's probably worth mentioning that we do not have uh video from Starliner if you think back to June on its ascent and journey to the International Space Station um it it's not able to send video down when it's not connected to space station so we won't be getting inflat views from it but we do have several cameras out at the Landing site as well as some aircraft in the area that where you're hoping to get some views from uh but of course it is going to be pretty dark out in the desert at night so um they may be infrared or black and white views um but hopefully we'll we'll get some some good uh camera views to show you and we're taking a live look now from The Landing site but uh the shot is quite dark at the moment you can see just a few lights blinking there uh hopefully as we get uh closer to the ground as Starliner gets closer down we will have some better shots e the landing and Recovery teams have been out in the desert preparing for the spacecraft's return for several days I've been speaking with them to catch up on some of the preps that have been taking place they ran through a full mission dress rehearsal where they the landing and Recovery operation with all the different groups and functions and they've also been keeping a close eye on the wind direction to establish the best recovery zone out at White Sands they've even sent up some weather balloons to check the wind speeds tracking Vehicles out there are equipped cameras uh so the team has been calibrating those and again although we don't expect any views from Starliner on its way down we're hoping to get some good ones from those tracking cameras as well as aircraft in the area we plan to have the wb-57 getting views while it is um about 16,000 ft above the ground until the drog parachutes uh deploy and then at about 6,000 ft um we hope to see views from a Cessna in the area and this is actually a current view of the Cessna as it makes its way out to The Landing site wh sand space Harbor in New Mexico and this is a shot from one of the ground cameras that we have on site so again although it is dark there we are hoping to to see um to see some good views and in the last few hours the teams there on the ground have been at the holding area loading up their vehicles doing last minute checks making sure all the equipment is ready to go and then shortly they'll begin moving into place to watch Starliner make its Final Approach and then once Starliner lands teams will move closer in a very strategic way they will first stop at about the 500t mark away from the spacecraft and then they'll move in closer to the 150 ft Mark while ground teams safe the vehicle that first team on site with Starliner will be what we call the gold team they start recovery operations by performing what's called a sniff test where they use sensors to check for hydrazine one of the propellants that uh Starliner uses they'll be wearing protective gear known as hazmat suits to prevent exposure to hypergolic propelling hydrazine is used as propellant and it if it turns into a vapor it can be toxic after the snift test they will notify the rest of the Convoy when it's safe to approach and then they're going to check the winds make sure the entire landing and Recovery team is staged U range from the direction the wind is blowing for added protection now everyone out there is part of a different color team and they wear a vest with that color so it's very obvious who does what so the next up is the silver team and their first job is to ground the spacecraft Starliner will be powered down but there could be some residual electricity so before anyone can touch it they will ground it and discharge it teams here on the ground reporting that um everything is getting into good configuration for the deorbit burn that's now just about um 6 and A2 minutes away uh going on uh with the with what we were saying we also will have the blue team that documenting that documents everything that's going on at the Landing site these are photographers from both Boeing and NASA who have situational awareness cameras and again here's a a current view of those teams all um ready to deploy at Landing yeah that's the holding site that we were mentioning and then of course you can see um the mountains there in the background in this black and white View and the Green Team hooks up the HVAC trailers to Starliner to get cooling on it but their first job is to put up an environmental enclosure on the spacecraft and that enclosure looks a lot like a big inflatable it wraps around the vehicle to get cool air around it and make sure the critical systems don't overheat then the red team opens the hatch that is mostly uh Boeing fire rescue they will back up the mobile access platform to Starliner hatch giving the team access and Starliner will be bringing back more than 900 lbs of cargo including a nitrogen oxygen recharge system or what we call Norse tank that NASA um will service and refill for future space station needs the teams will unload that cargo before Starliner heads back to Florida just over 5 minutes to go now until tonight's uh 10:17 p.m. central Time deorbit burn team here on the ground reports that Starliner has gotten into the right attitude uh kind of the right way it's pointing uh for that burn so everything is looking good we're on track for uh landing at 11:00 p.m. central midnight Eastern with just just a couple minutes or four minutes left to go into the deorbit burn we're going to check in once again with the landing team and Leah Cheshire and Josh Barrett thanks Brandy yeah we are out here uh just waiting in the Convoy area now most of the team is taking part in a safety briefing right now as we prepare to uh watch the deorbit burn and the re-entry and then move in toward the spacecraft like you mentioned it's really dark out here Josh and I were just able to take in the really beautiful site of uh the Milky way it's so dark so once the capsule starts to re-enter the Earth's atmosphere we expect we expect to have a pretty good view of the streak um as that plasma builds up around the capsule itself that's right we should be seeing it come just over the Southwest Horizon right through the saddle of kind of the mountains uh that are just overlooking the mountain range here and uh remembering back to of1 kind of the view that we should be having here is that we'll hear the sonic boom as well after we see kind of that plasma envelope and then pretty quickly afterward it is pretty remarkable how quickly it does end up over our heads uh we'll see the flashes from uh the mortars uh which deploy those uh for heat she Shield parachutes which take the the fort heat shield off um then we start hearing those mortors those mortars and then the the uh parachutes start to deploy um and then it's kind of slow motion from there as it drifts down and we're seeing a lot of movement as teams have just completed that safety briefing here so they're now all walking to join us at the Convoy uh so it looks like we are just a few minutes away from the deorbit burn and the show is really getting on the road soon so with that we're going to turn it back over to you in Houston we are uh just over two minutes away from the deorbit burn at this point uh Starliner has moved well away from the International Space Station and quite a few kilometers ahead of it as well we had a number of uh smaller Burns to ensure that Starliner was at a safe distance away from the space station before it performs performs the deorbit burn that will bring it out of orbit and on its Journey back to Earth and flight director Rick henling and his team expect starliners orbital maneuvering attitude control thrusters also called omx to fire around 10:17 central time pushing the spacecraft out of its orbital flight path and onto its journey home this deorbit burn will set us up for a touch down time of about 11:00 p.m. central or 10: p.m. Mountain Daylight time out there in White Sands New Mexico once it's there control teams in Houston will begin powering off starliners radiators and solar rays as the spacecraft now has enough power to get home and sublimator will be taking over cooling they use water to cool the cabin Starliner is also uh as we said now in the correct attitude for performing the deorbit burn and at this point the service module and crew capsule are still attached to to each other four of the service modules 12 AF basing orbital maneuvering and attitude control engines are going to be powering the de burn allowing them to separate safely and those engines are each, 1500lb thrusters meaning this burn will take about 6,000 lbs of thrust slowing Starliner from its current orbital velocity and bringing it back to Earth's atmosphere for a smooth Landing the small reaction control system or RCS thrusters assist here in holding Starliner in the correct attitude during this test flight our teams ran roughly a million computer mod model simulations showing all the different Thruster combinations possible for a safe return to Earth today just 20 seconds now until the burn starts to last uh 59 seconds and again you uh be firing those orbital maneuvering and attitude control thrusters for orbital maneuvering and attitude control thrusters on starlander service module are now firing slowing Starliner down as a capsule against its Journey back to Earth this will take about 59 seconds to complete we're hearing a good all good uh all thers firing well so far can see here those uh those representation of those thrusters firing Starliner is maintaining its attitude and as those large orbital maneuvering thrusters are firing smaller reaction control system thrusters are also working keeping the spacecraft in the correct position for the burn still looking good and we did see the uh durber burn cut off successfully teams here on the ground reporting a good burn Starliner is now on its way to wh sand space Harper New Mexico and a plan touchdown at about 11:00 p.m. central midnight Eastern Time next up on the uh to-do list for tonight is the separation of the service module when the service modules job done it'll be disposed of over the Pacific Ocean leaving the uncrewed crew module to carry on alone in addition to all its other jobs the service module has spent the flight protecting the crew module's heat shield Jing it uncovers that critical piece of equipment allowing it to shelter the spacecraft as it begins traveling back through the Earth's atmosphere the crew module will then make its final attitude adjustments to make sure the heat shield is at exactly the right angle to provide that protection and those fine-tuned adjustments are really just a strong capability of Starliner guidance navigation and control system in fact on the two previous flights Starliner made Bullseye Landings thanks to that system Starliner is maneuvering into position for that jettison at this time e team here on the ground reporting that uh Starliner in a good attitude pointing the right direction for the service module separation and the service module has just jettison separated and is now falling away it will burn up during re-entry over a remote part of the Pacific Ocean and Starliner will continue on its path to New Mexico where the landing and Recovery team is waiting for Touchdown so liner is now angling itself and its heat shield for re-entry an entry interface is coming up in just about 10 minutes that's the hottest part of the re-entry process with Starliner heat shield reaching about 3,000 de to protect Starliner from those heat loads the spacecraft has what's called an ablative heat shield the outer surface of that Shield heats up to a gas which then carries the heat away from the crew module through convection and our team calls this process us a game of Threes because during entry interface the heat shield will handle those temperatures of about 3,000 de but it will convert that heat to about 300° with only 3 in of a blader and because of this protection during this hottest part of re-entry the inside of the spacecraft remains at about room temperature when Starliner returned from its last two flights the capsules landed with two black stripes up the sides indicating the heat shield was a bladed as intended so we do expect to to see that again today and the team considers that a bit of a badge of honor to Rob e e e once again uh we did see uh Starliner deorbit or uh performance deorbit burn on time at 10:17 p.m. central Time and then quickly turned around and jettisoned its surface module now that it has performed its Duty over the course of the mission we are still about uh 20 minutes away from entry interface but things will start to happen quickly after that about 4 minutes after we go into the entry interface the heat from starliners reinjury will become so intense that the plasma will begin to form around the spacecraft causing a blackout in Communications with Starliner for about 4 and a half minutes and after that we'll see Starliner Starliner jettison its forward heat shield that's been protecting the parachutes during GRE entry then when Starliner is around 30,000 ft above the ground the spacecraft's parachute sequence will begin two drone par drog parachutes rather will uh start slowing Starliner down and then they'll detach and three main parachutes will deploy and inflate at about 3,000 ft off the ground the base heat shield jet exposing the airbags and then at touchdown those airbags absorb the initial force of Landing cushioning the spacecraft for a soft safe return to Earth e currently Starliner is about 213 miles above the uh South Pacific Ocean it's just past the southernmost portion of this final orbit coming around the uh southern coast of Australia and now is going to begin making its way northward towards uh the west coast of the United States for that um landing at 11 p.m. central Time midnight eastern time at wh sand space Harbor in New Mexico again we've had the deorbit burn that took place just as planned at 1017 a 59c burn that uh changed the uh Starliner speed by about uh 290 mph 130 m/s that made way for the service module separation and the next Milestone we'll be watching for is the entry interface coming up around 10:45 still about 10 minutes away live view here of the uh recovery forces staged uh near The Landing site ready to move in when Starliner touches down we are taking off Milestones as expected for that uh 11:00 p.m. central midnight Eastern or 1000 p.m. mountain time touchdown today in New Mexico again Starliner performed its deorbit burn about 12 minutes ago the thrusters performed nominally and the flight home is going smooth e e we're still about uh 14 minutes away from the entry interface which is our next Milestone I think I said earlier that we were 10 minutes away that was a mistake um but about 14 minutes now we'll be experiencing the uh the atmosphere for the first time since star laner launched and since we do have a little time we're going to check back with the landing team Lee and Josh how are things going out there thanks Brandy yeah that was a great view of the uh Landing Convoy all lined up I was just watching some of the gold team members getting suited up as you mentioned earlier that's going to be the first team to come in and inspect the vehicle they're sniffing for those um hyper gools or any of those dangerous fumes before the rest of the teams get to go to move in and approach the capsule of course it's kind of a waiting game right now as we are still waiting to spot Starliner uh coming from the southwest so a lot of us are outside of the Convoy right now and keeping our eyes on the skies yeah that's right we're we've got about just under probably three dozen vehicles I all lined up in three rows just waiting to get that touchdown signal again going through that Convoy list that you guys went through already so well behind that gold team after starliners declared safe the silver team moves in and they do the electrical grounding they'll also stabilize the vehicle just in case the airbags start deflating we make sure that the hatch has uh a good stable orientation for red team to come in and they're the ones with the hatch orientation uh and once uh the red team establishes hatch access actually the silver team has a fun job tonight in the dark they're going to go start looking for the pieces that came off of Starliner those heat shields uh some of those Lids from those those parachute mortars uh and then after that after red team has hatch access and opens up the hatch uh NASA's ISS program folks are going to come in for the cargo inspection so again we are expecting to start seeing Starliner coming across the Horizon around the time that entry interface begins but until then just wanted to give you guys a hit from The Landing site and the latest that we have going on here so we'll toss it back over to you in Mission Control Houston thanks so much Le and Josh we are watching for that entry interface as well we now about uh 12 minutes away Starliner continuing to make good progress uh following at 10:17 p.m. central Time D orbit burn again we're looking at the landing and Recovery team set up at the holding Zone there at White Sands Josh and Leah are embedded with that Convoy and they will make a very strategic move toward the spacecraft after touchdown first stopping at about the 500t mark and then they'll get the go to move forward to the 150 ft Mark and then once the vehicle is considered safe they will move in with the new orbit burn complete and uh the service mod module separated the space Craft's heat shield is now exposed and ready to begin experiencing the atmosphere again uh the Starliner is going to make some final attitude adjustments that keep that heat shield pointing at exactly the right angle and next step after that is entry interface again just coming up in a few minutes at 400,000 ft above Earth Starliner faces temperatures of 3000° fah from the plasma created by air friction around the spacecraft but Starliner can handle that heat with its heat shield which is made of an ablade of material designed to keep the inside of the spacecraft at about 70° few minutes later Starlin will experience an expected blackout in Communications and that will last about 4 and 1/2 minutes at 30,000 ft and just 11 minutes before landing Starliner jettison its forward heat shield exposing the spacecraft's parachute system then two drug shoots will deploy in increasing drag and significantly slowing down Starliner then three pilot parachutes will pull out the main shoots allowing the spacecraft to continue its slow and City descent for another 8,000 ft towards the landing Zone and once the main parachutes are fully inflated star liner's bucket handle releases and what that does is it just basically levels out the spacecraft ahead of touchdown and then the base heat shield that protected Starliner through re-entry will separate at about 3,000 ft uncovering The Landing airbags those airbags of course will fill with nitrogen allowing for Starliner to land softly and safely there in the sand less than 10 minutes to go now before we do get to that entry interace point and uh now just 20 24 and 1/2 minutes away from The Landing at wh sand space Harbor everything's pretty quiet in the room which is a good sign things are continuing to go smoothly as Starliner begins making it way making its way back to Earth you're taking a look there at flight directors Rick henling on the left speaking with Mike Lamers on the right Rick is the flight director for this Landing operation Mike is weather flight director they are tag teaming this operation team has been keeping a close eye on weather at the Landing site but everything uh looks pretty good for tonight's touchdown yeah about 79° Fahrenheit out there they reported 10 miles visibility the winds are within the limits so we are looking good for a touchdown coming up right about 11:00 p.m. Central Time 7 minutes to go now in tool entry interface and then uh that intense heating will start about about 2 minutes after we do begin the Ender Bas that'll last about 4 and 1/2 minutes during which time we'll be in a blackout starlander is currently about 130 miles 149 miles rather above uh the Pacific Ocean heading northward towards the western coast of the United States and it's touchdown in New Mexico we're taking a look here at the Landing trajectory there on the left of your screen you can see that line that crosses over the Baja Peninsula and that is the track Starliner will take as it makes its way into New Mexico as it gets closer to the ground people living in the area might get a a bright shot of Starliner coming back through the atmosphere and Landing there in White Sands New Mexico you can also see there in the center of the screen the uh to-do list basically before before we do get to Landing the service module separations highlighted in green because that one's already taken place and next up is the entry interface about 5 minutes away from now and flight controllers here in the room are reporting attitude for that entry interface coming up again in just under 5 minutes e e e e 2 and a half minutes left before Starliner begins to fill the effects of the Earth's atmosphere again everything uh continuing to go smoothly flight controllers here in the room are quiet as they're working through their steps but all uh going well so far Starliner in position to begin experiencing that heat from re-entry now less than 100 miles above the Earth and uh heading towards the Baja Peninsula we'll be flying over that before landing in New Mexico ago just 17 minutes to go until Landing e less than a minute now until we begin uh entry interface again about 2 minutes after entry interface starts we'll begin seeing the heating uh really get intense and we'll go into a 4 and 1/2 minute blackout e team here in the ground reporting entry interface has begun they're seeing a good range seeing another view from the uh Landing site or the the team's uh getting ready to move out to The Landing site here a little better idea from this view of exactly how dark it is out there with all the lights of the vehicle shining a minute and a half until we move into the blackout period for Starliner and 14 and 1/2 minutes until we land in White Sands New Mexico the star lanter ures Earth's atmosphere at 17 times the speed of sound which could create a Sonic Boom for folks living in the area it will then be slowed down by parachutes to a speed very similar to what you might experience while going down an elevator inside a high-rise building the vehicle then comes to a safe comfortable stop at Landing 30 seconds now until the uh blackout period begin due to the compression of fr and friction of the air the molecules generate a very hot plasma that uh causes the red orange glow you often see appear in postflight imagery on Min spacecraft although we won't get to see that tonight uh it will happen causes an expected communication Dropout this one will last 4 and a half minutes as the vehicle uh goes through a time when plasma interferes with a satellite signal we expect that to blank out to end around 10:52 p.m. central this is also the time that I mentioned earlier where a Starliner in the past two flights has gotten that black um Mark along the sides of it and that just really proves to our team that the ablade of heat shield or the ablade of material um around Starliner is is doing its job and the heat shield is pushing that plasma away it's blackout time again uh last about 4 and a half minutes we've got uh about 3 and 1 half left of it uh after that uh the Milestones will be watching for include a Ford heat shield jettison at 1056 when Starliner is about 4.3 Mi above the Earth very soon after that uh almost immediately drug shoots deploy those uh give the give a little bit of an initial slowdown to the vehicle before the really uh large main parachutes deploy that happens when the star liner is about 2 and 1 half miles above the Earth e e this uh is a live view from the International Space Station where we're able to get a view of uh Starliner track as it comes in we are now less than 10 minutes away from landing at wh Sands space Harbor scheduled for uh 10 or 11:00 p.m. central also uh getting reports that the WB 57 is also able to see Starliner now as it begins coming in for its uh for its Landing we've still got just about a minute left to go before Starliner comes out of its uh blackout period and this is the view from the wb-57 one of uh NASA's aircraft that is uh at the uh Landing site has been uh been uh staged and ready to pick a Starliner or pick up the of Starliner as it comes in and that is what we are seeing now and they're filming this video from about 16,000 ft the bb57 should continue to uh give us a view until the drogue parachutes deploy and then we hope to pick it up with the Cessna that is also in the area and flight rers here in the room are reporting that we are out of that blackout period and everything is looking good Starliner remaining nominal as she returns to Earth again this is a view from the WB 57 Starliner showing a beautiful streak across the sky as she returns to White Sands New Mexico we're about 3 minutes away from the forward heat shield jetos scine that's the next Milestone we're looking for Starliner is currently about 27 miles above the earth and the team at uh white sand reporting that they have seen it we got a tally hole from them uh reported uh remotely that means they are seeing Starliner from the ground there in New Mexico this view is coming from the Cessna that's also in the area picking up uh star now Starliner now from its lower altitude about 6,000 ft above whereas the WB 57 is about 16,000 ft up we are now just uh 6 minutes and 22 seconds away from Landing we should also just be a couple minutes away from the forward heat to jettison which will bring on the drog parachute deploy followed by the main parachutes and the strobe lights on Starliner are now on Starliner is now over the landing site and that strobe light will help the teams actually track star liner on the ground because it is very dark out there now about 12 miles above uh The Landing site and just 5 minutes away from Landing for watching now for the forward heat shield Jenison that should be coming up uh again making way from for the parachute deployment all right and that action you're seen in your screen forward heat sheld and drugs out really interesting view of this uh coming down from the wb-57 see those two drug parachutes uh now deployed they slow the uh vehicle down initially until it gets to a uh a safe uh speed for the enormous main parachutes to to follow about 4 minutes to go until touch down now back to A View From the cesna aircraft in the uh vicinity of the landing site again this is a A View From a little lower than the wb-57 we were seeing the next thing we're going to see here is the three main parachutes come out and everything will happen pretty quickly from that point on after those Mains are out we'll see the uh bottom heat shield that has been protecting uh Starliner through its journey through the atmosphere come off that makes way for the landing airbags to deploy and there's the main parachutes there on your screen we see three out currently reefing and the teams at the uh Landing uh recovery teams report that they heard uh booms as those came out three good Mains fully open there you can see Starliner in a slight tilt so we're going to see the rotation handle move here shortly and it will level out Starliner but three good parachutes looking great just a little over 2 minutes until the expected Landing time and we heard the rotational handle has been released so you can see that uh tilt evened out next up is the back heat shield jettison and there it goes that again makes way for the airbag inflation nice to see that you can see the airbags deploying on your screen those airbags are filled with nitrogen as they guide Starliner safely back to the desert floor just a beautiful sight as Starliner makes its way to the the Sands of New Mexico and fight controllers confirming six good airbags few still coming to us from the cesna we've got uh about just about a minute left to go until the expected touchdown be watching for that time for you e just about 15 seconds away from expected touchdown you're seeing the ground there in your screen as we get closer e touchdown Starliner is back on Earth that Landing coming at 1101 and 35 seconds Central Time 10:01 and 31 seconds mountain time at wh sand space armor at the US Army's Missile Range in New Mexico our landing and Recovery teams will now wait for clearance before making their way to the spacecraft one of the changes uh required with no crew on board is that the team here in the flight control room will be the ones to uh command the uh parachute uh to be cut away so that uh the wind doesn't pull the capsule along but uh that's no problem for them so uh now with the with Starliner down they can begin working on some of the post Landing to-do items again uh we saw Starliner touchdown at 11:01 p.m. central Time that's uh 1 minute after midnight Eastern Time or 10:01 p.m. central at the Landing site in New Mexico This Is A View From the Cessna still watching the drones slowly make their own way down uh those of course are the uh the drog parachutes that uh preceded the main parachutes uh first slowing Starliner down before the the large parachutes opened and really just a Flawless and beautiful Descent of Starliner today even heard some cheers and clapping in the background e this again is the drug parachute still uh still making their way to the ground after Starliner has touched down with its main parachutes touchdown came at 11:01 p.m. central Time the team here uh in Mission Control will be working through some post Landing steps now view here of Starliner at its Landing site in uh White Sands at space Harbor The Landing recovery teams will soon begin making its way out to them to uh begin recovering the spacecraft team here in uh mission control is pulling right now to see if everybody is ready to power off the vehicle that again is a step that the flight control team has taken over with the uh with the uh lack of crew on board once the spacecraft is powered down they will be transitioning control of the spacecraft over to the landing and Recovery team and it's a little difficult to see in this shot but there is a strobe light on Starliner that will help the teams follow it out [Applause] there and the uh recovery team is on the move but I think Leah chesar and Josh Barrett our colleagues out there may be able to give us one last update Leah and Josh can you hear us great landing of calypso I don't think obviously we did have really a great show we were able to see the cameras that you are watching too from the WB 57 from the Cessna from the International Space Station but can I interrup yes it's been a really amazing day we were hearing a bit from space to ground there uh but I think they've concluded unfortunately uh we'll see if we can get a recording of that for uh folks uh listening at home but Leah go ahead with your update yeah sorry about that couldn't hear that one here so uh but mcch here Rick just wanted to offer that he's got one more hour here hey it's his birthday once again flight director Rick hling has gotten a go from starliners for star for starliners deorbit burn from all of the flight controllers watching over the spacecraft's return tonight and that again means we are officially on for Starliner return to Earth at about 11:00 p.m. central time or midnight Eastern the dart burn at uh 10:17 p.m. central Time Is Now just 17 minutes away that'll be a 59 second firing of four of Starliner orbital maneuvering and attitude control clusters on Star liner's service module and joining us live from Starliner Landing Zone with wh Sands at Whit Sands space Harbor in New Mexico our colleagues Leah Cheshire from NASA public affairs and Boeing's Josh Barrett Leah and Josh how is it going out there thanks Brandy it is going well out here uh we are out here in White Sands the weather right now is about 75 degrees and very light winds approximately 6 miles per hour uh this looks like potentially a picture from earlier today it is quite dark out here at this point we have a beautiful view of the stars and we are lined up in the Convoy getting ready to roll that's right Leah so I've been out here for both of star liner's previous Landings the first one was very cold the second one one was quite warm and this one feels just about right uh we're following along with two command Vehicles we've got the mlcc or the mobile Landing control center uh they're tied in down in Mission Control in Houston with the people that you're seeing on your screen right now uh we also have the mdtv that's the mobile data and tracking vehicle and on top of that it's got a suite of Optics on top there's an infrared camera and two visible cameras one of them with a telescopic Focus so those will be the first things that we'll be seeing Starliner with here from The Landing Zone and you should be seeing those uh on your screens as well and Leah's got a few more things that she'll talk about that should get some cameras on Starliner as well yeah especially the wb-57 NASA plane that took off just a few hours ago uh just as we were heading out here to The Landing site so we arrived here at about 6 p.m. local time which is Mountain Time uh and since then have been getting ready lining up uh doing Communications checks between the various teams and just getting ready to eventually drive out to The Landing site once Starliner comes down so uh it is a SE of white gypsum sand out here um and teams are continuing to just prepare as soon as we get into that deorbit burns so they are actually in a h huddle right now talking through some of the next steps for tonight um getting ready to come and join us here in the Convoy as we await to see the deorbit burn so with that right now we are going to turn it back over to you Brandy and Lauren we are going to stick around though and cannot wait to see Starliner coming straight across the sky thank you thanks so much Leah and Josh we are hoping to get some good views from where you guys are at later today now once we make that final burn to get out of orbit today it'll take about 45 minutes for Starliner to reach its destination again white sand space Harbor in New Mexico where we just spoke with our colleagues from Starliner is currently flying with its solar arrays pointed toward the sun recharging the internal batteries to keep its systems powered through Landing the orbital maneuvering and attitude control thrusters or what we call omx will fire for about a minute to conduct the deorbit burn that maneuver slows the spacecraft down from orbital velocities and allows it to start falling back to Earth in a head down position at the end of that deorbit burn Starliner angles itself for re-entry the deorbit burn is just the first in a series of Milestones we're going to be taking off tonight to give you the full rundown uh deorbit burn is scheduled for 1017 p.m. central as uh as we said we just got the go for that a few minutes ago it's going to be followed by the separation of the crew module from the service module at 10:20 p.m. and the crew module will then continue on on its own at 10:45 p.m Starliner will begin to fill the uh effects of the Earth's atmosphere again for the first time since it's it's acient in June and a few minutes later around 10:47 the heat from Star ler re-entry will become so intense that the plas that plasma will begin uh to form around the spacecraft causing a blackout in Communications with Starliner for about 4 and A2 minutes once Starliner clears that blackout period things will begin to happen very quickly yeah so then up next at 10:56 when Starliner is about po 4.3 mil above Earth the spacecraft will be done with the forward heat shield that is at the top of the cap that helped protect it through re-entry and it will jettison it to make way for the parachutes that are stored underneath and then almost immediately those parachutes will begin to deploy first with two smaller droke parachutes that are meant to take the edge off Starliner speed they open up in stages over the course of about 28 seconds and then at 10:57 p.m. when Starliner is about 6 miles up the drug parachutes are released and three main parachutes are deployed they also open in stages over about 16 seconds but they stay with the spacecraft all the way until touchdown and again we are expecting that touchdown to come at 11:00 p.m. central just before the touchdown however at 1058 PM Starliner also sheds its based heat shield at the bottom of the capsule to make way for the inflation of six Landing airbags hidden underneath it and those will cushion the vehicle as it lands in New Mexico's desert it's probably worth mentioning that we do not have a video from Starliner if you think back to June on its ascent and journey to the International Space Station um it it's not able to send video down when it's not connected to space station so we won't be getting inflat views from it but we do have several cameras out at the Landing site as well as some aircraft in the area that where you're hoping to get some views from uh but of course it is going to be pretty dark out in the desert at night so um they may be infrared or black and white views um but hopefully we'll we'll get some some good uh camera views to show you and we're taking a live look now from The Landing site but uh the shot is quite dark at the moment you can see just a few lights blinking there uh hopefully as we get uh closer to the ground as Starliner gets closer down we will have some better shots e the landing and Recovery teams have been out in the desert preparing for the spacecraft's return for several days I've been speaking with them to catch up on some of the preps that have been taking place they ran through a full mission dress rehearsal where they practice the landing and Recovery operation with all the different groups and functions and they've also been keeping a close eye on the wind direction to establish the best recovery zone out at White Sands they've even sent up some weather balloons to check the wind speeds tracking Vehicles out there are equipped cameras uh so the team has been calibrating those and again although we don't expect any views from Starliner on its way down we're hoping to get some good ones from those tracking cameras as well as aircraft in the area we plan to have the wb-57 getting views while it is um about 16,000 ft above the ground until the drug parachutes uh deploy and then at about 6,000 ft um we hope to see views from a Cessna in the area and this is actually a current view of the Cessna as it makes its way out to The Landing site at wh sand space Harbor in New Mexico and this is a shot from one of the ground cameras that we have on site so again although it is dark there we are hoping to to see um to see some good views and in the last few hours the teams there on the ground have been at the holding area loading up their vehicles doing last minute checks making sure all the equipment is ready to go and then shortly they'll begin moving into place to watch Starliner make its Final Approach and then once Starliner lands teams will move closer in a very strategic way they will first stop at about the 500t mark away from the spacecraft and then they'll move in closer to the 150t mark while ground team safe the vehicle that first team on site with Starliner will be what we call the gold team they start recovery operations by performing what's called a sniff test where they use sensors to check for hydrazine one of the propellants that uh Starliner uses they'll be wearing protective gear known as hazmat suits to prevent exposure to hypergolic propellants hydrazine is used as propellant and it if it turns into a vapor it can be toxic after the sift test they will notify the rest of the Convoy when it say to approach and then they're going to check the winds make sure the entire landing and Recovery team is staged U range from the direction the wind is blowing for added protection now everyone out there is part of a different color team and they wear vest with that color so it's very obvious who does what so the next up is the silver team and their first job is to ground the spacecraft Starliner will be powered down but there could be some residual electricity so before anyone can touch it they will ground it and discharge it teams here on the ground are reporting that um everything is getting into good configuration for the deorbit burn that's now just about um 6 and a half minutes away uh going on uh with the with what we were saying we also will have the blue team that documenting that documents everything that's going on at the Landing site these are photographers from both bone in NASA who have situational awareness cameras and again here's a a current view of those teams all um ready to deploy at Landing yeah that's the holding site that we were mentioning and then of course you can see um the mountains there in the background in this black and white View and the Green Team hooks up the HVAC trailers to Starliner to get cooling on it but their first job is to put up an environmental enclosure on the spacecraft and that enclosure looks a lot like a big inflatable it wraps around the vehicle to get cool air around it and make sure the critical systems don't overheat then the red team opens the hatch that is mostly uh Boeing fire rescue they will back up the mobile access platform to Starliner hatch giving the team access and Starliner will be bringing back more than 900 lb of cargo including a nitrogen oxygen recharge system or what we call called noris tank that NASA um will service and refill for future space station needs the teams will unload that cargo before Starliner heads back to Florida just over five minutes to go now until tonight's uh 10:17 p.m. central Time deorbit Burn team here on the ground reports that Starliner has gotten into the right attitude uh kind of the right way it's pointing uh for that burn so everything is looking good we're on track for uh landing at 11:00 p.m. central midnight Eastern with just a couple minute or four minutes left to go until the deorbit burn we're going to check in once again with the landing team and Leah Cheshire and Josh Barrett thanks Brandy yeah we are out here uh just waiting in the Convoy area now most of the team is taking part in a safety briefing right now as we prepare to uh watch the deorbit burn and the re-entry and then move in toward the spacecraft like you mentioned it's really dark out here Josh and I were just able to take in the really beautiful sight of uh the Milky Way it's so dark so once the capsule starts to reenter the Earth's atmosphere we expect we expect to have a pretty good view of the streak as that plasma builds up around the capsule itself that's right we should be seeing it come just over the Southwest Horizon right through the saddle of kind of the mountains uh that are just overlooking the mountain range here and uh remembering back to of1 kind of the view that we should be having here is that we'll hear the Sonic booms as well after we see kind of that plasma envelope and then pretty quickly afterward it is pretty remarkable how quickly it does end up up over our heads uh we'll see the flashes from uh the mortars uh which deploy those uh Ford heat shield parachutes which take the the Ford heat shield off um then we start hearing those mortors or those mortars and then the the uh parachutes start to deploy um and then it's kind of slow motion from there as it drifts down and we're seeing a lot of movement as teams have just completed that safety briefing here so they're now all walking to join us at the Convoy uh so it looks like we are just a few minutes away from the deorbit burn and the show is really getting on the road soon so with that we're going to turn it back over to you in Houston we are uh just over two minutes away from the deorbit burn at this point uh Starliner has moved well away from the International Space Station and quite a few kilometers ahead of it as well we had a number of uh smaller Burns to ensure that Starliner was at a safe distance away from the space station before it performs performs the deorbit burn that will bring it out of orbit and on its Journey back to Earth in Flight director Rick henfling and his team expect starliners orbital maneuvering attitude control thrusters also called omx to fire around 10:17 central time pushing the spacecraft out of its orbital flight path and onto its journey home this deorbit burn will set us up for a touchdown time of about 11:00 p.m. central or 10 p.m. Mountain Daylight time out there in White Sands New Mexico once it's there control teams in Houston will begin powering off starliners radiators and solar rays as the spacecraft now has enough power to get home and sublimator will be taking over cooling they use water to cool the cabin Starliner is also uh as we said now in the correct attitude for performing the deorbit burn and at this point service module and crew capsule are still attached to each other four of the service modules 12 a facing orbital maneuvering and attitude control engines are going to be powering the deorbit burn allowing them to separate safely and those engines are each 1500lb thrusters meaning this burn will take about 6,000 lbs of thrust slowing Starliner from its current orbital velocity and bringing it back to Earth's atmosphere for a smooth Landing the small reaction control system or RCS thrusters assist here in holding Starliner in the correct attitude during this test flight our teams ran roughly a million computer mod model simulations showing all the different Thruster combinations possible for a safe return to Earth today just 20 seconds now until the burn starts to last uh 59 seconds and again you uh be firing those orbital maneuvering and attitude control thrusters four orbital maneuvering and attitude control thrusters on Star ler service module are now firing slowing Starliner down as a capsule against its Journey back to Earth this will take about 59 seconds to complete we're hearing uh good all good uh all thrusters firing well so far can see here those uh those representation of those thrusters firing Starliner is maintaining its attitude and as those large orbital maneuver thrusters are firing smaller reaction control system thrusters are also working keeping the spacecraft in the correct position for the burn still looking good and we did see the uh dber burn cut off successfully teams here on the ground reporting a good burn Starliner is now on its way to Whit sand space Harbor New Mexico and a planned touchdown at about 11:00 p.m. central midnight Eastern Time next up on the uh to-do list for tonight is the separation of the service module when the service module's job done it'll be disposed of over the Pacific Ocean leaving the uncrewed crew module to carry on alone in addition to all its other jobs the service module has spent the flight protecting the crew module's heat shield jetting it uncovers that critical piece of equipment allowing it to shelter the spacecraft as it begins traveling back through the Earth's atmosphere the crew module will then make its final attitude adjustments to make sure the heat shield is at exactly the right angle to provide that protection and those fine tuned adjustments are really just a strong capability of Starliner guidance navigation and control system in fact on the two previous flights Starliner made Bullseye Landings thanks to that system Starliner maneuvering into position for that jettison at this time team here on the ground reporting that uh Starliner is in a good attitude pointing the right direction for the service module separation and the service module has just jettisoned separated and is now falling away it will burn up during re-entry over a remote part of the Pacific Ocean and Starliner will continue on its path to New Mexico where the landing and Recovery team is waiting for Touchdown Starliner is now angling itself and its heat shield for re-entry entry interface is coming up in just about 10 minutes that's the hottest part of the re-entry process with Starliner heat shield reaching about 3,000 de to protect Starliner from those heat loads the spacecraft has what's called an ablative heat shield the outer surface of that Shield heats up to a gas which then carries the heat away from the crew module through convection and our team calls this process a game of Threes because during entry interface the heat shield will handle those temperatures of about 3,000 de but it will convert that heat to about 300° with only 3 in of a blader and because of this protection during this hottest part of re-entry the inside of the spacecraft remains at about room temperature when Starliner returned from its last two flights the capsules landed with two black stripes up the sides indicating the heat shield was a bladed as intended so we do expect to see that again today and the team considers that a bit of a badge of honor e to rock e e once again uh we did see uh Starliner deorbit or uh performance deorbit burn on time at 10:17 p.m. central Time and then quickly turned around BR and jettisoned its surface module now that it has performed its Duty over the course of the mission we are still about uh 20 minutes away from entry interface but things will start to happen quickly after that about 4 minutes after we go into the entry interface the heat from Starliner reinjury will become so intense that the plasma will begin to form around the spacecraft causing a blackout in Communications with Starliner for about 4 and A2 minutes and after that we'll see starliners Starliner jettison its forward heat Shi that's been protecting the parachutes during GRE entry then when Starliner is around 30,000 ft above the ground the spacecraft's parachute sequence will begin two drone par drogue parachutes rather will uh start slowing Starliner down and then they'll detach and three main parachutes will deploy and inflate at about 3,000 ft off the ground the base heat shield jettison exposing the airbags and then a touch down those airbags absorb the initial force of Landing cushioning the spacecraft for a soft safe return to Earth e currently Starliner is about 213 miles above the uh South Pacific Ocean it's just past the southernmost portion of this final orbit coming around the uh southern coast of Australia and now is going to begin making its way northward towards uh the west coast of the United States for that um landing at 11:00 p.m. Central Time midnight eastern time at wh sand space Harbor in New Mexico again we've had the deorbit burn that took place just as planned at 1017 a 59 second burn that uh changed the uh Starliner speed by about uh 290 mph 130 m/s that made way for the service module separation and then next Milestone we'll be watching for is the entry interface coming up around 10:45 still about 10 minutes away live view here of the uh recovery forces staged uh near The Landing site ready to move in when Starliner touches down we are taking off Milestones as expected for that 11:00 p.m. central midnight Eastern or 10:00 p.m. mountain time touchdown today in New Mexico again Starliner performed its deorbit burn about 12 minutes ago the thrusters performed nominally and the flight home is going smooth e e we're still about uh 14 minutes away from the entry interface which is our next Milestone I think I said earlier that we were 10 minutes away that was a mistake um but about 14 minutes now we'll be experiencing the uh the atmosphere for the first time since Starliner launched and since we do have a little time we're going to check back in with the landing team Lee and Josh how are things going out there thanks Brandy yeah that was a great view of the Landing Convoy all lined up I was just watching some of the gold team members getting suited up as you mentioned earlier that's going to be the first team to come in and inspect the vehicle they're sniffing for those um hyper gools or any of those dangerous fumes before the rest of the teams get to go to move in and approach the capsule of course it's kind of a waiting game right now as we are still waiting to spot Starliner uh coming from the southwest so a lot of us are outside of the Convoy right now and keeping our eyes on the skies yeah that's right we're we've got about just under probably three dozen vehicles I all lined up in three rows just waiting to get that touchdown signal again going through that Convoy list that you guys went through already so well behind that gold team after starliners declared safe the silver team moves in and they do the electrical grounding they'll also stabilize the vehicle just in case the airbags start deflating we make sure that the hatch has uh a good stable orientation for red team to come in and they're the ones with the hatch orientation uh and once uh the red team establishes hatch access actually the silver team has a fun job tonight in the dark they're going to go start looking for the pieces that came off of Starliner those heat shields uh some of those Lids from those those parachute mortars uh and then after that after red team has hatch access and opens up the hatch uh NASA's ISS program folks are going to come in for the cargo inspection so again we are expecting to start seeing Starliner coming across the Horizon around the time that entry interface begins but until then just wanted to give you guys a hit from The Landing site and the latest that we have going on here so we'll toss it back over to you in Mission Control Houston thanks so much Le and Josh we are watching for that entry interface as well we're now about uh 12 minutes away Starliner continuing to make good progress uh following that 1017 p.m. central Time de orbit burn again we're looking at the landing and Recovery team set up at the holding Zone there at White Sands Josh and Leah are embedded with that Convoy and they will make a very strategic move toward the spacecraft after touchdown first stopping at about the 500t mark and then they'll get the go to move forward to the 50 ft Mark and then once the vehicle is considered safe they will move in with the new orbit burn complete and uh the service mod module separated the spacecraft's heat shield is now exposed and ready to begin experiencing the atmosphere again uh the Starliner is going to make some final attitude adjustments that keep that heat shield pointing at exactly the right angle and next step after that is entry interface again just coming up in a few minutes at 400,000 ft above Earth Starliner faces temperatures of 3000° f from the plasma created by air friction around the spacecraft but Starliner can handle that heat with its heat shield which is made of an ablade of material designed to keep the inside of the spacecraft at about 70° few minutes later Starlin will experience an expected blackout in Communications and that will last for about 4 and 1/2 minutes at 30,000 ft and just 11 minutes before landing starlander jettison its forward heat shield exposing the spacecraft's parachute system then two drog shoots will deploy in increasing drag and significantly slowing down Starliner then three pilot parachutes will pull out the main shoots allowing the spacecraft to continue its slow and steady descent for another 8,000 ft towards the landing Zone once the main parachutes are fully inflated Starliner bucket handle releases and what that does is it just basically levels out the spacecraft ahead of touchdown and then the base heat shield that protected Starliner through re-entry will separate at about 3,000 ft uncovering The Landing airbags those airbags of course will fill with nitrogen allowing for Starliner to land softly and safely there in the sand less than 10 minutes to go now before we do get to that entry interface point point and uh now just 20 24 and 1/2 minutes away from The Landing at wh sand space Harbor everything's pretty quiet in the room which is a good sign things are continuing to go smoothly as Starliner begins making it way making its way back to Earth you're taking a look there at flight directors Rick henfling on the left speaking with Mike Lamers on the right Rick is the flight director for this Landing operation Mike is weather flight director they are tag teaming this operation team has been keeping a close eye on weather at the Landing site but everything uh looks but pretty good for tonight's touchdown yeah about 79° fah out there they reported 10 mies visibility the winds are within the limits so we are looking good for a touchdown coming up right about 11:00 p.m. Central Time e 7 minutes to go now in tool entry interface and then uh that intense heating will start about 2 minutes after we do begin the interface that'll last about 4 and 1/2 minutes during which time we'll be in a blackout starlander is currently about 130 miles 149 miles rather above uh the Pacific Ocean heading northward towards the western coast of the United States and it's touchdown in New Mexico we're taking a look here at the Landing trajectory there on the left of your screen you can see that line that crosses over the Baja Peninsula and that is the track Starliner will take as it makes its way into New Mexico as it gets closer to the ground people living in the area might get um a bright shot of Starliner coming back through the atmosphere and Landing there in White Sands New Mexico you can also see there in the center of the screen the uh to-do list basically before before we do get to Landing the service module separations highlighted in green because that one's already taken place and next up is the entry interface about 5 minutes away from now and flight controllers here in the room are reporting good attitude for that entry interface coming up again in just under 5 minutes e e e e 2 and 1/2 minutes left before Starliner begins to fill the effects of the Earth's atmosphere again everything uh continuing to go smoothly flight controllers here in the room are quiet as they're working through their steps but all uh going well so far Starliner in position to begin experiencing that heat from re-entry now less than 100 miles above the Earth and uh heading towards the Baja Peninsula we'll be flying over that before landing in New Mexico just 17 minutes to go into landing e less than a minute now until we begin entry interface again about 2 minutes after entry interface starts we'll begin seeing the heating uh really get intense and we'll go into a 4 and 1/ half minute blackout e team here in the ground reporting entry interface has begun they seeing good range seeing another view from the uh Landing site or the the team's uh getting ready to move out to The Landing site here a little better idea from the view of exactly how dark it is out there with all the lights of the vehicle shining a minute and a half until we move into the blackout period for Starliner and 14 and 1/2 minutes until we land in White Sands New Mexico the star laner enters Earth's atmosphere at 17 times the speed of sound which could create a Sonic Boom for folks living in the area it will then be slowed down by parachutes to a speed very similar to what you might experience while going down an elevator inside a high-rise building the vehicle then comes to a safe comfortable stop at Landing 30 seconds now until the uh blackout period begin due to the compression of friction and friction of the air the molecules generate a very hot plasma that uh causes the red orange glow you often see appear in postflight imery on Min spacecraft although we won't get to see that tonight it will happen causes an expected communication Dropout this one will last 4 and 1/2 minutes as the vehicle uh goes through a time when plasma interferes with a satellite signal we expect that blank out to end around 10:52 p.m. central this is also the time that I mentioned earlier where a Starliner in the past two flights has gotten that black um mark along the sides of it and that just really proves to our team that the ablative heat shield or the ablade of material um around Starliner is is doing its job and the heat shield is pushing that plasma away it's black out time again uh last about 4 and A2 minutes we've got uh about three and a half left of it uh after that uh the Milestones will be watching for include a Ford heat shield jettison at 1056 when Starliner is about 4.3 Mi above the Earth very soon after that uh almost immediately drug shoots deploy those uh give the give a little bit of an initial slowdown to the vehicle before the really uh large main parachutes deploy that happens when the Starliner is about 2 and a half miles above the Earth e that's this uh is a live view from the International Space Station where we're able to get a view of uh Starliner track as it comes in we are now less than 10 minutes away from landing at White Sands space Harbor scheduled for uh 10 or 11:00 p.m. central also uh getting reports that the wb-57 is also able to see Starliner now as it begins coming in for its uh for its Landing we've still got just about a minute left to go before Starliner comes out of its uh blackout period and this is the view from the WB 57 one of NASA's aircraft that is uh at the uh Landing site has been uh been uh staged and ready to pick Starliner or pick up the view of Starliner as it comes in and that is what we are seeing now and they're filming this video from about 16,000 ft the bb57 should continue to uh give us a view until the drogue parachutes deploy and then we hope to pick it up with the Cessna that is also in the area and flight controllers here in the room are reporting that we are out of that blackout period and everything is looking good Starliner remaining nominal as she returns to earth again this is a view from the WB 57 Starliner showing a beautiful streak across the sky as she returns to White Sands New Mexico we're about 3 minutes away from the forward heat shield jettison that's the next Milestone we're looking for Starliner is currently about 27 mil above the earth and the team at uh White Sands reporting that they have seen it we got a Telly hole from them uh reported uh remotely that means they are seeing Starliner from the ground there in New Mexico this view is coming from the Cessna that's also in the area picking up uh star now Starliner now from its lower altitude about 6,000 ft above whereas the WB 57 is about 16,000 ft up we are now just uh 6 minutes and 22 seconds away from Landing we should also just be a couple minutes away from the forward heat to jettison which will bring on the drove parachute deploy followed by the main parachutes and the strobe lights on Starliner are now on Starliner is now over the landing site and that strobe light will help the teams actually track Starliner on the ground because it is very dark out there now about 12 mil above uh The Landing site and just 5 minutes away from Landing watching now for the forward heat shield Jenison that should be coming up uh again making way from for the parachute deployment all right and that action you're seeing in your screen forward heat sheld and drugs out really interesting view of this uh coming down from the WB 57 see those two drug parachutes uh now deployed they slow the uh vehicle down initially until it gets to a uh a safe uh speed for the enormous main parachutes to to follow about four minutes to go until touchdown now back to A View From the Cessna air craft in the uh vicinity of the landing site again this is a A View From a little lower than the WB 57 we were seeing the next thing we're going to see here is the three main parachutes come out and everything will happen pretty quickly from that point on after those Mains are out we'll see the uh bottom heat shill that has been protecting uh Starliner through its journey through the atmosphere come off that makes way for the landing airbags to deploy and there's the main parachutes there on your screen we see three out currently reefing and the teams at the uh Landing uh recovery teams report that they heard uh booms as those came out three good Mains fully open there you can see Starliner in a slight tilt so we're going to see the rotation handle move here shortly and it will level out Starliner but three good parachutes looking great just a little over 2 minutes until the expected Landing time and we heard the ational handle has been released so you can see that uh tilt evened out next up is the back heat shield jettison and there it goes that again makes way for the airbag inflation nice to see that you can see the airbags deploying there on your screen those airbags are filled with nitrogen as they guide Starliner safely back to the desert floor just a beautiful sight as Starliner makes its way to the Sands of New Mexico and fight controllers confirming six good airbags SP still coming to us from the cesna we've got uh about just about a minute left to go until the expected touchdown be watching for that time for you just about 15 seconds away from expected touchdown you're seeing the ground there in your screen as we get closer touchdown Starliner is back on Earth that Landing coming at 1101 and 3 seconds Central Time 10:01 and 31 seconds mountain time at wh sand space armor at the US Army's Missile Range in New Mexico our landing and Recovery teams will now wait for clearance before making their way to the spacecraft one of the changes uh required with no crew on board is that the team here in the flight control room will be the ones to uh command the uh parachute uh to be cut away so that uh the wind doesn't pull the capsule along but uh that's no problem for them so uh now with the with Starliner down they can begin working on some of the post Landing to-do items again uh we saw Starliner touchdown at 11:01 p.m. central Time that's uh 1 minute after midnight eastern Time or 10:01 p.m. central at the Landing site in New Mexico This Is A View From the Cessna still watching the drones slowly make their own way down uh those of course are the uh the drog parachutes that uh preceded the main parachutes uh first slowing Starliner down before the the large parachutes opened and really just a Flawless and beautiful Descent of Starliner today even heard some cheers and clapping in the background this again is the drug parachute still uh still making their way to the ground after Starliner has touchdown with its main parachutes touchdown came at 11:01 p.m. central Time the team here uh in Mission Control will be working through some post Landing steps now view here of Starliner at its Landing site in uh White Sands at space Harbor Landing recovery teams will soon begin making its way out to them to uh begin recovering the spacecraft team here in uh mission control is pulling right now to see if everybody is ready to power off the vehicle that again is a step that the flight control team has taken over with the uh with the uh lack of crew on board once the spacecraft is powered down they will be transitioning control of the spacecraft over to the landing and Recovery team and it's a little difficult to see in this shot but there is a strobe light on Starliner that will help the teams follow it out [Applause] there and the uh recovery team is on the move but I think uh Leah chesar and Josh Barrett our colleagues out there may be able to give us one last update Josh can you hear us great landing of so I don't think obviously we did have really a great show we were able to see the cameras that you were watching to from the wb7 from the cesna from the International Space Station but can I interr yes concur been a really amazing day we were hearing a bit from space to ground there uh but I think they've concluded unfortunately uh we'll see if we can get a recording of that for uh folks uh listening at home but Leah go ahead with your update yeah sorry about that couldn't hear that one here so uh but MC here Rick just wanted to offer that he's got one more hour here hey it's his birth once again flight director Rick hling has gotten a go from starers for Star four starers deorbit burn from all of the flight controllers watching over the spacecraft's return tonight and that again means we are officially on for starliners return to Earth at about 11:00 p.m. central time or midnight Eastern the dart burn at uh 10:17 p.m. central Time Is Now just 17 minutes away that'll be at 59 second firing of four of Starliner orbital maneuvering and attitude control thrusters on Starliner service module and joining us live from Starliner Landing Zone with wh Sands at Whit Sands space Harbor in New Mexico our colleagues Leah Cheshire from NASA public affairs and Boeing Josh Barrett Leah and Josh how is it going out there thanks Brandy it is going well out here uh we are out here in White Sands the weather right now is about 75 degrees and very light winds approximately 6 mph uh this looks like potentially a picture from earlier today it is quite dark out here at this point we have a beautiful view of the stars and we are lined up in the Convoy getting ready to roll that's right Leah so I've been out here for both of Starliner previous Landings the first one was very cold the second one was quite warm and this one feels just about right uh we're following along with two command Vehicles we've got mlcc or the mobile Landing control center uh they're tied in down in Mission Control in Houston with the people that you're seeing on your screen right now uh we also have the mdtv that's the mobile data and tracking vehicle and on top of that it's got a suite of Optics on top there's an infrared camera and two visible cameras one of them with a telescopic Focus so those will be the first things that we'll be seeing Starliner with here from The Landing Zone and you should be seeing those uh on your screens as well and Le's got a few more things that she'll talk about that should get some cameras on Starliner as well yeah especially the WB 57 NASA's plane that took off just a few hours ago uh just as we were heading out here to The Landing site so we arrived here at about 6 PM local time which is Mountain Time uh and since then have been getting ready lining up uh doing Communications checks between the various teams and just getting ready to eventually drive out to The Landing site once Starliner comes down so uh it is a sea of quite GP some sand out here um and teams are continuing to just prepare as soon as we get into that deorbit burn so they are actually in a uh huddle right now talking through some of the next steps for tonight um getting ready to come and join us here in the Convoy as we await to see the deorbit burn so with that right now we are going to turn it back over to you Brandy and Lauren we are going to stick around though and cannot wait to see Starliner coming straight across the sky thank you thanks so much Leah and Josh we are hoping to get some good views from where you guys are at later today now once we make that final burn to get out of orbit today it'll take about 45 minutes for Starliner to reach its destination again white sand space Harbor in New Mexico where we just spoke with our colleagues from Starliner is currently flying with its solar arrays pointed toward the sun recharging the internal batteries to keep its systems powered through Landing the orbital maneuvering and attitude control thrusters or what we call omx will fire for about a minute to conduct the deorbit burn that maneuver slows the spacecraft down from orbital velocities and allows it to start falling back to Earth in a head down position at the end of that deorbit burn Starliner angles itself for re-entry the deorbit burn is just the first in a series of Milestones we're going to be taking off tonight to give you the full rundown uh deorbit burn is scheduled for 107 p.m. central as uh as we said we just got the go for that a few minutes ago it's going to be followed by the separation of the crew module from the service module at 10:20 p.m. and the crew module will then continue on on its own at 10:45 p.m. Starliner will begin to fill the uh effects of the Earth's atmosphere again for the first time since it's asent in June and a few minutes later around 1047 the heat from Star liner's re-entry will become so intense that the plas that plasma will begin uh to form around the spacecraft causing a blackout in Communications with Starliner for about 4 and 1/2 minutes once Starliner clears that blackout period things will begin to happen very quickly yeah so then up next at 10:56 when Starliner is about po 4.3 miles above Earth the spacecraft will be done with the forward heat shield that is at the top of the capsule that helped protect it through re-entry and it will jettison it to make way for the parachutes that are stored underneath and then almost immediately those parachutes will begin to deploy first with two smaller drug parachutes that are meant to take the edge off Starliner speed they open up in stages over the course of about 28 seconds and then at 10:57 p.m. when Starliner is about 6 miles up the drug parachutes are released and three main parachutes are deployed they also open in stages over about 16 seconds but they stay with the spacecraft all the way until touchdown and again we we expecting that touchdown to come at 11:00 p.m. central just before the touchdown however at 10:58 p.m. Starliner also sheds its based heat shield at the bottom of the capsule to make way for the inflation of six Landing airbags hidden underneath it and those will cushion the vehicle as it lands in New Mexico's desert it's probably worth mentioning that we do not have uh video from Starliner if you think back to June on its ascent and journey to the International Space Station um it it's not able to send video down when it's not connected to space station so we won't be getting INF flat views from it but we do have several cameras out at the Landing site as well as some aircraft in the area that where you're hoping to get some views from uh but of course it is going to be pretty dark out in the desert at night so um they maybe infrared or black and white views um but hopefully we'll we'll get some some good uh camera views to show you and we're taking a live look now from The Landing site but uh the shot is quite dark at the moment you can see just a few lights blinking there uh hopefully as we get uh closer to the ground as Starliner gets closer down we will have some better shots e the landing of recovery teams have been out in the desert preparing for the spacecraft's return for several days I've been speaking with them to catch up on some of the preps that have been taking place they ran through a full mission dress rehearsal where they practice the landing and Recovery operation with all the different groups and functions and they've also been keeping a close eye on the wind direction to establish the best recovery zone out at White Sands they've even sent up some weather balloons to check the wind speeds tracking Vehicles out there are equipped cameras uh so the team has been calibrating those and again although we don't expect any views from Starliner on its way down we're hoping to get some good ones from those tracking cameras as well as aircraft in the area we plan to have the WB 57 getting views while it is um about 16,000 ft above the ground until the drog parachutes uh deploy and then at about 6,000 ft um we hope to see views from a cesta in the area and this is actually current view of the Cessna as it makes its way out to The Landing site white sand space Harbor in New Mexico and this is a shot from one of the ground cameras that we have on site so again although it is dark there we are hoping to to see um to see some good views and in the last few hours the teams there on the ground have been at the holding area loading up their vehicles doing last minute checks making sure all the equipment is ready to go and then shortly they'll begin moving into place to watch Starliner make its Final Approach and then once Starliner lands teams will move closer in a very strategic way they will first stop at about the 500t mark away from the spacecraft and then they'll move in closer to the 150t mark while ground teams safe the vehicle that first team on site with Starliner will be what we call the gold team they start recovering operations by performing what's called a sniff test where they use sensors to check for hydrazine one of the propellants that uh Starliner uses they'll be wearing protective gear known as hazmat suits to prevent exposure to hypergolic propellants hydrazine is used as propellant and it if it turns into a vapor it can be toxic after the snift test they will notify the rest of the Convoy when it's safe to approach and then they're going to check the winds make sure the entire landing and Recovery team is staged uprange from the direction the wind is blowing for added prote C now everyone out there is part of a different color team and they wear a vest with that color so it's very obvious who does what so the next St is the silver team and their first job is to ground the spacecraft Starliner will be powered down but there could be some residual electricity so before anyone can touch it they will ground it and discharge it team here on the ground are reporting that um everything is getting into good configuration for the deorbit burn that's now just about um 6 and a half minutes away uh going on uh with the with what we were saying we also will have the blue team that documenting that documents everything that's going on at the Landing site these are photographers from both Boeing and NASA who have situational awareness cameras and again here's a a current view of those teams all um ready to deploy at Landing yeah that's the holding site that we were mentioning and then of course you can see um the mountains there in the background in this black and white View and the Green Team hooks up the HVAC trailers to Starliner to get cooling on it but their first job is to put up an environmental enclosure on the spacecraft and that enclosure looks a lot like a big inflatable it wraps around the vehicle to get cool air around it and make sure the critical systems don't overheat then the red team opens the hatch that is mostly uh Boeing fire rescue they will back up the mobile access platform to Starliner hatch giving the team access and Starliner will be bringing back more than 900 lbs of cargo including a nitrogen oxygen recharge system or what we call noris tank that NASA um will service and refill for future space station needs the teams will unload that cargo before Starliner heads back to Florida just over 5 minutes to go now until tonight's uh 10:17 p.m. central Time deorbit Burn team here on the ground reports that Starliner has gotten into the right attitude uh kind of the right way it's pointing uh for that burn so everything is looking good we're on track for uh landing at 11:00 p.m. central midnight Eastern e with just a couple minutes or four minutes left to go until the deorbit burn we're going to check in once again with the landing team and Leah Cheshire and Josh Barrett thanks Brandy yeah we are out here uh just waiting in the Convoy area now most of the team is taking part in a safety briefing right now as we prepare to uh watch the deorbit burn and the re-entry and then move in toward the spacecraft like you mentioned it's really dark out here Josh and I were just able to take in the really beautiful sight of uh the Milky Way it's so dark so once the capsule starts to reenter the Earth's atmosphere we expect we expect to have a pretty good view of the streak um as that plasma builds up around the capsule itself that's right we should be seeing it come just over the Southwest Horizon right right through the saddle of kind of the mountains uh that are just overlooking the mountain range here and uh remembering back to o1 kind of the view that we should be having here is that we'll hear the Sonic booms as well after we see kind of that plasma envelope and then pretty quickly afterward it is pretty remarkable how quickly it does end up over our heads uh we'll see the flashes from uh the mortars uh which deploy those uh Fort heat shield parachutes which take the the fort heat shield off um then we start hearing those mortors or those mortars and then the the uh parachutes start to deploy um and then it's kind of slow motion from there as it drifts down and we're seeing a lot of movement as teams have just completed that safety briefing here so they're now all walking to join us at the Convoy uh so it looks like we are just a few minutes away from the deorbit burn and the show is really getting on the road soon so with that we're going to turn it back over to you in Houston we are uh just over two minutes away from the deorbit burn at this point uh Starliner has moved well away from the International Space Station and quite a few kilometers ahead of it as well we had a number of uh smaller Burns to ensure that Starliner was at a safe distance away from the space station before it performs performs the deorbit burn that will bring it out of orbit and on its Journey back to Earth and flight director Rick henling and his team expect starliners orbital maneuvering attitude control thrusters also called omx to fire around 10:17 central time pushing the spacecraft out of its orbital flight path and onto its journey home this deorbit burn will set us up for a touchdown time of about 11:00 p.m. central or 10: p.m. Mountain Daylight time out there in White Sands New Mexico once it's there control teams in Houston will begin powering off starliners radiators and solar rays as the spacecraft now has enough power to get home and sublimator will be taking over cooling they use water to cool the cabin Starliner is also as we said now in the correct attitude for performing the deorbit burn and at this point service module and crew capsule are still attached to each other four of the service modules 12 a facing orbital maneuvering and attitude control engines are going to be powering the deorbit burn allowing them to separate safely and those engines are each 1500lb thrusters meaning this burn will take about 6,000 lb of thrust slowing Starliner from its current orbital velocity and bringing it back to Earth's atmosphere for a smooth Landing the small reaction control system or RCS thrusters assist here in holding Starliner in the correct attitude during this test flight our teams ran roughly a million computer mod model simulations showing all the different Thruster combinations possible for a safe return to Earth today just 20 seconds now until the burn starts it last uh 59 seconds and again you uh be firing those orbital maneuvering and attitude control thrusters four orbital maneuvering and attitude control thrusters on starlander service module are now firing slowing Starliner down as a capsule againsts its Journey back to Earth this will take about 59 seconds to complete we're hearing a good all good uh all thrusters firing well so far can see here those uh those representation of those thrusters firing Starliner is maintaining its attitude and as those large orbital maneuvering thrusters are firing smaller reaction control system thrusters are also working keeping the spacecraft in the correct position for the burn still looking good and we did see the uh durber burn cut off successfully teams here on the ground reporting a good burn Starliner is now on its way to wh sand space Harper New Mexico and a planned touchdown at about 11:00 p.m. central midnight Eastern Time next up on the uh to-do list for tonight is the separation of the service module when the service module's job done it'll be disposed of over the Pacific Ocean leaving the uncrewed crew module to carry on alone in addition to all its other jobs the service module has spent the flight protecting the crew module's heat shield jettisoning it uncovers that critical piece of equipment allowing it to shelter the spacecraft as it begins traveling back through the Earth's atmosphere the crew module will then make its final attitude adjustments to make sure the heat shield is at exactly the right angle to provide that protection and those fine-tuned adjustments are really just a strong capability of star liner's guidance navigation and control system in fact on the two previous flights Starliner made Bullseye Landings thanks to that system Starliner maneuvering into position for that jettison at this time team here on the ground reporting that uh Starliner is in a good attitude pointing the right direction for the service module separation and the service module has just jettisoned separated and is now fall in away it will burn up during re-entry over a remote part of the Pacific Ocean and Starliner will continue on its path to New Mexico where the landing and Recovery team is waiting for Touchdown Starliner is now angling itself and its heat shield for re-entry entry interface is coming up in just about 10 minutes that's the hottest part of the re-entry process with Starliner heat shield reaching about 3,000 de to protect Starliner from those heat loads the space craft has what's called an ablative heat shield the outer surface of that Shield heats up to a gas which then carries the heat away from the crew module through convection and our team calls this process a game of Threes because during entry interface the heat shield will handle those temperatures of about 3,000 de but it will convert that heat to about 300° with only 3 in of a blader and because of this protection during this hottest part of re-entry the inside of the spacecraft remains at about room temperature when Starliner returned from its last two flights the capsules landed with two black stripes up the sides indicating the heat shield was a bladed as intended so we do expect to see that again today and the team considers that a bit of a badge of honor e to Rob e e once again uh we did see uh Starliner deorbit or uh performance deorbit burn on time at 10:17 p.m. central Time and then quickly turned around and jettisoned its surface module now that it has performed its Duty over the course of the mission we are still about 20 minutes away from entry interface but things will start to happen quickly after that about four minutes after we go into the entry interface the heat from Star liner's reinjury will become so intense that the plasma will begin to form around the spacecraft causing a blackout in Communications with Starliner for about 4 and A2 minutes and after that we'll see starliners Starliner jettison its forward heat shield that's been protecting the parachutes during great entry then when Starliner is around 30,000 ft above the ground the spacecraft's parachute sequence will begin to Dr par drog parachutes rather will uh start slowing Starliner down and then they'll detach and three main parachutes will deploy and inflate at about 3,000 ft off the ground the base heat shield jettison exposing the airbags and then at touchdown those airbags absorb the initial force of Landing cushioning the spacecraft for a soft safe return to Earth e currently Starliner is about 213 miles above the uh South Pacific Ocean it's just past the southernmost portion of this final orbit coming around the uh southern coast of Australia now is going to begin making its way northward towards uh the west coast of the United States for that um landing at 11:00 p.m. central Time midnight eastern time at wh sand space Harbor in New Mexico again we've had the deorbit burn that took place just as planned and at 1017 a 59 second burn that uh changed the uh Starliner speed by about uh 290 mph 130 m/s that made way for the service module separation and the next Milestone we'll be watching for is the entry interface coming up around 10:45 still about 10 minutes away e live view here of the uh recovery forces staged uh near The Landing site ready to move in when Starliner touches down we are taking off Milestones as expected for that 11:00 p.m. central midnight Eastern or 10: p.m. mountain time touchdown found today in New Mexico again Starliner performed its deorbit burn about 12 minutes ago the thrusters performed nominally and the flight home is going smooth e e we're still about uh 14 minutes away from the entry interface which is our next Milestone I think I said earlier that we were 10 minutes away that was a mistake um but about 14 minutes now we'll be experiencing the uh the atmosphere for the first time since Starliner launched and since we do have a little time we're going to check back in with the landing team Le and Josh how are things going out there thanks Brandy yeah that was a great view of the uh Landing Convoy all lined up I was just watching some of the gold team members getting suited up as you mentioned earlier that's going to be the first team to come in and inspect the vehicle they're sniffing for those um hyper gools or any of those dangerous fumes before the rest of the teams get to go to move in and approach the capsule of course it's kind of a waiting game right now as we are still waiting to spot Starliner uh coming from the southwest so a lot of us are outside of the Convoy right now and keeping our eyes on the skies yeah that's right we're we've got about just under probably three dozen vehicles I all lined up in three rows just waiting to get that touchdown signal again going through that Convoy list that you guys went through already so well behind that gold team after Starliner is declared safe the silver team moves in and they do the electrical grounding they'll also stabilize the vehicle just in case the airbags start deflating we make sure that the hatch has uh a good stable orientation for red team to come in and they're the ones with the hatch orientation uh and once uh the red team establishes hatch access actually the silver team has a fun job to night in the dark they're going to go start looking for the pieces that came off of Starliner those heat shields uh some of those Lids from those those parachute mortars uh and then after that after red team has hatch access and opens up the hatch uh NASA's ISS program folks are going to come in for the cargo inspection so again we are expecting to start seeing Starliner coming across the Horizon around the time that entry interface begins but until then just wanted to give you guys a hit from The Landing site and the latest that we have going on here so we'll toss it back over to you in Mission Control Houston thanks so much Le and Josh we are watching for that entry interface as well we're now about uh 12 minutes away Starliner continuing to make good progress uh following that 1017 p.m. central Time D orbit burn again we're looking at the landing and Recovery team set up at the holding Zone there at White Sands Josh and Leah are embedded with that Convoy and they will make a very strategic move toward the spacecraft after touchdown first stopping at about the 500t mark and then they'll get the go to move forward to the 150t mark and then once the vehicle is considered safe they will move in e with the new orbit burn complete and uh the service mod module separated the spacecraft's heat shield is now exposed and ready to begin experiencing the atmosphere again uh the Starliner is going to make some final attitude adjustments that keep that heat shield pointing at exactly the right angle and next step after that is entry interface again just coming up in a few minutes at 400,000 ft above Earth Starliner faces temperatures of 3000° f from the plasma created by air friction around the spacecraft but Starliner can handle that heat with its heat shield which is made of an ablade of material designed to keep the inside of the spacecraft at about 70° few minutes later Starin will experience an expected blackout in Communications and that will last for about 4 and 1/2 minutes at 30,000 ft and just 11 minutes before landing Starliner jet sends its forward heat shield exposing the spacecraft's parachute system then two Dro shoots will deploy in increasing drag and significantly slowing down Starliner then three pilot parachutes will pull out the main shoots allowing spacecraft to continue its slow and steady descent for another 8,000 ft towards the landing Zone and once the main parachutes are fully inflated starliners bucket handle releases and what that does is it just basically levels out the spacecraft ahead of touchdown and then the base heat shield that protected Starliner through re-entry will separate at about 3,000 ft uncovering The Landing airbags those airbags of course will fill with nitrogen allowing for Starliner to land softly and safely there in the sand less than 10 minutes to go now before we do get to that entry interface point and uh now just 20 24 and 1/2 minutes away from The Landing at wh sand space Harbor everything's pretty quiet in the room which is a good sign things are continuing to go smoothly as Starliner begins making it way making its way back to Earth you're taking a look there at flight director Rick henfling on the left speaking with Mike Lamers on the right Rick is the flight director for this Landing operation Mike is weather flight director they are tag teaming this operation team has been keeping a close eye on weather at the Landing site but everything uh looks pretty good for tonight's touchdown yeah about 79° Fahrenheit out there they reported 10 Mi visibility the winds are within the limits so we are looking good for a touchdown coming up right about 11:00 p.m. Central Time e 7 minutes to go now in tool entry interface and then uh that intense heating will start about 2 minutes after we do begin the interface that'll last about 4 and A2 minutes during which time we'll be in a blackout Starliner is currently about 130 mil 149 miles rather above uh the Pacific Ocean heading northward towards the western coast of the United States and it's touchdown in New Mexico we're taking a look here at the Landing trajectory there on the left of your screen you can see that line that crosses over the Baja Peninsula and that is the track Starliner will take as it makes its way into New Mexico as it gets close to the ground people living in the area might get a a bright shot of Starliner coming back through the atmosphere and Landing there in White Sands New Mexico you can also see there in the center of the screen the uh to-do list basically before before we do get to Landing the service module separation highlighted in green because that one's already taken place and next up is the entry interface about 5 minutes away from now and flight controllers here in the room are reporting good attitude for that entry interface coming up again in just under 5 minutes e e e e 2 and 1/2 minutes left before Starliner begins to fill the effects of the Earth's atmosphere again everything uh continuing to go smoothly FL controllers here in the room are quiet as they're working through their steps but all uh going well so far Starliner in position to begin experiencing that heat from re-entry now less than 100 Mil above the Earth and uh heading towards the Baja Peninsula we'll be flying over that before landing in New Mexico just 17 minutes to go until Landing e less than a minute now until we begin uh entry interface again about 2 minutes after entry interface starts we'll begin seeing the heating uh really get intense and we'll go into a 4 and 1/2 minute blackout