Boeing's Starliner returns to Earth without astronauts | Orbital Velocity Live

e e e e e okay welcome everybody let me know in the chat if you can hear me making sure my setup is good as you can see right now starlander is getting ready to undock in about about a half an hour so I want to welcome everybody who is new over the last couple of weeks uh I had a new video recently about the lunar Gateway and the problems that has been happening with the mass on that one so if you haven't seen that be sure to watch that after this stream but thank you all uh for joining especially all the new subscribers um this stream is basically going to be kind of a casual conversation while the event is happening uh and I'll answer some questions in the chat if you guys have some and of course when NASA commentary is ongoing my plan is to be a uh a little quieter so um so in the chat it looks like we've got ghost 307 and we've got SFS uh newspace and he said he was uh it's like 12:00 a.m. for him at least when he posted that so it's pretty late for him so if he's still listening well thanks for watching if not I understand you uh wanted to get some sleep um sleep is always nice um ghost 307 thank you for joining and you asked uh why don't they leave Starliner space suits on the ISS for the next emergency that's a good question actually uh I think part of that is because they're custom for the actual astronauts and they'll probably want them back since I think they even then even if they're custom I think they still technically belong to Boeing but they probably want them back on the ground and it also probably helps with ballast for the spacecraft since there's not a crew on there anymore I imagine They're bringing back a bunch of um unneeded equipment or cargo or something like that but I'm not 100% sure maybe NASA will Enlighten us um but yeah that's a good question they do have a apparently they have a spare SpaceX suit that uh Sunni Williams was able to uh fit into so we'll see what happens in the future doesn't really matter because it's probably not going to be another crude Starliner on ISS probably for at least a year but we'll see what happens there so give a couple people a few more minutes to join in um I imagine most people are familiar with what's going on with Starliner but if not um basically we have two astronauts on on this little on on the space station this Starliner spacecraft I wonder if this will actually zoom in if I have any Focus issues here there we go so this is currently attached to the space station Starliner and uh it launched with Butch will um um Butch Willmore and Sunni Williams back in uh I think it was June 5th somebody can correct me if I'm wrong there I believe it was June 5th and they docked a day later and while they were on the way to the space station they had a few helium leaks um with the uh some of the uh thrusters and some of the thrusters also had some issues so on all the thrusters are located in these little if you can see them on here these little pods I don't know if you can see it or not we maybe yeah these little pods um in particular the reaction control system thrusters and so they had some issues while they were trying to dock to the space station and then um they got most of them fixed and actually docked to the space station successfully but NASA spent most of the summer trying to figure out why those thrusters had problems and during that testing I guess they found some uh some uh at least certain engineers at Nasa just weren't comfortable sending the crew back inside Starliner when there's a perfectly viable alternative uh crew Dragon that's definitely safe so I think some of the problems was the thrusters are overheating when they're using them in the wrong way just learning how to use it since it's a new vehicle and uh it's possible it sounds like the uh during the thrusting in the dog houses those little pods I told you about they're getting a little hotter than they expected and so that's causing some uh manifolds to expand I think there's a Teflon manifold in there that's starting to expand um possibly at least based on ground testing anyway so they're just the the exact root cause of that they're not 100% sure so since they don't know 100% for sure it's better just to send them home uh send uh Starliner home uncrewed so that means in the meantime Butch Wilmore and Sun Williams um will be coming home in February of 2025 now there's currently a dragon on there right now with four astronauts um let me try not to mix up names here so I'm going to look up it's the crew8 Dragon that's what you actually see um on your screen right there you see crew8 dragon and let's see here aboard crew a dragon you have Matthew Dominic um hang on I hold on yes hold on here making sure I got everything right okay you have Matthew Dominic you have Michael um Barrett Janette EPs and Russian cos Alexander I'm going to say this wrong so any body who's listening this Russian apologies for butchering the name here it's uh g grenen i sounds that sounds right grinin um anyway those four that's their primary R that's they launched back in gosh March I believe to the space station they're planning on coming back home on October 6 so about a month from now but between when Starliner uncrewed is undocked tonight um all the way through to uh when the crew n spacecraft launches which will only have two astronauts on board uh and that will be uh Nick hag and uh uh a Russian cosmonaut I'm trying to remember his name uh Alexander uh goranov those are the only two instead of four people normally so they're going to go up um but in between when crew uh when Starliner undocks and when crew nine gets there technically but well well um Butch and Sun spacecraft well left so in order to make sure they have an a way home in an absolute emergency is they'll have to be cargo on underneath the seats of the crew dragon and so apparently NASA's got a setup up there to where the two astronauts can I guess there's a couple cargo um bags it's situated in such a way it's kind of like a makeshift seat plus with some extra extra foam liners so they'll be there not in their pressure not in pressure suits since there's not no pressure suit compatible they don't have their SpaceX there's spaceex suit up there for them technically there's one up there for Sunni but not for both of them and uh and the Starliner suits aren't compatible so they'll be if there was an absolute emergency between now and when crew n arrives they would go home in that dragon in basically a shirt sleeve environment underneath the uh four seats strap strapped in like cargo so that that would be a little unnerving but to and as as I pointed out to other people if that ends up happening that's actually the Lesser store that that would basically mean something bad at happened with the ISS and that's the bigger story but that's likely not going to happen that's a very very unlikely sit situation but until then that's their right home but once crew n arrives there'll be an extra suit for uh Butch Wilmore and so both Butch and Sunni will have space suits or pressure suits compatible with dragon and then they'll just remain part of the crew nine crew the makesense the crew N9 crew for about six months and just returned home on February in February 2025 so that's basically what's going on right now in a nutshell in about 8 minutes it looks like how long it took me to do that so so yeah I'm mostly waiting it's of course it's a black screen right now because it looks like they're going into orbital Sunset I'm am going to go ahead and bear with me here I'm going to go ahead and uh turn on uh I can find it NASA TV at least the uh the uh stream there we go let me turn off that in case there's some extra stuff going on there and I'm going to yeah it's a very uh rudimentary stream today so I'm going to go oops go ahead and I guess I had to wait for that to come up so we'll just do I guess we'll go back to ISS live and wait yep that's what happened I'm a oneman show here guys okay we'll go back to the black screen so mostly we're waiting for NASA commentary to start and I believe it's supposed to start I actually probably should have actually looked when that start time was I think it's either uh either I think it's about five minutes it's supposed to start so I'll look that up then so if anybody's got any questions about Starliner the situation why NASA decided to do what what they did and uh yeah just let me know um just a little commentary on my part like I said this is mostly going to be kind of a casual conversation here I think the scariest part now obviously they're professional and they're completely safe up there that NASA's got contingencies but I tell you once that space once Starliner undocks it's probably going to be very weird for Butch and Sunni to uh you know look out the window and there goes their spacecraft um with their with their Boeing pressure suits too so it's just probably got to be kind of weird I was watching an interview with uh Mark Kelly the other day and he's like for him he imagines like it imagine it being like if he was on a shuttle mission and uh he looked out the window and the shuttle all of a sudden departed so little little uh little nerve-wracking there but on the bright side Butch and Sunni get an EXT extra 6 months on top of the two months they were supposed to uh that they were in space uh get an extra 6 months for a total of eight months and astronauts that this is this is what they live for they live to go for for space missions so they get an extra six months oops they get an extra six months up there on top of the two before it is probably harder on their families than it is for them though so let's listen to what they're saying here on this Bas let c i don't know if we ever circled back on how I am to leave my SSC what state I'm supposed to leave it in overnight still using it and TC we've uh chatted that down here we're planning to schedule it for a different day there are no operational impacts to you using your SSC our tenative plan is to schedule the troubleshooting early next week okay um so just put don't know if um what I was seeing last night with the scan and the um the amount of time it took for it to uh uh complete was that was that expected yes I'm hearing that was expected okay CU I I mean I lit I went to sleep and I woke up and it was still going and I just I just hard did a hard shut down of the SS sounds like it's basically orbital tech support right now for something um also be sure um to look in the chat box area cop our plan uh we're hearing that you'll need to leave your laptop powered on with the lid open so our goal is to find a time where it won't interrupt your sleep there's a poll going on right now what do you think will happen to Starliner tonight okay then um we'll wait till next week thank you our pleasure I've got several options for you to choose there I we have undocks and land safely undocks but the landing gets delayed because maybe Thruster issues and they got to troubleshoot something and we have um thrusters fail stuck in orbit basically the idea for that option is it's just stuck and and just has to wait for atmospheric drag to bring it down oops hang on I don't know what's going on there hang on a second hold on I'm actually not sure where that sounds coming from oh I know where it's coming from okay hold on ah got to get demonetized with this music here [Music] standby that's what's going on here properties interact mute that sorry about that don't know if you guys could have heard that let's find out hang on you guys might have actually may not have actually heard that okay well that's good um let me figure out the problem here um I'm going to keep that muted but let me go properties here that's probably going to mess with that cancel what I just do okay for that that's going to mess with that okay good evening and welcome to the Starliner Mission Control in Houston where teams are preparing for the autonomous undocking and departure of the uncrewed Boeing Starliner spacecraft from the International Space Station undocking today is current planned for 5:4 p.m. central 6:04 p.m. Eastern I'm Anna Schneider with NASA Communications and joining me today in Starliner mission control is Lauren biniki from Boeing Communications across the hall in the International Space Station flight control room we also have NASA's Rob navius in preparation for today's undocking activities the teams here in Starliner mission control and the flight control room flight control team in the International Space Station flight control room recently completed the go no go Poll for starliners undocking the teams all ped go to proceed with undocking and the team here in Starliner mission control is being led by flight director Chloe Marin today's undocking will set Starliner on its path home for a landing at wh sand space Harbor in New Mexico targeting approximately 11:00 p.m. central Friday September 6th midnight Eastern on Saturday NASA astronaut Butch Wilmore and sunny Williams flew to the International Space Station in June as part of NASA's Boeing crew flight test lifting off a top a United launch Alliance Atlas 5 rocket from SP space launch complex 41 at the Cape Canaveral space for station in Florida on June 5th the Starliner spacecraft docked the International Space Station on June 6th during the June 6th rendevu NASA and Boeing identified helium leaks and experienced issues with the spacecraft reaction control system or RCS thrusters a Starliner approach the station since then engineering teams have completed a significant amount of work including reviewing a collection of data conducting flight and ground testing hosting independent reviews with agency propulsion experts and developing various return contingency plans the uncertainty and lack of expert concurrence did not meet the agency's safety and performance requirements for human space flight thus prompting the NASA decision to return Boeing Starliner spacecraft to Earth without astronauts buch Willmore and sunny Williams aboard the uncrewed return allowed NASA and Boeing to continue Gathering testing data on Starliner during its upcoming flight home while also not accepting more risk than is necessary for its crew Wilmore and Williams will continue their work formally as part of the Expeditions 71 and 72 crew through February of 2025 they will then fly home aboard a dragon spacecraft with two other crew members assigned to the agency SpaceX crew 9 mission NASA astronaut Nick ha and Ross Cosmos Cosmonaut Alexander goranov as part of NASA's commercial crew program this is Boeing second flight to the International Space Station and third Starliner flight test overall following a second orbital flight test in May of 2022 yesterday the hatches were closed between Starliner and the International Space Station there are three hatches that separate the inside of Starliner from the orbiting laboratory the Starliner hatch and the AP pass hatch and no two forward hatch on the state side following hatch closure teams work through steps to depressurize the vestibule which is the area between the station hatch and Starliner hatch that were exposed the vacuum of space prior to docking shortly after the go no go poll earlier today where the joint teams here in the Starliner mission control and the International Space Station Mission Control pulled go for undocking NASA astronaut Sunny Williams called down to the flight control team on Space to ground to share some words with the team before starlander departure later today we'll go ahead and Replay that ex Exchange for you now station Houston Space to ground two for Starliner and Status go ahead we're with you hey I both the Starliner and ISS flight control teams have pulled go for undock at this time the expected undock time is 2204 okay copy 2204 hey you know we're just looking at the flight control roster and like wow it is the allstar team you guys it is the time to bring Calypso home you have got this where we have your backs and you've got this bring her back to Earth good luck sunny and but this is Chloe just on behalf of the entire Mo team I know the other flight control teams around the building we thank you for your endless Support over the years we've enjoyed every training event and every meeting we remember every setback and every Revelation with you the teams on the ground have worked countless hours over the last few weeks months and for a group of us years to bring Calypso back and we're ready to do that today we wish you the best of luck in your increment and sunny I will make sure the right people have your Coming Home song ready to play on Space the ground when it's time for you guys to come home good luck and thank you wonderful comments uh flight we appreciate that and we agree many years of uh great enjoyment um siming together uh playing together and being involved with each other's lives and it's been special um bring it home happy thank you and have a good evening we are now just over 13 minutes away from today's planned undocking as we continue to approach that undocking you can see the team here and the Starliner Mission Control team working um in tandem with the ISS flight control room across the hallway just before we came on the air here the teams opened up the helium manifold to check Starliner leak rate everything looks good the teams say the rate remains steady and we have plenty of margin for the ex uh rest of the flight so let's talk a little bit about what is coming up at around :2 p.m. central 602 Eastern we are going to be listening for the authority to proceed for undocking after the ATP or authority to proceed is issued for undocking the hooks on the NASA docking system will begin to open there are 12 hooks hooks that seal the surfaces between the docking system and the ISS International docking adapter or the Ida once all of those hooks are open Springs on Starliner docking ring will push the spacecraft away from the space station so again we're expecting that undocking at 50:4 p.m. central 6:04 Eastern and then just a few seconds later at about 5 m out our first separation burn starliners thrusters will complete two short firings to gradually increase the separation speed to help the spacecraft carefully move away from the orbiting laboratory the command given to Starliner will be to back straight away to the 200 met mark But then a few seconds later a second command will be given before it gets too far to change that path and head up higher than station these 12 pre-planned Burns will be performed with starliners forward facing reaction control system or RCS thrusters which have been performing nominally during this fight Starliner will then begin a breakout burn which will take the spacecraft forward and above the station during this burn sequence starliners thrusters will perform a series of 12 short firings this entire sequence will take about 5 minutes to complete and will allow Starliner to quickly break out to outside of the approach ellipsoid or AE about 4 minutes into this burn sequence Starliner will exit the keep out sphere or Kos the keep out sphere is an imaginary 200 met sphere centered on the space station one once outside the keep out sphere vehicles must provide a four orbit safe free drift trajectory around 510 p.m. central that automated breakout sequence will be completed and then just 15 minutes later we will be out of the approach ellipsoid the approach ellipsoid is in the same family as the keep out sphere but this time it is an imaginary 3dimensional ellipsoid around the space station Vehicles outside the approach ellipsoid have to be on what we call call a 24-hour safe free drift trajectory and that means the spacecraft would not cross over that imaginary line for at least 24 hours even if it lost all maneuvering capabilities once outside the approach ellipsoid joint operations between the Starliner mission control and International Space Station flight control room will conclude and Starliner will be on a path back to Earth to say Mr Big Mouth uh on the chat says uh now SpaceX will build NASA for returning of the crew and then ghost 7 replied the same number of buts but different names extra weather predictions for the landing site at White Sand space Harbor in New Mexico and the weather continues to look good to support a landing later today as part of the departure preparations for Starliner Mission managers completed a series of operational and weather checks yesterday 24 hours before undocking NASA analyzed the weather predictions for the landing site and there are several different weather criteria that must be met including winds at the selected Landing site must be approximately 13 mph or 12 knots or less when uncrewed and ground temperatures must be warmer than 15° Fahrenheit and the cloud ceiling must be at least 1,000 ft one nautical mile of visibility is also required and the area must be clear of precipitation thunderstorms and lightning within an approximately 22 mile radius a final weather check will also take place before the spacecraft C orbit burn which is currently scheduled for 10:17 p.m. central 11:17 p.m. Eastern and following the weather briefing the navigation and docking lights on Starliner were turned on the Lars were confirmed to operate and the r cards were enabled for departure the Lars or laser detection and ranging lasers create a 3D picture of the International Space Station for starliners computers to help the spacecraft guide itself around the ISS when it's flying close to the station the ladar system was developed and tested in orbit aboard the space shuttle as they docked with ISS the r cards or remote analog interface unit gathers data on the status and health of critical spacecraft systems during All Phases of the mission this allows the important systems information to be stored aboard the spacecraft so Engineers can review it once the spacecraft lands just a reminder we've got a poll in the chat for anybody who wants to guess U what you think will happen for St with Starliner tonight and apparently less than half about 50 50% rough almost 50% thinks that everything will be fine which is where I'm at and the rest of you think something bad's going to happen whether it's gets a landing gets delayed or thrusters get stuck or it can't undock so everybody's got got their opinions on this which is it's fair but yeah as I was saying earlier um agreeing with ghost 307 it's basically the as far as charging NASA or Boeing for space SpaceX charging NASA or Boeing um there's no reason for that since they just swapped out seats and that's actually part of the reason why NASA did it this way is because it's the is why they're spending the extra six months is because they have it will it's the least interruption in the uh commercial in the actual crew rotation schedule we're now just over 6 minutes away from the planned undocking at 50:04 p.m. central as we continue to stand by for Starliner departure from from the International Space Station I'll hand it over to NASA's Rob navius for an update from the International Space Station flight control room thanks Anna here in the space station flight control room at the Johnson Space Center in Houston the uh flight control team led by flight director Anthony varia is in the final moments before the expected undocking of uh Starliner from the forward Port of the harmony module on the International Space Station once uh the undocking is complete and Starliner has exited the approach ellipsoid that you heard Lauren describe just a moment or two ago the uh nine crew members on board the station led by Commander Al kenko will begin their sleep period they're going to be moving into an off duty period on Saturday the vacancy of the forward Port of Harmony will open up uh that port for the uh beginning of two crew rotations over the next several weeks next Wednesday NASA's Don Pettit and Ros Cosmos cosmonauts Al uh Alexi of chinin and Ivan Vagner will be launching from the bik Andor cosmodrome in Kazakhstan on a two orbit Rendevous to reach the International Space Station that will swell the station's population to 12 and uh begin an 11-day Handover with NASA astronaut Tracy Dyson and Konan Yenko and Nikolai CH who will be departing the station on September 23rd a day later if everything goes as planned NASA NASA's uh Nick hag and Ros Cosmos cosmina alexand uh Alexander gorinov will be launching from the Cape Canaveral space force station on the SpaceX crew Dragon Freedom uh they will uh be a two-man crew to reach the International Space Station and provide the orbital Uber if you will for Butch Wilmore and sunny Williams to come home on next February with Wilmore and Williams completing what is expected to be about a 262 day Mission meanwhile the crew8 crew Matt Dominic Mike Barrett Janette EPs and Alexander greenin are in the final weeks of their mission on board the station they are planning to depart after a 5-day Handover with ha and gorbin off that Handover will uh lead the way for a departure on or around October 1st the crew a crew will then be coming home to bring the station back to its compliment of seven crew members so with that we're about uh 3 and a half minutes away from the planned undocking of Starliner we'll be watching carefully it will take about 21 and A2 minutes from undocking for Starliner to exit the approach ellipsoid that you heard Lauren described a moment ago that's that 2 and 1 half mile long by 1.2 mile wide Corridor if you will the neighborhood of the International Space Station so we'll be following along as Starliner begins its journey home and and a landing at midnight eastern time at the we sand space Harbor in New Mexico with that we'll turn it back to you Anna in the Starliner control room looks like we got orbital Sunrise coming up station Houston Space ground 2 for Starliner undock status go ahead ISF and Starliner flight control teams remain go for an on time undock at 22 04 please perform 1 decimal 106 crew CST 100 approach and departure monitoring steps 2 decimal 2 and 2 decimal 3 verbally call Houston when physical set is confirmed be advised that NDS hook Motors are driving space to space c may be ready it says crew copies ready for undock monitoring also based on the commentary on NASA it sounds like they're also going to be avoiding the use at least while at Space Station close to space station thank Rob we just heard some conversation between the crew on the International Space Station and the teams here in the Starliner Mission Control confirming that we are continuing to be go for an undock in just under 2 minutes from now at 5:04 p.m. e Central 6:04 p.m. Eastern we are standing by for the command of the undock ATP or authority to proceed once the authority to proceed is issued for undocking the NDS or NASA docking system hooks will begin to open and there are 12 hooks that seal the surfaces between the NDS and the ISS International docking adapter Ida once all 12 hooks are open Springs on Starliner docking ring will push the spacecraft away from the space station and flight director Chloe Marion just asked for quiet in the room as we are approaching 1 minute out from Starliner undocking and we just heard confirmation that the umbilicals are retracting and hooks are beginning to drive I'm nervous for them I'm not I'm not even up there watching your spacecraft float away it's going to be real weird 30 seconds there it goes separation confirmed Starliner is now backing away from station and starting its return to Earth Starliner sters will then complete two short firings to gradually increase the separation speed to help the spacecraft carefully move away from the orbiting lab here it goes the vehicle is now about 2 meters away from the International Space Station at the time of undocking Starliner and the International Space Station were flying approximately 260 statute miles over Central China Starliner will be beginning a breakout burn soon which will take the spacecraft forward and above station during this burn sequence starliners thros will perform a series of 12 short firings the entire sequence takes about 5 minutes to complete and allows Starliner to quickly break out to outside the approach ellipsoid or AE and about 4 minutes into the burn sequence Starliner will exit the the keep out sphere or the Kos and you can see those thrusters firing there on the left of your screen as Starliner backs away from space station and we are now just at 35 M away from the International Space station we saw a good first burn ISS ISS enabled confirmation all 27 Jets have fired okay Houston copies ISS thrusters enabled and you're seeing the light show there on your screen and the first three of the 12 firings have completed and there's about 100 can't pause until the fourth burn the thresher firings are really pretty though Starliner is about 60 M away and fight controllers are reporting good attitude and good control we are standing by for the fourth of the 12 Burns in the series of firings as part of the breakout burn as a reminder the entire sequence will take about 5 minutes to complete about 4 minutes into the sequence star liner will across what is known as the appro or the keep out sphere the keep out sphere is an imaginary 200 M sphere centered on the space station we are 15 seconds away from the fourth burn in the series of 12 and just saw burn four which just completed we're hearing good burn and the fifth burn and that sequence of 12 just completed and it was a good burn the sixth burn in the series of 12 was just completed and it was a good burn we have we are halfway through the series of 12 six more to go all good so far you might be able to see some of those lights on the front of Starliner a red and a green and a white those indicate the different sides of Starliner and they're used by the ISS crew to watch Starliner move away from the ISS along the undocking access and we just heard good confirmation of both Burns seven and eight completed Starliner undocked approximately 5 minutes ago and has just a handful of short firings left in its breakouts breakout burn and it is now about 150 M away from the International Space Station and we heard confirmation of a good burn n three more to go and this is an abbreviated undocking and breakout because they're trying to not push the thrusters um trying to make sure things don't overheat too much burn 10 good burn we have one more burn to go but they have confirmed that Starliner has cross the keep out sphere or the Kos which is an imaginary 200 met sphere centered on the International Space Station that helps flight controllers here on the ground monitor the arrival and departure of visiting Vehicles station Houston Space to ground 2 Starliner has exited the key sphere she's exited the key here wait for that last burn a reminder this automated breakout sequence was chosen to use Starliner forward thrusters which have remained nominal during this flight and we heard confirmation that all 12 Burns in this series of breakout burn firings have completed and they were all good Burns Starliner has crossed the keep out sphere so the next milestone for Star liner's departure will be crossing the approach ellipsoid or AE the AE is another invisible shape monitored by the flight control team measuring 4 km x 2 km x 2 km Starliner is scheduled to cross the approach ellipsoid in about 10 minutes Vehicles outside the AE have to be on what we call a 24-hour safe free drift trajectory which means the spacecraft would not cross into the approach ellipsoid for at least 24 hours even if it lost all maneuvering capabilities once outside the approach ellipsoid joint operations between Starliner mission control and the International Space Station flight control room will conclude and Starliner will be on a path back to Earth hopefully they get that camera focused a little bit better we're now taking a look from the Vesta system which stands for vision based Electro Optical sensor tracking assembly it's a bit of a mouthful so we like to call it Vesta and this is a look from Starliner back at the International Space Station the system is really the eyes of Starliner it's able to pick up on features on the outside of station like handrails and reflectors you can see some of that on your screen there in the outlines and it's the way to assess Starliner position and attitude it also gives the ground teams a very accurate look at Starliner location relative to the station so earlier we were taking a look from the station back at Starliner now we're looking from Starliner back at station that's a cool graphic we're just under 10 minutes away from the AE exit so in the meantime we will check back in with NASA's Rob navius and the internationala space station flight control room Rob thank you guys um flight Dynamics has reported that Starliner is on a perfect trajectory backing away from the International Space Station and opening uh a rate of about 13 a 12 statued miles per rev at the time of the deorbit burn at uh 1017 and 13 seconds p.m. central time later this evening the uh vehicle will be about 56 statute miles away from the International Space Station that deorbit burn by the way will be a 59 second burn to slow Starliner down by across Baja California and heading towards its landing at the wh sand space Harbor in New Mexico with the forward Port of Harmony now vacant that sets the stage as I mentioned a few minutes ago for the start of a couple of crew rotations that are coming up down at the bikon or Cosmo Drome in Kazakhstan Don peted of NASA and rosmos cosmonauts Alexi of chinan and Ivon Vagner and their backups are in the final stages of their preparation s for launch next Wednesday their soyu 2.1a booster and the soyu ms26 spacecraft that they will ride to orbit uh they that vehicle will roll out to the Launchpad in bik and or on Sunday and then final preparations will lead them to a launch next Wednesday at 11:23 a.m. Central Time heading for a two orbit 3-hour 10-minute journey to dock to the International Space Station's rosette module now that forward port on Harmony that was just vacated by Starliner departure will be the Port of Call for NASA astronaut Nick ha and roscosmos cosmina Alexander gorbin off and their launch no earlier than September 24th on the SpaceX Dragon Freedom spacecraft off of launch complex 40 at the Cape Canaveral space force station that will be about a 30-hour transit for those uh two crew members to reach the International Space Station and the automated docking to the forward Port of Harmony ultimately ha gorbin off Butch Wilmore and sunny Williams will do a relocation of the uh SpaceX Dragon spacecraft from the forward Port of Harmony to the Zenith Port of Harmony opening up that forward port for the arrival of the next SpaceX cargo ship SpaceX 31 that's scheduled for launch in October so a lot of activities uh lying ahead for the space station crew the uh crew aboard the International Space Station soon will begin its sleep period and an off duty day on Saturday while the activity shifts over to the white flight control room down the hall as they are in a shift Handover right now uh flight director Rick henling will be taking over shortly to supervise entry and Landing operations and uh the team over there will be monitoring the progress of Starliner as it moves to its deorbit position about 56 statued miles away from the International Space Station with that we'll turn it back to the white ficker and Anna and Lauren thank you rob Starliner is now about 750 m away from the International Space Station as it continues to make its way to the approach ellipsoid exit again that approach ellipsoid exit is targeted for 5:25 and 30 seconds p.m. central Time 6:25 and 30 seconds p.m. eastern time and everything continues to proceed as planned with Starliner departure and return back to Earth and you're looking live at Starliner and free drift Engineers are telling us that the breakout Burns all went well thrusters are all looking good everything is nominal as we continue up and around space station and head back to Earth again Starliner undocked just a short while ago from the International Space Station at 5:4 p.m. central 6:04 p.m. Eastern as the space station and Starliner were flying approximately 260 statute miles over Central China and shortly after that physical separation starliners thrusters completed two short firings to gradually increase the separation speed and help the spacecraft carefully move away from the orbiting laboratory as part of of the separation Burns and Then star Starliner began the breakout burn which was a series of 12 short firings which allowed the space cop to quickly move outside um the keep out sphere and it is now approaching the um approach ellipsoid exit and once Starliner is outside of the approach aloid The Joint operations between teams here and the Starliner mission control and the International Space Station flight control room across the hall will end and Starliner will be back on its path I think that little dot there is Starliner all the way out there already and we are about 6 minutes away from that approach ellipsoid exit and Starliner is now about 900 M away from the International Space Station traveling at a rate of 1.2 m/ second 15 minutes and already almost a kilometer away that dot in the center of your screen is Starliner looking from space [Music] station and that's the view that uh that little dot is the view that Butch and Sun are seeing with their spacecraft going away that's o like I said they're safe especially with crew8 there but it's probably got to be a little bit unnerving watching your spacecraft with your space suits just leave without you so far it looks like the capsule is operating as expected we are now about five minutes away from the approach ellipsoid exit Starliner undocked from the International Space Station about 16 minutes ago at 5:04 p.m. central 6:04 p.m. Eastern starl is now just over 1,000 M away from the International Space Station after Starliner crosses the approach ellipsoid the next milestones for the vehicle will be its entry cover closure and that is planned for about 6:42 p.m. central 7:42 p.m. Eastern and then there will be some checkouts of the omac thrusters at 7:05 pm. Central 8:05 PM Eastern and then after that we get into the entry and Landing coverage and the go noo for the deorbit burn will be at approximately 9:57 p.m. central 10:57 p.m. Eastern following with the deorbit burn about 20 minutes later at 10:17 p.m. central 11 17 p.m. Eastern again seen good views of Starliner leaving the International Space Station it's that distant dot on your screen the vehicle is now about 1,120 M away from the International Space Station hope that attitude rotation we're seeing is nominal it probably is and we just heard confirmation that Starliner is out of the approach ellipsoid the approach ellipsoid is a imaginary three-dimensional ellipsoid around the space station and V Vehicles outside of the approach ellipsoid have to be on what we call a 24-hour safe free drift trajectory which means the spacecraft would not cross into the approach ellipsoid for at least 24 hours even if it lost all maneuvering capabilities now that Starliner is outside of the approach ellipsoid joint operations between the Starliner mission control and International Space Station fight control room will conclude and Starliner is now on a path back to Earth so once again Starliner undocked from the International Space Station at 5:4 p.m. central 6:04 p.m. Eastern as the space station was flying 260 statute miles over Central China shortly after physical separation starliners thrusters completed two short firings to gradually increase the separation speed to help the spacecraft carefully move away from the orbiting laboratory Starliner then began the breakout burn and Starliner smaller Jets performed a series of 12 short Burns to allow the spacecraft to quickly move outside the approach ellipsoid Starliner again crossed the approach ellipsoid moments ago and is now on its journey home the next milestones for Starliner ahead of its deorbit burn targeted for 10:17 p.m. include crossing the entry cover closing the entry cover and and conducting checkouts of the omx or the orbital maneuvering and attitude control thrusters those are the bigger Jets on Starliner for now let's check in one final time with NASA's Rob navius following Starliner exit from the approach ellipsoid thank you guys uh here in the space station flight control room flight director Anthony varia and his team will be remaining on Console throughout the course of the evening keeping a watchful eye on things for Starliner status Calypso has exited the approach ellipsoid Sunny we are ready for RWS tear down when you are okay she's on her way home congratulations to uh the undock team and we'll be turned down the and copy thanks spacecraft communicators here in the station flight control room talking to Sunny Williams National Space Station the uh Starliner is a trajectory moving well away from the International Space station where it's deorbit burn at 1017 and 13 seconds p.m. this evening once again that'll be a 59 second burn of the four orbital maneuvering and attitude control system uh Jets on the Starliner spacecraft to slow Starliner down by 129.99 Eastern Time 11:00 p.m. central Time give or take a few seconds at the white sand space Harbor in New Mexico with that the space station team will begin to turn its attention to the next major activity that will be the launch out of the bikon or cosmodrome in Kazakhstan on Wednesday of NASA's Don Pettit and roscosmos cosmonauts alexe Obin and Ivan Vagner on the soyu ms26 spacecraft that will increase the station's population from 9 to 12 and the beginning of a busy several weeks of crew rotations on the International Space Station leading to the start of expedition 72 so with that uh we're going to call it a day here in the space station flight control room turn it back to you guys in the white flight control room down the hall all right thank you very much Rob Starliner is now on its way back home to Earth and has about a 6-hour journey ahead of Landing we are targeting again around 11:00 Central mid night Eastern for that landing at White Sand space haror in New Mexico we will resume live coverage of starliners deorbit entry and Landing beginning at 9:50 p.m. central 10:50 p.m. Eastern until then thank you for joining us for starliners undocking and departure from the International Space Station this is Mission Control Houston okay so I will keep this stream up I'll put on a uh NASA's live stream uh ISS live in the meantime but yeah everything seemed to go well let me put this back up real quick and I'll keep talking for a few minutes before I go on a break myself um let's go and uh interact here make sure it's live full screen if I did I do that yep we're good so yeah everything went well um sure Butch and sooner I me again the right call was made but I'm sure they're probably wondering themselves we could have been flying home in that everything seems to be going fine but it still got a long way to go um they got to test out the thrusters before they actually land and then of course as you heard the uh deorbit burn is in about I don't know about 5 hours or so so my plan here is to I'll put on a little bit of music in the background for those who just want to keep this up um but as you can see I've got the ISS live stream and I will probably be back at about 9 my time and central time about 9:30 so about 10:0 :30 uh eastern time I'm not sure what that is UTC but yeah I'll come back and do some um commentary before NASA comes back on for the deorbit burn commentary and the ult ultimately The Landing but yeah let me know in the comments if you were surprised by how smooth that went I personally wasn't but they also did a an undocking sequence that was very easy on the thrusters for this very reason to prevent any anything from happening so okay um and before any of you if any of you decide to leave be sure you hit the like button on your way out and uh or even if you're uh planning on staying for the music um hit the like button and thanks for tuning in and like I said I'll be back at about 9:30 on this same stream so thanks again and until next time in about three hours at Astra [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] on for RWS with you on toy yeah just a quick question that UOP there's a plug in it that says PCS power so I'm just powering down the PCS as well is that correct checking [Music] Sunny back with you on Space to ground 2 we only need you to perform step two in that procedure and the PCS should stay powered on okay so the cable that's running out of the U that says PCS power is not necessarily really PCS power is that [Music] correct Sunny we're checking okay it has the label over it CB in2 and um 120 Vol data so that's the one that I think it's going to the PCS but if I just turn the UL off I want to make sure that I'm not going to hurt that PCS copy all Sun we're double checking [Music] [Music] [Music] okay we just traced the line and I even though the label is on it it looks like it's not connected to anything it's connected to a Cobalt brick that's not connected to anything else and then powered off so we're good Houston copies thanks [Music] and Houston on to for a request Sunny with you want you go ahead and most of us are going to be up at 3 to monitor what's going on with the deorbit burn um so if you guys wouldn't mind can you just give us a call on to with statuses at that time absolutely we've got the next shift here in the room they heard that request and we'll [Music] do okay thank you so much [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] s [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] we [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] for e [Music] e [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] 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[Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] all [Music] [Music] [Music] yep yep [Music] [Music] [Music] okay good evening everybody let me know if you can or cannot hear me man it's getting late I know it's even later for some some other people here uh I mean I guess it's only almost 10 o'clock here but it's been a long day for me I've got my actually this is TE but plan on going to bed right after this uh Starliner as far as I know is well on its way as far as I know there have been no problems at least nothing that have been that has been reported so we should be good for uh deorbit burn at about uh 10:17 central time um or 11:17 Eastern Time NASA TV should be going live in the next 10 to about eight minutes something like that losing track of time here so going into going into the comments that I missed while I was gone see Andrew asked how much did star the Starliner Mission cost well um specifically if we're talking about the development of the entire Starliner space spacecraft uh NASA originally awarded them a fixed firm price contract of about 4.2 billion but they've gone about a billion and a half over that and that's for the entire development as well as uh the extra crew uh the extra orbital flight test they had to do after they failed or partially failed uh first orbital flight test so quite a bit of quite a bit of money um now I don't know if any of that counts any crew rotation flights um um starting with Starliner one which may or may not be the next mission so I hope that answers your question there this specific Mission I'm not sure how much it cost um but it's part of the development cost regardless and uh Mr Big Mouth asked once the omac positions the spacecraft in the proper orientation for retrofire and retr fire succeeds The Command Module can use its own thrusters for positioning what can go wrong after that well there's not a whole lot to go wrong once it's uh well there's always something that can go wrong but once it's in the actually right now this little door here hang on here this little hatch cover entry cover is actually shut right now on the spacecraft so it should look about like this um hopefully you guys can all see that in this little small square I've got see if this actually focuses maybe it'll focus oh there we goes oh that's focusing on me again but once it does the deorbit burn with the uh omac thrusters the back here which is a I think it's a 59 second burn um yeah all it has to do is separate the service module with uh the service module on capsule break that yeah separate these and then uh yeah the thrusters on the actual uh Sur uh space uh crew module excuse me can actually Orient itself and do whatever it needs to do so as long as they get rid of that service module and nothing goes wrong there there's really nothing serious that can go wrong um at least with the thrusters now at space flight something could always go wrong and it's uh um some unexpected things have already happened with this spacecraft anyway so who knows who knows but put this back together here yeah things hang on here where sorry making sure the capsule's uh in the right position there we go yeah things um should go smoothly once uh once the deorbit burn happens let's see so Sandra Wilcox says I am in Southern California what part of the US is Starliner Crossing um hang on I can't see them I got something blocking this here oops well poter starine uh of the US is Starline are crossing at this point hope to see it Southern California you might be able to see it um hang on here I wish I could actually easily put a map on here I could but I might mess up everything um it's actually coming in from the uh from from the Pacific Ocean from the south the Southwest so it should be flying over like the Baja uh California and into uh northern Mexico before going into New Mexico so you you can always look toward the S if it's a if it's a clear night you can always look toward the uh Southeast you might see it but probably not it might be very low on the horizon that reentry so yeah like if you're in La we'll see you might I mean it doesn't hurt to try hang on here let me make sure some some of the other settings I've got are going properly on my stream here where is there we go turn that off so here we go okay and I need to make sure NASA TV is set up to go live when it's time and on here could turn that that off one one man show here sorry about that so that should be good there do properties oops not properties and oh can't do that just yet oops but yeah if you are under the uh re-entry path uh specifically if you're C North Central Mexico maybe a little bit in the Baja California area or even even right there in South Central New Mexico you'll see it if it's should be a clear night at least at least in New Mexico why is this not want to do what I want it to do okay well we'll just see what happens NASA's stream should be live in about two minutes or so so yeah it's been a it's been a long night already I was had to get some uh tea so I wouldn't fall asleep but yeah the uh Deber burn is about uh 10:17 Central Time 11:17 um Eastern and then the landing is right around right around midnight Eastern so 11 o'clock by time or here central time so let me see if I could find that map maybe I can try not to mess too many things up and see if I can show it to you I know oops actually NASA is starting to go live here give me a second interact full screen toy that and I'm going to go a and mute that so I don't see interact again mute so nothing crazy happens and then I should be able to do that that there we go you guys should be seeing that screen in a second and oh they're going to go straight to it and here we go I'm Lauren binki with Boeing Starliner safely Departed the International Space Station and is on its way back to Earth Starliner is making its return autonomously tonight without Nas astronauts Butch Wilmore and sunny Williams after a decision to return without crew was made during a flight test Readiness review last week but the team here in Michigan troll will be watching over star laner over the course of the next hour and a half as a spacecraft fires its engines to drop back into Earth's atmosphere and make its way down for a landing in New Mexico at about 11:00 p.m. central or midnight Eastern the team here is Led tonight by flight director Rick henfling with weather assistance from flight director Mike Lamers henling is is just under 7 minutes away from polling the flight controllers here in the room on their Readiness for Starliner to perform its deorbit burn at Starliner Landing Zone teams in Florida Houston and New Mexico have been monitoring the spacecraft mostly undocked from the International Space Station at 5:04 p.m. time while flying 260 miles over Central China NASA astronauts Butch Wilmore and sunny Williams National Space Station in June as part of NASA's Boeing crew flight test a United launch Alliance Atlas 5 rocket from complex 31 at Cape Canaveral space force station in Florida that wasth they arrived at the International Space Station on June 6th during that June 6th Rendevous NASA and boing identified helium links and experienced issues with the starliners reaction control festers as the spacecraft approached the space station since then engineering teams have completed a significant amount of work collecting and reviewing data conducting flight and ground testing hosting independent reviews with agency propulsion experts and developing various return contingency plans uncertainty and uh lack of expert concurrence did not meet the agency's safety and performance requirements for human space flight thus prompting NASA's decision to return Boeing Starliner spacecraft to Earth without the astronauts but schore and sunny Williams aboard the uncrewed return allows NASA to continue Gathering test data on Starliner during its upcoming flight home while also not accepting additional risk for the crew lumore and Williams meanwhile have uh formally joined the Expedition 7172 crew and are going to remain at the space station conducting science experiments and helping with maintenance through February 2025 they're going to fly home aboard a dragon spacecraft with two other crew members assigned to the agency's SpaceX crew 9 mission that is NASA astronauts Nick ha and R Cosmos Cosmonaut Alexander goranov on Thursday afternoon the hatches were closed between Starliner and the International Space Station and earlier today at 5:04 p.m. central the docking hooks released Starliner allowing it to separate and begin moving away from the space station and into place for its journey home you can see that uh video from earlier today playing here it was a beautiful undocking actually and thrusters all fired nominally it looked like I always love saying Thruster fires beautiful display of starliners thrusters there the whole Situation's too bad really honestly other than those thrusters from everything I'm hearing that spacecraft performed beautifully which is why if this landing and re-entry goes without a hitch um it's probably a good sign for the next flight butore and SNY Williams also had some words to say for the teams here on the ground as Starliner was making its way away from the space station station Houston Space to ground two for Starliner undock status go ahead we're with you hey Sun both the Starliner and ISS flight control teams have pulled go for undock at this time the expected undock time is 22 colon 04 okay copy 2204 hey you know we just looking at the flight control roster and like wow it is the allstar team you guys it is the time to bring Calypso home you have got this where we have your backs and you've got this bring her back to Earth good luck sunny and Butch this is Chloe just on behal of the entire Mo team I know the other flight control teams around the building we thank you for your endless Support over the years we've enjoyed every training event and every meeting we remember every setback and every Revelation with you the teams on the ground have worked countless hours over the last few weeks months and for a group of us years to bring Calypso back and we're ready to do that today we wish you the best of luck in your increment and sunny I will make sure the right people have your Coming Home song ready to play on space Easter ground when it's time for you guys to come home good luck and thank you wonderful comments uh flight we appreciate that and we agree many years of uh great enjoyment um simming together uh playing together and being involved with each other's lives and it's been special um bring it home happy thank you and have a good evening that again was uh a conversation recorded earlier today between uh astronauts Sunny Williams and Butch Wilmore talking with the Starliner flight director at the time of undocking Khloe miring since that undocking uh when starlander and the space station were flying 260 Mi above Central China starer has been steadily increasing the distance between it and the space station ensuring that it will be able to get into Spa into place uh to perform a 1017 p.m. Cal deorbit burn now in about uh 20 minutes while it has been moving away the flat controllers here on the ground took the opportunity to perform a few test of starliners thrusters during the test the crew modules 12 small reaction control system thrusters one of the Jets didn't fire when commanded the reaction control system thrusters on the crew module are used to steer star liner as it makes its way back down to earth after the uh service module has been jettisoned because because those 12 jets are divided into two redundant strings of six Starliner only uses one string during normal operations so although this means a slight loss of redundancy it shouldn't keep Starliner from getting through re-entry and Landing as expected they lost a Thruster huh yeah and Starliner has plenty of redundancy with this part of the prop system on the capsule so no impact to the deorbit burn or re-entry and it's not required for flight roles the team also tested 10 of the 28 reaction control system jets in the service module after undocking and they all performed as expected and here on the ground the team just uh gave their go officially to Rick henling today's flight director meaning that uh tonight's Landing of Starliner is on that again is scheduled to happen touchdown at uh 11:00 p.m. central time or midnight Eastern Time so if I understood that correctly one of the service module not the service module one of the crew module thrusters of the 12 did not fire or did not command to fire that's interesting but like they said they have redundancy so not a big deal there but still that's kind of interesting so Mr Bigmouth you asked what can go wrong after that well apparently other things could go wrong not that anything's going terribly right now it's just things do still happen [Music] going to make another pull here once again flight director Rick hling has gotten a go from starliners for to St 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 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 fustes on Starliner service module and joining us live from starliners 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 Leon 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 starliners 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 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 planing 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 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 Sol Rays 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 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 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 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 miles up the drug parachutes are released and three main parachutes are deployed they also open in state 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 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 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 confirm over there I guess it is night in New Mexico 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 as some better shots yeah Mr Big Mouth a one more test flight to make sure and certified then man flight can resume that may be what they do it just dep I think a lot of it'll just depend on the outcome of this Landing I think somebody pointed out on Twitter May and Eric Berger space reporter from Mars Technica suggested it could be a cargo Mission so that they can at least get something out of it and not have to uh you know worry about basically the their first certificate the post certification flight per se Starliner one could potentially be an uncrewed flight with cargo but there's only uh it six six uh Atlas fives available to use for Starliner which is what it's rated to fly a top so and of course the uh ISS um is going to be at the end of its life by about 2030 although that may be extended 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 Whit sand 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 yeah hey that's a cool shot 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 got love those infared shots 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 sift test they will notify the rest of the Convoy when it's safe to approach and then they're going to check the wind 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 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 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 and 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 pounds 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 five minutes to go now until tonight's uh 107 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 and for those that missed in the chat I've got a poll if what you what you think uh should the next uh Starliner should the next Starliner Mission have a crew aborted yes or no so far 11 people have voted and we got 18% say yes uh 82% say no overwhelming a majority so far I think that NASA should have an uncrewed or Boeing should have an uncrewed Mission next so let me know what you think go ahead and vote in the poll make your opinions be known yeah I tend to lean toward make the next uh Mission uncrewed maybe an uncrewed cargo 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 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 self 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 Flash is from uh the mortars 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 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 is really getting on the road soon so with that we're going to turn it back over to you and Houston we are uhu 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 sand New Mexico once it's there control teams in Houston will begin power 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 the DU orbit burn and at this point service module and crew capsule are still attached to each other four of the service modules 12 AF basting orbital maneuvering and attitude control engines are going to be powering the de 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 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 Mr Big Mouth I agree at least they're putting the return to good use by pecking it with returnables indeed about 900 lounds of cargo from the ISS and if I missed it or think I heard right including life important gear for servicing 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 starliners 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 looking good so far still looking good and we did see the uh dber burn cut off successfully teams here on the ground reporting a good burn starliners 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 good to hear it's Homeward Bound now although it's looking like hindsight it probably next up on the 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 bull ey Landings thanks to that system star lers maneuvering into position for that jettison at this time I wish they give us the closeup of that maneuvering over there in the screen next to my face on the yeah a agree the eight ball looks stable looks like get into separation attitude as I was saying earlier hindsight it may have been safe for the crew but don't play with hindsight when it or don't assume hindsight reporting that 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 is now justce star liner 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 starliners 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 oblad as intended so we do expect to see that again today and the team considers that a bit of a badge of honor yeah everything's looking good looks like the pole has 20 votes still the overwhelming majority thinks the next one should be uncrewed which is probably for the best let me see what the next major Milestone is yeah I think the next major Milestone is atmospheric entry which is at 11:45 Eastern Time [Music] not a whole lot to do but wait for for to come in contact with the atmosphere 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 mon 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 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 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 had the crew been aboard I think this would have been the first time since 1982 that a crew returned to AC crude orbital spacecraft has return had returned to White Sands I think I think it was the Space Shuttle somebody can correct me if I'm wrong there I'm sure there's trying to think there's anything else besides the space shuttle look that up 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 white 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 an entry interface coming up around 10:45 still about 10 minutes away reading from Wayne hail's Twitter said the last time a spacecraft put the crew on board landed at White Sands the last time that happened was sts3 space shuttle on March 30th 1982 which was 42 years ago and 5 months of course that's not going to change tonight since there's no crew on Starliner but it could have so it's that record will continue to extend he does point out that there are still suborbital Crews launching and landing on either side of white hands I think Spaceport America is just to the west and the other side of the mountains and then of course in West Texas is where blue origin launches uh its uh astronauts on live view here of the 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 uh 11:00 p.m. central midnight Eastern or 10 p.m. mountain time touchdown today in New Mexico again Starliner performed its D orbit burn about 12 minutes ago the thrusters performed nominally and the flight home is going smooth e I knew um Mr Bigmouth I knew I knew what you meant I will say would have been if I had the time and time and money I probably would have driven out there to try to 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 conv booy 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 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 cardo 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 500 foot 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 yeah Mr Bigmouth sts3 was the last time a crew landed at Whit Sands if I recall correctly when the spacial all landed at White Sands uh there was so much salt if I recall correctly they had to do a lot of extra refurbishment because of all that salt so think that was a kind of a we don't want to land here again unless we absolutely have to for the Orbiter a little different for a capsule though 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 3,000 de 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 star 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 choots 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 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 and despite the Starliner program issues over the years um from this point on the last two missions uh oft um orbital flight test in 2019 December 2019 and of2 in May 2022 I think think or yeah I think it was me yeah there were there have been no issues 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 Dees 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 see if anything else if anything significant happens off nominal from here on out it probably be something new that they haven't caught before but so far everything is nominal so far as we've seen on the on the live stream [Music] 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 starliners currently about 13 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 skyers on Final Approach [Music] thinking about making another poll what do you guys think will fly fly first either the next Starliner Mission crude or not or emus 2 or uh maybe the next Japanese cargo ship think get set 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 and next up is the entry interface about 5 minutes away from now I will say any of you ever get a chance to look up and see a spacecraft re-entering it's it's pretty cool depending on how close you are to the actual and flight controllers here in the room are reporting good attitude for that entry interface coming up again in just under 5 minutes depending on how close you are to the actual end of the uh path like if you're near the landing Zone you'll hear the Sonic booms but if you're uh just in general over the path where the entry interface is going it'll be just like a really bright large Fireball going all the way across the sky I mean if you've ever seen a satellite orbit the earth you know how F obvious they're higher up but you know you know how fast those go across the sky but this just is booking it across the sky because it's so much closer uh closer to you from a perspective standpoint and it's and it's silent it's just eerie but beautiful at the same time and it's a nice bright orange and uh orange and yellow and it's just crazy um the one I saw I think it was a in this last spring when a crew Dragon returned went right over um Kansas and so I drove South I live in the Kansas City area so I drove South to make sure I can get a better I think yeah I was close to witch when I actually saw it but it was pretty it was pretty spectacular so if you guys ever get a chance to see a re-entry drive away from the clouds if you can so it's worth it unfortunately I don't have any good pictures because it was night and it was a little more difficult especially the first time seeing it I really wasn't I was more more worried about seeing it with my eyes than than my camera screen but it was pretty cool start that new Pole trying to think of something else to add for the uh for the pole what flies first 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 FL controllers here in the room are quiet 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 be flying over that before landing in New Mexico just 17 minutes to go into landing threw in on that poll the Japanese HTV X cargo ship because I'm actually not sure when it's going to launch it might be next year it might be the year after next so that might have just been a a weird one and the thing about the Artemis 2 mission is that when whenever that flies they've still got the heat shield problem they've got to worry uh work through and if they have to change the heat shield on emis 2 Then That Could delay the mission by another year possibly [Music] so space flight is hard I know it's a cliche but things take time sometimes frustratingly so 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 a half minute blackout okay entry interface should be starting so we got four minutes of no radio blackout 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 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 oh sorry and 14 and a half 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 that Landing yeah just think about this right now the capsule is not even at the at Baja California um that peninsula over there and it's in 12 minutes it'll be on the ground in New Mexico 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 that way 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 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 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 ster liner is about 4.3 mil 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 about the Earth can't tell if the people on screen are dancing or stretching I guess while we're waiting for starlander to regain Communications if you guys haven't already be sure to hit that like button or as I like to say launch that like button into orbit I guess as Starliner is deorbiting launch the like button into orbit oh there we go this uh is a live view from the International Space Station where from the 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 at 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 land we've still got just about a minute left to go before Starliner comes out of its uh blackout period looking at that like that could have been our ride home oh that's pretty that's just gorgeous 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 nomal 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 must be a heck of a view the clouds will give you some speed perspective there 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 sh 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 Landing site and that strobe light will help the teams actually track Starliner on the ground because it is very dark out there wait for confirmation of that parachute now about 12 miles above uh The Landing site and just 5 minutes away from Landing [Music] [Music] 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 you're seeing on your screen those clouds and drugs out oh okay really interesting view of this uh coming down from the WB 57 oh that's why it two drug parachutes uh now deployed they slow the uh vehicle down initially to gets to a uh a safe uh speed for the enormous main parachutes to to follow when I saw mountains in that view I got a little scared like oh no the parachute didn't deploy properly no this it's from a plane that's way higher up so we're good about four minutes until touchdown but my heart skipped a couple beats now back to A View From the Cessna aircraft in the uh vicinity of the landing site against and 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 sh that has been protecting Starliner through its journey through the atmosphere come off that makes way for the landing airbags to deploy okay 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 te team report they 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 you can see that uh tilt evened out little bucket handle released next up is the back heat shield jettison there goes the heat shield 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 what a long Saga this three month Saga just a beautiful sight as Starliner makes its way to the Sands of New Mexico hey Brand and flight controllers few 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 yeah I'm sure Butcher and sunny are watching I think they could they probably watching live stream right now 15 seconds away from expect touch NASA's obviously but they're like we would have been safe safe in that but in your screen as we get closer yeah I agree Mr Big Mouth uh it all worked well but NASA should take no chances and there's no reason to take the chance especially since they saw things they didn't like it sounds like Boeing may have been confident but certain people at Nasa may not have been confident so this is the All Things Considered this is the best outcome for Boe after the Thruster issues the better outcome would have been having no Thruster issues of course but but all things consider this is a good outcome this means uh the next flight being crude is much more likely at least in my opinion but we'll see what the data shows on Earth that Landing coming at 11:01 and 35 seconds Central Time right on time 10:01 and 31 seconds mountain time at White 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 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 man 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 if you haven't done so already go ahead and give the stream a like uh to celebrate the fact that they had a successful Landing this is good it looks like that's the uh the Dr sh from the cesa still watching the drones slowly make their own way down 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 really got to understand what happened with those thrusters though and why they in the uh service module and why the dogghouse is overheat but if they can get that problem solved everything else on this vehicle seems to be working fine now why they had problems with the overheating to begin with why they didn't do more rigorous testing I guess the NASA's Inspector General is going to have to figure that one out that's going to be that itself is an investigation but it's all on Boeing at that point at least this again is the drug parachut still uh 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 yeah Brandon yeah I don't know if the bad press was all for nothing some of it was but um but yeah if it was 1980 they probably would have U come home and nobody would have been the wiser that may have been true but that could also say a lot about NASA's safety culture too back then at least um you hear of starer overly cautious at its Landing site in White Sands at space Harbor Landing recovery teams will soon begin making its way out to them to uh begin recovering the spacecraft NASA's safety culture in the 80s and and of course team here in uh mission control is pulling right now to see if everybody is ready to power off the vehicle through to Columbia again is a step that the flight control team has taken over with the uh with the uh lack of crew on board the safety cultures around the challeng the power 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 absolutely Brandon better to be overly cautious when lives are at stake is it overly risk adverse it maybe it is but and the uh recovery team is on the but I think Leah Chesire and leg may be able to give us one last update Jos can you hear us great landing of calypso I don't think there could be um 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 love to hear from you but I want to hear from can I interrupt you yes concur it's been a really amazing day we missed it 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 could he that one here so uh but uh MC here Rick just wanted to offer that he's got one more hour here it's his birthday here yeah and that's what counts yeah it was a it was a good Landing it's pretty awesome it somebody birthday are the best you are the best thank you Sunny Williams there uh offering a a slightly early happy birthday to Flat director Rick hling he will be uh celebrating his birthday on September 7th but technically in Houston we're still a little less than an hour away from that uh they are of course already they're in GMT on uh uh September 7th in at the International Space Station but Leah if you were still with us we'll still take that update if you can give it to us yeah so as I was saying we got to see the capsule and the plasma Trail coming up over the mountains uh from the southwest and uh we were all still standing outside the Convoy to watch that happen but the most unexpected part was when I could hear the main parachutes being deployed it was very fade just a little bit of a rumble um but that strob light really helped us identify Starliner as it was descending and it would reflect a little bit up onto those parachutes so we actually had a decent view as it was coming down under those shoots and now we are uh actually on the drive out and we can see the strobe light it's giving us a great direction as we head toward the capsule yeah that's right we are actually making our way down the uh former space shuttle Runway uh literally driving right down the middle of it uh Starliner is a little bit towards the southern end so we see that strobe uh kind of in the in the distance there um but we will make our way to the 500 foot Mark where go team will will move in and begin in their assessments and then uh once they declare that uh operations proximity operations can begin uh the recovery op will really get underway and with that I think uh we were GNA toss it back to you Brandy and Lauren if you don't hear it from us again tonight just wanted to say thanks for uh letting us be part of the broadcast and give you the perspective of all the hardworking ground teams both NASA and Boeing out here at White Sands in New Mexico so with that sending it back over to michig control Houston yeah Mr Big Mouth at least hased trust and conf it's great to see starer home and I I envy you the up close view but we appreciate your updat to solve the problem starer Starliner has returned safely well done to the entire team for completing the mission with a successful undocking deorbit and Landing Starliner has once again proven herself a safe ride to and from space on behalf of the entire Boeing team welcome home Calypso and with that we will also wrap up our coverage tonight um we would like for you to stay tuned for our 12 uh30 a.m. post Landing news conference that is uh 12:30 a.m. Central Time so about an hour and a half a little less than an hour and a half from now when we'll be giving you uh final uh final thoughts on um the activities of the night but Starliner is Home Again The Landing came at 11:01 p.m. central Time and with that we will sign off thank you so much for following along with us this is Michigan control Houston oh wow that's that I thought about staying live until the uh press conference in about an hour and a half but I'm getting tired and I'm sure some people it's even later but yeah um yeah as I was saying to Mr Big Mouth at least um now Boeing has regained NASA's trust and confidence I don't know if they actually ever if NASA ever lost or Boeing ever lost NASA's trust but I mean who knows but um definitely this is a good thing this is definitely a good thing oops hang on let me uh let me change things here real quick and get this repositioned you know what uh go and throw ISS Live feedback up there if it's not going to be too much um but yeah um but they have to really fix these uh Thruster problems and get it solved I don't think there's going to be a redesign they're probably going to figure out how to work around it it's probably too late in the game to redesign the dog houses if the doghouses are still um allowing too much heat to be regained uh retained but but that'll be that will also go a long way with with regards to the trust and importantly when the next Starliner flies there can be pretty much no issues otherwise it just it just won't look good yeah um Brandon say as an engineer I'm I'm relieved I know it means the world to the team over at Boeing that their hard work paid off absolutely people have to remember that um it's easy to poke fun at Boeing uh and go gosh God knows there's a lot to a a lot of problems in the within the Boeing um mostly the business management culture but but there are hundreds of if not thousands of Engineers who poured their Blood Sweat and Tears into this program and uh not one of them I guarantee you would have wanted anything bad to happen to those astronauts and I guarantee you none of them are negligent um I know that's an opinion statement I realized that but I I I don't believe any of them would have wanted any of that to happen so now is it possible that Boeing was overconfident in its designed approaches that's to be determined but yeah it's glad that this whole ordeal is done I mean it's mostly done we still have to get butchered Sunni home um back in in uh in February and again if for those who may not know the uh crew now is uh they their return their their official return home on crew 9 has not launched yet but their contingency emergency seats in case they have to book it out of the space station like something hits the space station or there's a depressurization event or something like that their safe haven vehicle their contingency return vehicle right now is crew eight in the cargo rack underneath the seats um they've organized some of the cargo pallets the cargo pallet down there to act as a makeshift uh um seat and so they'll sit if they had to leave in an absolute emergency they'd be underneath the four astronauts in their basically in their flight suits um the pressure suits for Boeing are on the ground now in New Mexico um now when crew 9 launches is with only two astronauts uh Nick hag and I can't remember the Russian cosmonauts name um they'll take the other two seats on that crew Dragon for crew n and they'll just be part of the crew n Mission until February so so yeah that's that that's the end of the Starliner crew flight test or mostly crew flight test um it'll be interesting to see um oops hang on just a second here let me forgot to change that over there we go um let me fix this too it'll be interesting to see uh what the uh the postmortem is on this when it comes to uh what NASA decides as far as certification goes so so yeah thanks everybody for watching um it's been a basically a two one stream two-parter on the conversation um the whole stream itself's been going on for almost 7 hours it's getting pretty late here um I hope to do more of these um I think the next I could do Polaris Dawn I'm not sure if that would be that would be interesting for people let me know in the in the comments if you'd like me to do or even uh in other comments or anywhere on Twitter or whatever let let me know if you'd like me to do Polaris Dawn U for the launch and maybe even for the spacewalk um Mr big mouse said the last time there was a similar situation with a capsule dock to space station um was in the Skylab program with the second crew spacecraft had RCS like oh I have to look that up um what Skylab mission was that you know I you know I may have heard about that yes but yeah I I good all the drama is finally over indeed yes I'm sure there'll be people trying to make drama somewhere else but yeah if uh if you guys want me to I can do a stream for Polaris Dawn it's just that one's going to be at least my time about 2:30 in the morning um and even later for other people um and the next one I would like to do and I'm not sure when it launches but uh when the next so use launches with uh two Russians and an American astronaut I think that's on the 11th I want to say that's the middle of the day but I might do a stream over that and of course uh of course I'll stream crew N9 when it returns and or when it launches and crew8 when it returns but that's like the 24th and yeah the 24th and the October 6th so there's a few things I'm also working on some more videos if you haven't seen my latest video it's about the lunar Gateway and the mass problems that it's had that that the uh uh office of inspect excuse me the U government accountability office um I've been looking into over the last couple years so you can uh find out about that by watching my latest video gateway Mass problems but and uh so but yeah like I said the next couple of videos I'm looking at doing I'm hoping to do some more Evergreen videos but if you guys are interested I can do a video on all the uh crude spacecraft that we've uh that we've flown um I'm also looking at doing a uh how the Water Reclamation uh system works on the International Space Station I thought that'd be kind of neat to do and uh yeah I've got some plans it's just these videos do take time so uh ideally someday I'd like to get to one video a week but just not I'm just not quite there yet so but the live streams I can do more often these are a little easier to do so sky laab 3 nice wait Mr big map when you say you saw it what do you mean you saw it I'll wait for you to reply there oops so when you say when you said you saw it did you mean you saw the uh Starliner re-entry or you talking about something else sorry I'm a little confused it's late I'm also considered doing a video over the uh this might be a little more of a Hot Topic IC so I have to be very careful I don't want to try try to be as unbiased as possible but I was hoping to do a political uh space policy on the two presidential candidates um in mid October for that one so that could be interesting so oh you saw the G yeah you saw the Gateway video awesome yes see like I said it's getting late so I'm going to go ahead and sign off before I start rambling and saying thanks um thank you guys so much for watching this has been quite quite quite a stream a great Mission uh despite the issues and uh yeah we'll be more there'll be more space coming soon and uh for those who are still around I appreciate it um if you haven't already be sure to hit the like button and if haven't already go ahead and subscribe if I've earn the subscription and uh I'll see see you guys all around around later um in until next time as always at Astra [Music]