Boeing Starliner returns to Earth [Live coverage]

oh oh he B he e [Music] I [Music] [Music] [Laughter] line 260 miles over Central China you are looking live as we prepare for the return of Boeing's Starliner live coverage of the spacecrafts return coming your way in just moments as NASA reracks this launch video which I will welcome in my co-host for the evening Joseph naen in Greensboro North Carolina Joseph remember when we watched this launch we thought they were only going up for about a week or so and how far we've come as now we prepare for Star lonard to return back to Earth without them how you doing tonight Joseph I'm doing very good how are you you know I think we're doing as best as we can be as we begin this live coverage on the Carolina weather group of the return of Boeing Starliner a mission that was intended to Showcase Boeing's strengths and abilities to bring astronauts to the International Space Station as part of NASA's commercial crew program and human space flight but Joseph as we know Boeing has been long trying to compete with SpaceX who's been in this game for several years now and Boeing's just been plagued with some problems that has resulted in NASA deciding to keep their two astronauts aboard the International Space Station uh give us the the brief summary if you will Joseph as to uh what type of problems they've seen lately for anyone who maybe's been under a rock yeah I mean um Starliner the starl program the the first off has had multiple has had this is the third flight of Starliner and uh each one has had some problem of some sort um so it's nothing new to have something come up um and in all fairness all space flights have something come up even SpaceX does they don't always make it widely available but in this case um they took off couple months ago early early summer and you know they had uh before launch they I delayed it because I had a helium leak and uh helium leaks aren't always a problem and it sounds concerning but um the space sh had leaks um but within tolerances within certain margins that like an aircraft they can sometimes defer maintenance on aircraft and fly it um if it's been checked and it's fairly obvious um and they delayed it and they looked at the data before launch and they they Boeing just and NASA jointly jointly decided um that they would push on to launch and a later date and then when they did launch um they noticed some problems with thrusters and um while on orbit and then um they didn't know exactly what what the problem was with the thrusters so that's why um after docking uh they St stay on space station which isn't necessarily a problem but um they just wanted to see if they could get any data that would make sure it's checked out and ready to come back home but um unfortunately this part of the spacecraft that has the thrusters is on a service module behind um show you actually so this the the um the Starliner has a um main capsule and it's stocked to the station when it was like this and the thrusters that are in question are um right there and they're not really um able to um can't get to them in from the inside and so there's really no way you can really get to them and fix them first of all so they have to only use data but there's only so much you can do before they actually have to bring the spacecraft home and so out of abundance of safety um they've decided to just bring home own R um and they did have a contingency plan for this um there's always a plan this is a test flight un like a standard space station operation operational Mission so there were was a little bit more of background apparently plans for this in the in the case of this happening so that's a relief yeah you know uh butcher Sunny are going to spend the next six months up on the space station and essentially become a part of crew 9 and eventually be brought home by Boeing's competitor SpaceX which has to be I think a black eye for Boeing which we know is having problems both in its commercial Aviation sector and now with this in its spacecraft sector um you know it's interesting you you mentioned how both Boeing and NASA were go to begin this third mission for Boeing Starliner but the First with humans both jointly agreeing that now is the time to try to lack these two test pilots into space these two astronauts uh I can only imagine the decision to leave them on the space station maybe wasn't as joint uh as that decision to launch with NASA ultimately deciding that they were going to keep their crew members safely up on the ISS I can only I can only imagine what being a fly on the wall in that meeting would have been like I definitely I think um and it's been a bit since they their last press conference on this that I was able to watch but um Starline um when they had the press conference announcing this it was only NASA Personnel on the panel uh which is very unusual for SpaceX press conferences the last uh I've been following the Starliner in general program since the beginning I saw the first launch in Hilton Head Down Range and so that was a pretty they're luckily they got the capsule back on the first one that'll be very Frank um so yeah there's definitely this has definitely been a black a further black guy on the program yeah NASA had a news conference similar to the one you described just this past Wednesday we had it on our Carolina weather group YouTube and audio podcast feed and you know that question was asked of the three NASA officials who were on the panel Boeing was not there and I would say in a lot of these press conferences as I'm sure you've seen Joseph NASA is always polite not very emotional very just matter of fact and I was kind of reading in between the lines when they were trying to say it was our decision we went to a meeting and this is what we decided because ultimately it's NASA who's responsible for the safety of the two astronauts because the context of course uh is that NASA for a long time had its space shuttle program they've did away with that and they've shifted now to this private sector uh accommodations with SpaceX essentially being their taxi service they wanted Boeing to also be their taxi service for redundancy um and so it's you know it's NASA who's Contracting we need a lift up to the space station for these humans or for this cargo or whatever it may be and so um you know I've had a couple people ask me today and Joseph you probably are in the same boat like hey what are the chances this thing safely lands in the desert in New Mexico tonight at midnight like it's supposed to and my answer has just been well not as high as NASA would have liked to feel comfortable enough to put humans on it I think it's likely I think it's very likely land um but um they had Thruster issues on the last flight unud flight right on deorbit and they thought it was a oneoff or not you know it was the end of the mission anyway because they has um the the service module burns up and they separate from the capsule um right before landing and so the other issue with this issue they're having right now is the thrusters is um they're not going to get the components back it's all going to reenter so it's not a great part to have fail but at the same time it's not um in dangering the crew at the moment since they have the station um but they had Thruster blow out which I'm not exactly sure it is um but I'm assuming it's just not correct usage of th thrusters and it's a significant malfunction I will say though um my last flight at the end after right before they separated the service module here at the end so it has happened so there have been yeah I thought you said about you know some of this burning up during re-entry is key too because that was the storyline we were hearing at first uh as the spacecraft was docked at the International Space Station and the delay was just beginning to be days before it became weeks uh was well we just want to get some close-up views of the exterior of the spacecraft before we bring them home in it because you know some of that will burn up and ultimately I guess they decided again the decision uh to to leave them up there uh we do have a question right now live from the Carolina weather group YouTube channel this is uh Brian Smith asking will I be able to see this in the sky from just south of Greensboro so uh unlike Joseph's story where he was able to see one of those earlier test missions this one you will not be able to see it is going to come in uh across the Pacific Ocean over Baja Mexico over portions of Mexico and ultimately Landing in New Mexico I got to tell you Joseph I'm still trying to get the word Landing plays funny for me when it's kind of going to parachute down into the desert I mean I guess that is the word but the scent feels maybe more natural yeah I think also you know this is it's worth noting that some of the space the first the most recent SpaceX flights um you might remember I think it might have been actually wnc uh with the report on the trunk coming off which is a on a SpaceX it's it's um on a SpaceX Dragon which is the equivalent um this drag the back trunk had a piece of it reenter and come down oh near Asheville like a year ago um and and SpaceX re-entries used to come over the US like the shell did um but because of that they're also going to be coming over over the Pacific so a future information for that is that even for people that are not in the Carolinas but are in you know further west it's going to be harder to see these re-entries probably from now on out from both the Boeing and the SpaceX side um yeah yeah that was a really good example and and how so close to home too right with finding that that piece uh up there a little behind the scenes for folks here as we now past the 11:00 Eastern hour James bton and Charlotte Joseph they been there in greensbor North Carolina uh this is the first live event uh we or NASA are bringing you since the demise of NASA TV and that is relevant for one very important reason because normally as we or other broadcast entities uh bring you this coverage we get what's called a clean feed where we can see what's happening at Nasa we can hear the coms but we don't normally have to compete with their commentators or their video that they're rolling or their Graphics well I don't know if it's a problem on my end or a problem on NASA's end but I'm having a hard time Joseph tuning in that clean feed so what we are watching right now in our big box is the main NASA T NASA plus broadcast that has their commentators on it which means I gotta ring up and down their volume so we'll have to probably just listen in at times Joseph to find out exactly what's going on otherwise we won't hear any of the comps yeah it's worth knowing right now what you're seeing is what was one of the shuttle flight rooms um control rooms um now on a big screen uh where you can see where where starl actually is over the Indian Nation so again it changed right right right when you said so perfect example right perfect example of how we uh we aren't in control of the uh the video uh that we are uh relaying to you tonight I'm going to see if we have any sort of Alternatives we used to get a down link via satellite uh and NASA has decided to discontinue that uh that particular delivery method and it's just making things a little bit trickier here tonight as we get used to that uh we will tell you that the debert burn is scheduled for 11:17 p.m. eastern time so that's a little under 15 minutes from now and then a landing at White Sands there in New Mexico uh at about 12 a.m. eastern give or take that live map does show us as Joseph just pointed out where the uncrewed Boeing Starliner is right now uncrewed meaning there are no humans on board uh and there you go there's the mission control I believe that's is that Houston there Joseph yeah that's Houston yes yeah yes so uh you know I I believe we now have oh what was it we have was it nine people up on the International Space Station we have quite a few number of significant number um and more coming since one the highest since the shuttle era um we're getting close to space shuttle era levels of NASA's been really particular uh trying to get media Outlets just stop running the headline astronauts stranded in space they're not stranded n would say they are safely on the International Space Station with a roof over their head and oxygen and food and water I understand why they don't like the word stranded but that wasn't plan a but it was as you mentioned a contingency plan to have them Stow up there at the space station um and it has happened it has happened before um there multiple instances is happening um one of the one that comes to my mind is actually U there's a guy um one of the cosna Nots in the 90s it was the last Soviet because um when the Soviet Union fell he was the last one that was still in space um he was kind of just left there so that's there's a multiple instances of weird uh technical issues holding up Cruz this is a little bit we haven't had one like this in a while to this extent this would probably be also the first one I mentioned in the age of private space race right you mentioned Soviets and our initial space race between the United States and what was then the Soviet Union of course later Russia and now that we've turned the page into a private space race SpaceX Boeing um so many other companies that are out there right now trying to compete for government contracts or even private individuals we're looking L right now at Star L Starliner Landing site at White Sands New Mexico uh it is of course nighttime there uh about two three hours behind where we are on the eastern coast I was wondering about this Joseph being that it's nighttime we may or may not be able to get as uh clear review had it been daytime I'm thinking back to oras Rex was it that they brought down in New Mexico and that was during the day and we could watch that parachute Come On Come On In I'm not completely sure um they might have spotlights and they probably do um the SpaceX lands at night all the time out in the ocean uh and so I'm not completely sure um and we usually get okay footage of that so we haven't had one with crw so it's it's G to be interesting from White Sands um this actually if they have had if they had cruded tonight land it would have been the first it would have been the second crude landing at White Sands I was going to be one of my questions for you as our go-to uh space expert here is you know I'm so used to seeing obviously the shuttle landing uh mostly at Kennedy but some of its backup sites too we've seen SpaceX in the more recent years splash down why is this one a on land parachuting onto hard surface it's a post so SpaceX has made a lot less of a problem but they've had issues with saltwater corrosion in the ReUse process of these capsules and so they thought when lands on land um and this is again a site it was a backup site for the shuttle White Sands and um the shuttle landed I think early in the like the third space shut flight they had to abort to a different Landing site and that was white sand but um yeah they they think it's just a bit easier for reuse because these are reusable capsules this capsule flew on the first starl flight so this would be this is the second flight um that's that's mainly why as far as I understand just you know so interesting as we're getting I'm still getting used to SpaceX even as they you know we look now into crew 9 which will launch uh fingers crossed later this month with only two astronauts because then Butcher and sunny will meld into that mission once they get up in space uh you know it's so interesting to see how different companies designed things uh or or even different government agencies design things I think we have a launch uh next week uh from uh from Russia uh as they continue to fly up to the International Space Station too uh let's take a brief listen in to the commentary from NASA and we'll be back with you right here on the Carolina moving into 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 hydro one of the propellants that Starliner uses they'll be wearing protective gear known as hazmat suits to prevent exposure to hypergolic propellants hydrazine is used as propellant and it if it turns into a vapor it can be toxic after the sift test they will notify the rest of the Convoy when it safe to approach and then they're going to check the winds make sure the entire landing and Recovery team is staged U range from the direction the wind is blowing for add in protection now everyone out there is part of a different color to 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 1/2 minutes away uh going on uh with the with what we were saying we also will have the blue team that documenting that documents everything that's going on at the Landing site these are photographers from both Boeing and NASA who have situational awareness cameras and again here's a a current view of those teams all um ready to deploy at Landing yeah that's the holding site that we were mentioning and then of course you can see um the mountains there in the background in this black and white View and the green Joseph that is some very impressive night vision they've got out there in New Mexico I I'm glad they explained what it was we were looking at uh this will help I think get us that view uh when Starliner comes down a little after midnight as we await that de over burn here in the next few minutes um did you catch Joseph they were talking a little bit about you know uh when the spacecraft comes down the different Crews that will go there they're checked for contaminants but that whole conversation got me thinking a little bit about oh had there been crew on board the suits that they'd be wearing um you know in that news conference earlier this week uh there was actually a question of what space suits do Butch and sunny have the two astronauts who were intended to be a part of this Mission now that Butch and sunny are still up at the International Space Station and it got into this whole sidebar about how Boeing suits and SpaceX suits are not compatible so here you have American astronauts who are fulfilling similar missions but all depending on which spacecraft they ride up they get completely different space suits yeah definitely I mean there's some Americans that launch on the Russian so and they have the Russian soal soal suit which are very old school Uh Russian suits uh the Boeing Starliner Bush and sunny they have um uh basically deriv suits from the space shut programing and that as um one of the if you if you're if anybody listening as the aviation person it's descended from the SR71 Blackbird suits um so there's a lot of old school lineage with new modern tech in the Starliner suits and then the SpaceX suits are obviously new because it's SpaceX um uh and they will be bringing up new suits up um with crew nine um and they will probably their Boeing suits I think are still up there because they still have to have a contingency to come back down um yeah so I I know one of the things they talked about and I think they were hesitating to give us any visuals of this but I was painting the own visual in my head so now that Starliner has left in case of an emergency aboard the International Space Station had they need to evacuate they're all going to be piling in to the dragon that's up there and that's going to be six of them in a spacecraft that comfortably sits four and they were talking about I swear to you the vision that I was getting in my head from this description Joseph was like well we found some straps and we found a milk carton and we stuck it on in there and but and sunny will just strap on in in case they needed to come on home and I was like that's not how I would want to fly home space No it's it's never the most ideal um there was a the reason why everybody wears suits on Lane is because there is a risk of De uh depressurization and that's why there was a fatal incident for the Russians back in the 60s not wearing suits and they had depressurization on Landing um and so basically everybody since then has put suits on but obviously an emergency like that you want to just get down and so um I believe yeah obviously the the star um Spa the um Dragon was designed for seven people um if you take all the cargo out actually you could fit a whole rack of seats under under the current four um probably cluttered but you could you know it's interesting because I thought the same thing how it was built to uh seat you said seven I had the number eight in my head but I'm going to go with your seven and then there was all this talk well how do we get six people in there and I'm thinking to myself isn't the thing built to handle that many people but I I guess just like your uh your minivans it's how many of the rows do you have flipped down versus ready to go yeah and these pack a significant amount of cargo below their seats and so that usually takes up uh pretty substantially um so you if they had to do an emergency they would have to remove a lot like a minivan quite literally like the minivan uh we do know that the Starliner has some cargo coming back down um I don't remember too many of the specifics from the news conference but they did put some things in Starliner to come back down that were either you know complet uh science experiments I imagine probably some nonvital things um and they also have the spacecraft full of sensors so they can kind of get measurements on what it would have been like as a human to fly on down uh just here in the next few minutes uh the spacecraft will begin its deorbit before landing in New Mexico at midnight let's listen back into NASA commentary and Joseph and I will be back in just a few moments with continuing coverage of the turn of Boeing Starliner from the Carolina taking over cooling they use water to cool the cabin star liner is also uh as we said now in the correct attitude for performing the deorbit burn and at this point service module and crew capsule are still attached to each other four of the service modules 12 a fating orbital maneuvering and attitude control engines are going to be powering the deor burn allowing them to separate safely and those engines are each 1500lb thrusters meaning this burn will take about 6,000 pounds of thrust slowing Starliner from its current orbital velocity and bringing it back to Earth's atmosphere for a smooth Landing the small reaction control system or RCS thrusters assist here in holding Starliner 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 will last uh 59 seconds and again you uh be firing those orbital maneuvering and attitude control thrusters you are listening to commentary from NASA as we prepare for the deorbit and attitude control thrusters on starer service module are now firing slowing Starliner down is a capsule against its Journey back to Earth so take about 59 seconds to complete we're hearing a good all good uh all thrusters firing well so far you can see here those uh those representation of those thrusters firing Starliner is maintaining its attitude and as those large orbital maneuvering thrusters are firing smaller reaction control system thrusters are also working keeping the spacecraft in the correct position for the burn still looking good listening into NASA commentary as we await reaction from inside the room and insights the uh durber burn cut off successfully teams here on the ground reporting a good burn Starliner now on its way to wh sand space Harbor in New Mexico and a planned touchdown at about 11: p.m. central midnight Eastern Time Joseph I know you were waiting on that data screen to come on up and we did finally get it what were you looking for on that screen once that deorbit began yeah I mean that that that um and you can see it on the uh on the left screen em missig just I you want to watch to make sure um that all the thrusters are kind of firing evenly and at the rates it wasn't wobbling and that you know they weren't you didn't have like a half of a of a Thruster just fail off like significantly um doesn't mean nothing happened but like a major you know once because of one uh if one of these side thrust whole things didn't work they would would start wobbling it would start uh doing like this maybe while Landing so you just stability that really shows it's an even thrust in general sense um that's kind of it in layman's terms yeah and and I think it's realistic uh to be optimistic but say that's one of the things that in particular we were watching for with this deorbit and return to Earth is any sort of problem with the thrusters giving the historic troubleshooting we've had with the thrusters on on these missions do fairness that doesn't mean nothing was wrong I mean we don't know what we'll see that NASA will and bow will go and look at the data afterwards from this the sensors are picking up that are being archived um and there could have been a problem we don't know about it or in most life iness it's been smooth selling as they say um but obviously no showstoppers so far um but there could always be something that like it was off and more than they would love lik to so yeah there'll be a lot of data certainly for them to pour over right direction for the service module separation okay so they're cruising the ground reporting that Starliner is looking good right now separated and is now falling away it will burn up during re-entry over a remote part of the Pacific Ocean oce and Starliner will continue on its path to New Mexico where the landing and Recovery team is waiting for Touchdown Starliner is now angling itself and its heat shield for re-entry the entry interface is coming up in just about 10 minutes that's the hottest part of the re-entry process with star liner's heat shield reaching about 3,000 de to protect Starliner from those heat loads the spacecraft has what's called an ablative heat shield the outer surface of that Shield heats up to a gas which then carries the heat away from the crew module through convection and our team calls this process a game of Threes because during entry interface the heat shield will handle those temperatures of about 3,000 de but it will convert that heat to about 300° with only 3 in of a blader and because of this protection during this hottest part of re-entry inside of the spacecraft remains at about room temperature when Starliner returned from its last two flights the capsules landed with two black stripes up the sides indicating the heat shield was a bladed as intended so we do expect to see that again today and the team considers that a bit of a badge of honor a badge of honor I'm sure there are lots of things they look for lot of su superstitions lots of procedures lots of habits right uh that go into uh to space flight as we continue to look at live data displays right now there's obviously no live video feeds although I feel like SpaceX with their live cameras has spoiled us uh with the way we watch those booster Rockets L back down I don't know what Boeing has in store for us if anything right now they're probably just laser focused on getting this thing back down level yeah I mean I actually like this better I like the raw data uh spaceex doesn't give you all these you know uh this you know these data points as as much as I would like but um can you walk us through any of it I mean the only thing I as a as a Layman recognize is the ball up in the top left which I imagine would be like inside a cockpit of an airplane just to help you find the Horizon what what are you looking at here yeah so just as a disclaimer I'm not an engineering person of any sort but I I can understand somewhat the just from experience um you know the spacecraft as you see is oriented for re-entry um you'll see the heat shield is facing uh forward instead of the other way around for long um so that's good you'll notice the hatch you can see a little bubble on the top of the spacecraft which is the hatch that closes the protect the docking ring on the first flight they didn't have that and that damaged not dangerously or anything but it got the docking thing a little um cooked a little bit so they proba to do a little more refurbishment so that's just what I noticed but in terms of data you can see um the altitude on the next to the um you see the altitude go down up the top left um kind of like an air an aircraft simulation so that they're at 413 it looks like thousand meters uh and they're at Mach 23.5 it looks like so they're going the spacecraft is going very fast yeah certainly you'll notice at one point it was probably mock 24 and that's you'll notice some astronauts if you ever see them in their flight suits they'll have a shuttle full patch or they'll have a so they'll have a dragon and it'll have a little ribbon around it it'll say 25 and it's like a badge on that would mock 25 so we have a question from uh Ashley who's watching with us here on Facebook when will we see it will we hear it break the atmosphere so we are expecting it to land there in New Mexico at about midnight it's going to come in over the Pacific Ocean and over portions of Mexico uh before coming into New Mexico uh so actually depending on where you are if you have a clear view in the sky if you're in this portion of the world you might be able to see it uh I don't have any guidance here in particular Joseph about sound but yeah I would imagine if you're in this region you'd be able to hear it I don't expect to be able to see or hear anything from the Carolina no um but in New Mexico I mean the shuttle made famously it landed and made a Sonic Boom on the SpaceX um the Boom is what is actually the air being broken by the spacecraft um yeah and you would have that on the SpaceX Falcon first stage Falcon 9es when they would come down um this so Ashley says she's in New Mexico if you're near White Sand uh you might you might hear it um You' be really close I can't know exactly how um it's coming in over the Southwest part of the state of New Mexico um so maybe you got a chance Ashley you've got a chance to see or hear this I do think yes but uh you might see a if if you're what depends you might see it straight across if you have the ability to look Southwest um if not you might hear it if you're really close to White Sands um but I can't tell if it will be like Sonic booms the space shuttle was twice um so but I don't think dragon is and I don't think Starliner is I think it might be one um but yes I think it does uh we're excited for you Ashley too uh hopefully you stay with us and you let us know uh what it is uh that you see or hear it sounds like you're about an hour drives away from White Sands but by you know the way the crow flies or the way the spacecrafts fly you might be close enough to to see or hear something uh we'll find out here together you know this is a little bit of a new experience for all of us because as Joseph mentioned while this is the third test flight for Starliner uh these this craft has had adjustments still relatively new uh we are so used to seeing SpaceX flash down in the ocean that you know getting used to uh the New Mexico approach getting used to the approach where it's more of the ocean and less over land something that Joseph and both NASA officials have commented is about increasing the odds of having any sort of impact on communities uh we'll we'll see exactly what this is like here in the next half an hour or so our friend Tim watching on Facebook thank you for breaking it down the NASA plus commentators are using really big words and I I do appreciate Joseph you're like our uh our our live coverage pop-up edition if you remember those like MTV nights where they would put the little popups on the music video that's that's kind of what's going on here that might be a really dated reference but hopefully I I understand it um I'm one of the early G the people was born 01 so I get I get some I get uh I used VHS when I was younger probably old by them but there you go that's the uh that's the qualifier being I was on the line I guess yeah um you know I I'll take a moment here as we have about half an hour uh before this uh you know lands in New Mexico uh about a year ago the Carolina weather group had a chance to go down to Kennedy Space Center ahead of a SpaceX flight different company but the same Mission from NASA to get people up to the International Space Station where we are conducting science experiments to help humans across the globe increase their knowledge of how to live and explore space eventually onto the moon and eventually onto Mars and one of the things astronauts have been doing up the International Space Station is growing plants to help them make their own sustainable food source and when I was down at Kennedy Space Center last year they brought us into their plant lab to show us some of the experiments that they conduct both here on the ground and up in space take a listen so we're in a lab now where they are doing experiments to simulate growing plants in space because the longer the missions go and the further from Earth they go the more dependent astronauts will be on growing their own food this can't be a crew intensive activity uh the crew is not being we're not devising our cre Compliments by sending up people who are bought to see Farmers like the Martian did you may see that Mars looks like it's at the end of the road map but in actuality because of the needs of the food system it's really the first area we're working towards prepackaged food currently um will be fly in the ISS begins degrad in certain key nutrients after like 18 months for aremis I can send the prepackage food up there and we're good to go no issues but for a mission to Mar for the that's potentially 2 to 3 years make it longer in duration now I have to supplement that diet because certain key nutrients are starting to degrade so right now we're moving forward with some really cool plans we're doing um cucumbers and melons so I think what's interesting is we'll be able to utilize the the work that we do here to expand the um the amount of foods that are available to as in the future so that we can alleviate menu teue because we don't want them to get tired what they're eating or engineer plants that have less inedible material more fruit associated with them so we're actually using more of the plants than what you would traditionally grow today one of the plant grow systems we have on ISS is called the advanced plant habitat or the AP and the experiments that go on there are called the pH experiments ph4 I didn't mention last time but we grew peppers in uh in the advanced plant habitat so and then this one is going to be ph7 okay and what we're using are is technology science carriers sensors to help us identify what's going on inside the boxes and then we develop Hardware here in our maker space like 3D printing fabrication rapid prototyping to make everything work one of the features of this experiment is something that we haven't done yet is collecting a sample from the root Zone in microgravity we use this growth media it's called arcite it's the red clay that you see on baseball fields and if you open the box in space it'll float everywhere so how do you get a root sample back to here well one of our students came up to the P device that's 3D printed we're using a thread on the on the actual lid this screws in and then a sample or a core comes out that holds the sample in it once the astronaut pulls it out they put it into the 80 below freezer and then we bring it back to Earth and do analysis with it so it's really cool I don't know much about the analysis but I do know about the prototyping in the drawing the 3D printing so it's like where all microbiology and engineers and biology come together this is it completely and if you want to add that special to your YouTube watch list we've got the links down in our comments you can watch it after tonight's live coverage of Boeing's Starliner return Joseph I look forward to one day re-editing that now with we have new AI Technologies to eliminate the really loud fans that were running in that room as they were trying to cool the room and try different air flows on the plant that was the hardest of the audio down there Kennedy was inside that that boty lab I quite like it actually I think it gives good Ambiance but it was a lot of ambiance for a guy trying to produce some videos so uh again that was uh down at Kennedy Space Center last year for SpaceX crew 6 launch uh which we were there in person for for live coverage here on the Carolina weather group but right now tonight here on September 6 2024 you're looking live at White Sands New Mexico uh this lovely night vision shot provid provided to us by NASA where in just under half an hour Boeing's Starliner will be returning without its crew uh as it is completing it's now third third right test mission up to space this was the first with humans on board for launch was intended to be uh yeah yes right partial because we were intended to bring them back down and and that just certainly uh did not happen uh you can join us uh in the comments on Facebook and YouTube if you're watching live I'm James Bron and Charlotte Joseph naen there in greensbor as Carolina weather group continues to track in let's listen into NASA and see the latest that they've got going on out there in New Mexico down first stopping at about the 500 foot Mark and then they'll get the go to move forward to the 150 ft Mark and then once the vehicle is considered safe they will move in uh Joseph it sounds like they are once again walking through the different crew that will go in first to deem the spacecraft safe before they would bring in any of the science recovery teams any of the Medical Teams we've seen this of course with with SpaceX had there been crew on board I imagine for a Boeing Landing just like with a SpaceX splash down you'd probably have a doctor or somebody there to assist them right because this is not only the first time that the spacecraft has experienced atmosphere in weeks uh it's the first time the crew is going to have that Earth gravity too if there had been you know as yeah I mean they if it had been like the first like it was scheduled to be it would only been like a couple a week or so eight days heat SH now and ready to begin experiencing the atmosphere so there would not have been a as many effects on on the uh astronauts as much as they will be when they come back back but they are the groupings of vehicles are in different groups in terms of um how like the Hazmat C goes first the nether support first and so you might notice the the the commentators from NASA uh you'll notice that they might be farther back and you will might not get cameras as early it depends because they're way back in the Convoy because the had the support people go first and they might practice like there's people on board and that's something you should look for you can look for they did it all the last two flights but because this was originally of Step crew and then it didn't I'm not sure if it will or not but they might like uh have like a whole ramp they put up to it like if people were going to get out but um we'll see we'll see how much of it they actually simulate yeah yeah we're gonna pause here for just a moment and welcome in our viewers on WCNC plus this is live coverage of the return of Boeing Starliner the spacecraft on docking from the International Space Station just after the 600 p.m. Eastern hour earlier tonight on this this Friday and taking that 6-hour Journey back here to Earth in the next 25 minutes just after midnight we're expecting the spacecraft without any humans on board to land in New Mexico completing this third test mission of the partnership between NASA and Boeing Boeing being one of NASA's private contractors uh that NASA works with with the intention of getting astronauts to the International Space Station and back uh this is a program that has been underway for several years following the conclusion of NASA's space shuttle program as NASA turned the pages and went into a chapter where they were going to contract with private companies SpaceX and Boeing among them to shuttle if I may use that word astronauts to and from the International Space Station uh problems with the Boeing Starliner with regards to its thrusters with regards to some helium leaks ultimately led to an Extended Stay aboard the International Space for the two test pilots the two NASA astronauts who were aboard when Boeing's Starliner launched those two astronauts still on the International Space Station this evening after NASA decided to keep them there for another six months they will join crew n and its Mission aboard the orbiting laboratory of the two remaining astronauts on the crew n Mission will be launching later this month beginning the formal six-month period stay for that now team of four up there at the space station but what we are here to do tonight is watch The Return of Boeing's Starliner long awaited back here to planet Earth as you were looking live at White Sands in New Mexico you can see as Joseph was just explaining to us the many support resources from NASA and Boeing and other agencies there uh as we were looking through a night vision camera it is three hours behind there in New Mexico where we are here on the East Coast uh luckily for us here in the Carolinas NASA's giving up all the times in eastern so it is midnight that we expecting the landing and it'll be about 900 p.m. there at wh Sands New Mexico as the Starliner Landing site uh Joseph you were just talking through some of what we can expect and somewh are just question marks because we haven't really seen this uh rehearsed or or staged enough time to know exactly who goes where when but we can certainly uh be anxiously uh awaiting these feeds here in the next 20 minutes as as Starliner will descend be a parachute uh what do you think the next thing that you're keeping your eye or your ear out for is um I'm on I'm looking at a couple other feeds is um I'm looking at they're a little more technical um people that you know are Engineers a lot frequently comment on them and you know but uh I'm looking at that you know I mean I think soon they'll get more um once it gets entry interface um and gets into heating um that'll be significant I'm also looking at on our screen when it's unfortunately don't give us the media feed anymore or as much so as you'll see the spacecraft is getting close and closer and closer to White Sands space Harbor which is why it says on that map it says WS SSH um and so it's approaching it and so on this chart you see it's convenient because it's going to switch right now because this feeds ahead by a couple of seconds um the next feed they're going to switch to is g to it will it'll start showing it getting closer and closer um to the site um there we go um in this chart here and in the far left you might you'll eventually see it start kind of racing up um you'll it'll start highlighting as it does uh that's kind of what I'm looking at um yeah it's an impressive 208,000 m above the ground right now as you can look at some of that raw data which I know you were excited to see some of those raw data as NASA Shar some of their screens with us yeah definitely he says ground range I'm assuming that's the range towards White Sands um so it's going down and you can see altitude is also coming down so you know it's getting real close to the atmosphere um yeah we know some of you are watching here in the Carolinas as uh you have found an interest in this story for one reason or another we know we have our new friend Ashley who is in New Mexico uh who is about an hour drive away from the Starliner Landing site who maybe will get a glimpse of this shooting across the night sky or maybe even hearing a sonic boom uh you know Joseph we were talking about how you know the difference between a day landing and a night landing you know the one of the benefits to a night landing is you'd be easier to spot that streaking across the sky theoretically uh at night than maybe you would during the day where you have the brightness of the clouds in the sky here you're going to have that contrast that might make it a little bit easier to spot at least theoretically yeah I mean definitely the my actually I will say it's actually better an hour um Before Sunrise or right at Sunrise is is actually for a launch is the best um I saw of1 the first flight from H as I said earlier and it was illuminated the plume it makes which you as you see was illuminated by the sun rays because it was brighter up in the atmosphere than it was down here and um I mean one of the most beautiful things I've ever seen it's like a natural Aurora um kind of and um we could see the the U model here we could see the the booster um separate the first stage in the second stage ignite you could literally see it kind of ignite and start really moving up northward fast or not northward uphill so yeah I mean definitely uh as in this case it will be small but bright probably um especially in New Mexico I don't think white SS is near anything signif like huge it's probably not near anything intentionally correct right um and you know you also mentioned the sunrise and the sunset launches you know here in the Carolinas uh comparatively speaking you know we're a terribly long drive down to Florida we've been down to uh Virginia for wups if you want to be near a launch in person but you know the sunrise and sunset launches from either one of those facilities are also ones that here in the Carolinas we can often sometimes see as you mentioned Illuminating across the night sky because of just the way the Earth is curved and that visibility along our Coast not a situation we're going to see as we've mentioned with tonight's Landing uh because it is going to be uh too far away from us here in the Carolinas to see it so the best place to see it is right here on your smart TV on your phone wherever you are watching us right now as we await uh about 15 minutes away from the landing of Boeing's star liner and we will bring it to you live when it happens let's listen into n entry now less than 100 miles above the Earth and uh heading towards the Baja Peninsula we'll be flying over that before landing in New Mexico just 17 minutes to go until Landing 17 more minutes as Joseph and I and you at home anxiously await the return of a spacecraft that was due back weeks ago but got delayed as a crw on the ground and in space attempted to figure out what was going on I think one of the most interesting and memorable parts of this Mission will be a nonserious thing that happened but just kind of layered on to the complexities of an ongoing Mission but Joseph I'm sure you saw the headlines about a week ago uh when Butch one of the astronauts up in space radio down to say hey guys the Starliner is making a really weird sound as the Starliner was still docked with the space station it was making a kind of a pulsing w sound uh given the problems they've had with the spacecraft given the concern to always want to prioritize safety uh the ground Crews began conducting an investigation into what could possibly be making that sound it turned out to be something completely harmless which was just audio feedback coming out of a speaker but I can only imagine it was just like one more head scratch uh for this spacecraft I mean that's surprising I would have thought a fan because they do have to fan uh make sure the air is consistent throughout the vehicle because you don't have um you just have to do it make sure no CO2 build up they do have to put like little tubes you'll see in the station they'll put like tubing between different docky models so everything is kind of flowing the air doesn't get stagnant um it's not like like my like up here I don't have a fan on my room is you know it feels the air is moving around but in the space station you have to manually do that you don't have a breeze going around so um that's why I thought it was originally but it's funny was feedback it was just funny that it was something so innocent guys watching with us on Facebook says should go right over my house so glad you found us here guy we welcome you in let us know what it is you see or hear we're very interested uh to uh learn what you are witnessing tonight as we await the return of Starliner and Shout out also to Phil watching with us on YouTube cool this channel is quite informative well we appreciate that uh Philip and appreciate you watching along with us and for your comments so far as we look live at the Starliner Landing site in White Sands New Mexico uh just under 15 minutes away uh Joseph you've been watching this Mission the previous Starliner missions lots of space stuff for us here um you know what's going through your mind right now uh what are you feeling what are you thinking as we narrow down the last few minutes of this test mission yeah I mean all this is definitely the longer duration probably the longest duration Starliner flight to far uh inadvertently um so that's interesting um but it shouldn't be a problem it's just interesting similar to what you might experience while going down an elevator inside a highrise building the vehicle then comes to a safe comfortable stop at Landing I could hear them in the review monitor talking about how folks in the area might hear a sonic boom and I know that is a question that has come into our chat tonight what people in New Mexico might be able to experience I'm sorry I cut you off but I as you and I have been speculating I wanted to get it straight from NASA and that was in fact what they were trying to tell people is yes you might hear a sonic boom and you know SpaceX is becoming uh and it says right now they're raing entry interface about now on another Fe I'm looking at boing just tweeted um and they will lose Communications throughout four minutes so that's why it's probably a little more quiet on the NASA feed because they're just not getting as much interface um which is very normal um sometimes they have enough Sal lights above them they can still get the feed for a longer period of time um but even the shuttle loss black out um basically any every capsule has had that so yeah here's the the tweet that you mentioned the post on X uh from Boeing's space account so uh you know we've been listening to commentary from NASA and it's good to know that you know Boeing The Joint partner with NASA on this again to explain that relationship to folks who may not be so familiar ever since NASA discontinued its space shuttle program uh they have been contracting with companies SpaceX and Boeing alike to build the spacecraft and operate the spacecraft to get NASA astronauts and SCI ific equipment up into orbit up into uh the International Space Station uh and so that's why you've got a private company Boeing so heavily involved in a uh a mission here that we're also getting information from NASA so there's two parties involved here uh and that is the world that we live in as NASA looks to privatize space as other a comp agencies other governments worldwide uh look to privatize space I mean Joseph we haven't mentioned tonight that the International Space Station itself in the year 2030 give or take going to be decommissioned deorbited burned up through the Earth's atmosphere and then turned over to a new orbiting space lab or Labs which is expected to be once again run by private companies as we move into this next generation of of space flight yeah it's a natural progression in my opinion um but uh NASA really wants to do this more deep space lunar and um eventually Mars in the near-term lunar um uh exploration and that and they kind of want their idea is that they will Pioneer kind of the the lunar stuff they'll kind of with an you know push that and then because they've they're going to push the resources that way then that kind of leaves a little bit of room for the private companies to come behind it so um that's kind of the idea behind it um the space station is getting old I mean it's been up there longer than I've been alive so when that does happen be very weird the guy the guy who still REM using VHS tapes is still younger than the space station okay all right that helps us hone that in a little bit yeah I don't know why we had them in my basement but we did uh but um yeah so the space station launch like 90 99 or 98 around then so about two three years before I was born um so it's been another for a while some of the modules are starting to have more and more problems you might have seen news articles about small leaks in the past so um not bad thing not badly but you know there there are a lot more problems starting to pop up because some the modules are I think some of them have been up there the longest um we're coming to an end of lifean yeah let's take a a listen at this as we bring the audio back up from NASA too uh we saw some of the crew getting out of their vehicles there at White Sand this uh is a live view from the International Space Station where we're able to get a view view of uh Starliner track as it comes in we are now less than 10 minutes away from landing at the White Sands space Harbor scheduled for uh 10 or 1100 p.m. central so uh Joseph excuse me for a moment that it looks like any old uh camera you could buy at Costco uh is the Starliner path they mentioned I guess that's the white line streaking across uh the screen yeah yeah I mean it didn't there's some C it and you'll see it now then it'll go to another feed it's it's called launch azth or inclination it's kind of like the angle that the that the that the orbits over and that angle is because it had to launch to get to the ISS it is in the same angle because yeah it's just the less fuel so that's why camera angle I recognize yeah yeah so this is on an aircraft in altitude uh but it's actually this is a view from the WB 57 one of NASA's air craft that is uh at the uh Landing s has been uh been uh staged and ready to pick a Starliner or pick up the view of Starliner as it comes in and that is what we are seeing now and they're filming this video from about 16,000 ft the bb57 should continue to uh give us a view until the drog parachutes deploy and then we hope to pick it up with the Cessna that is also in the area so we're getting into the part of this now as we near Landing where we're going to have some more camera angles from NASA both on the ground control in the room are reporting that we are out of that blackout period and everything is looking good Starliner remaining nominal as she returns to earth Phil watching on YouTube says SPX will the only hope for the new space station and you know I was just going to say uh that you know the space station we have now is a great example of how companies who were once in a heated Space Race came together to build a joint lab you know we hit ride with Russia they hit your ride with us from time to time other countries involved too uh so it was really interesting to see with this current space station how a lot of those countries came together and I think it'll be interesting to see Joseph as we head into the privatized version of that the relationship between these countries and what that looks like in the Next Generation yeah I think because of politics currently there won't be a lot of um that's just my because just my you know studies and being it you know of everything I think that is is a nice to Phill um but it they probably won't be doing anything with Russia for the time being after the Space Station's gone unless something changes um so that's that's something that's very likely that that won't happen as much anymore one those safe spaces where the cooperation has been ongoing despite whatever else is happening in the political sphere yeah I mean that's also because of it's been a necessity because the station was built that only the control parts of the space station with the thrusters are on the Russian side not on the American side or the international side rather so that makes it hard you can't really separate them it's kind of just built so U that's why Americans still launch on the Russian soy because that is just how it was built and it's it's it can't really separate it so that's just how that's why it's still that way this is a view from the Cessna Aircraft that is in the area NASA mentioning they have more than one aircraft right now and uh they probably have some cameras on the ground too that we'll see when this gets a little bit closer again the approach being uh that starliners coming in over the Pacific Ocean over portions of Baja Mexico and other areas of the country of Mexico before coming into the United States and the state of New Mexico that is most number of times I think I've ever said Mexico in a sentence uh and we're watching again as we are waiting for the uncrewed Boeing Starliner to land UNCW meaning there are no astronauts on board uh which was a deviation from the original plan but not a deviation from any of the contingencies that NASA certainly had with any Mission lengthy contingencies because it is very dark out there and you might notice at this point it may not be creating a plume reentry plume but um it might be glowing because of the heat still on infrared cameras because it is still obviously very warm on the outside so yeah especially as that atmosphere gets thicker it'll have more to push through it's it's always hard to imagine that the air itself and the particles that are in the air dust moisture all things that and when you're moving at this speed you certainly have to contend with uh We've I think mentioned that the blackout period has come to an end so we are again once again getting data from the spacecraft uh as the service module being jettison some 35 minutes ago Starliner angling for the re-entry uh and now in its final minutes as it comes into this Final Approach uh for landing in New Mexico all right and that action you're seeing your screen forward heat sh and Y explosions to release those coming down from the w57 see those two drug parachutes uh now deployed they slow the uh vehicle down initially until it gets to a uh a safe uh speed for the enormous main parachutes to to follow it looks like the airbags might be inflating they usually at some point drop the the um about minutes and then the actually I don't think it has opened yet but at some point you'll see the heat shell actually come off the spacecraft and then the airbag aircraft in theity of the landing site again this is a wb7 it was it's named cypo like a shuttle had a name this is uh um this one does too as is the SpaceX dragon three main parachutes come out and everything will happen pretty quickly from that point on live pictures from NASA White Sands New Mexico Ms are out we'll see the uh bottom heat shield that has been protecting uh Starliner through its journey through the atmosphere come off that makes way for the landing airbags to deploy yes and there's the main parachute screen we see three out currently Philip's question that Comet coming in just before these main three shoots opened up teams at the recovery teams report that they heard booms as those came out three good Mains fully open there you can see Starliner in a slight tilt so we're going to see the rotation handle move here shortly and it will level out Starliner but three good parachutes looking great just a little over 2 minutes until the expected Landing time and we heard the rotational handle has been released so you can see that tilt evened out looking nice and level there the heat shield should drop momentarily there it goes and there it goes then the airbags there's airbags below which will inflate to see that you can see the airbags deploying there on your screen those airs it's good to understand as you're explaining to us what we are seeing so that we know it's it's all it's something normal it's something nominal when we see these little explosions happening to release certain parts of mechanisms yeah it is the only space human raid spacecraft that uses airbags it's a very unique uh um sequence I mean Space six doesn't do it but it is a fairly hard Landing stares as far as I remember so um not dangerously hard but it is a a jolt confirming six good airbags it's not like an ocean where it kind of just comes down few still coming to us from the cesna we've got uh about just about a minute left to go until the expected touchdown be watching for that time for you James Barton Charlotte Joseph Naan in Greensboro North Carolina as we are watching this return of boeings Starliner in White Sands New Mexico here at this Midnight Hour now on the East Coast be curious to see of those folks who've been chatting with us live tonight some of you tuning in from New Mexico if if you heard or saw saw this shooting across the night sky uh be curious to hear any of those observations on what may have been visible outside of this White Sands Landing Zone uh that we have set up here as we watch the aircraft seconds away from expected touchdown you're seeing the ground there in your screen as we get closer you'll notice when the um May more closeup footage this capsule after landing that uh they has like a tile system on the sides of spacecraft like the sh did um so it's kind of interesting it's like an old school capsule with like a shuttle side of a heat heat shield except the bottom heat shield which dropped away and second getting pretty close to Landing here I imagine it's pretty dark out there but what a view we're getting from some of these night vision cameras touchdown Starliner is back on Earth that Landing coming at 1101 and 35 seconds Central Time 10:01 and 31 seconds mountain time at wh sand space armor at the US Army's Missile Range in New Mexico or 1201 if you're with us here on the East Coast so a mission that has been troubled with thrusters and helium leaks NASA deciding to keep the two crew that flew with Starliner to space up at the International Space Station here now with a successful Landing of Boeing's Starliner I'm sure there's lots of size of relief both at Nasa and at Boeing Joseph what are you feeling what are you thinking right now watching uh these images live yeah I mean I'm actually more interested the after the fact uh what what they if they determined anything else from the problem they had they because when you ran when you do the deorbit burn that's a very significant burn on the spacecraft and so excuse me very sorry it's mid night very um obvious interesting to see the extra data on that if there was a blowout a Thruster blowout like the other flights there was a you know higher temperature on it that should have been or Etc that they recorded so it'll be very interested to see they not tonight but like in the next couple days or if Boeing shares I don't know if they will but they may in in the future at some other press conference um so yeah there'll be a news conference about 1:30 a.m. eastern time where we might earn a little bit more information right now you're looking at the initial shoots that help slow Starliner before the main shoots open up those initial shoots still working their way back down to the surface as NASA is continuing to collect data from their aircraft on exactly how each and every mechanism involved with Boeing's Starliner uh functions and they of course have lots of data to review well beyond uh the 1:30 a.m. news conference that will be coming our way shortly uh as they will be peering over all of this data ahead of what I'm sure both Partners hope to be future Boeing Starliner missions up to the International Space Station in the years of the orbiting laboratory that remain 2030 being the year where we expect uh the orbiting laboratory to come to an end uh with SpaceX having already won the contract to deorbit the International Space Station let's listen back Starliner has touchdown with its main parachutes touchdown came at 11:01 p.m. central Time the team here uh in Mission Control will be working through some post Landing steps now eventually we'll see Crews move in towards the spacecraft as NASA's been telling us tonight there'll be several different colorcoded teams that go in with different missions and different objectives uh whether they're checking the spacecraft or theoretically checking a crew that would been there at its Landing site in uh White SS at space Harbor Landing recovery teams will soon begin making its way out to them to uh begin recovering the spacecraft team here in uh mission control is pulling right now to see if everybody is ready to power off the vehicle that again is a step that the flight control team is taken over with the uh with the uh lack of crew on board at least it's upright which is a good thing spacecraft is powered down they will be transitioning control of the spacecraft over to the landing and Recovery team and it's a little difficult to see in this shot but there is a strobe light on Starliner that will help the teams follow it out there and you can see in a little bit on another feed I this one is delayed but on another one I have you'll see in a second um the convoy start starting to roll out towards the spacecraft um up recovery team is on see there they go I think Leah and Josh Barrett our colleagues out there may be able to give us one last update Leah and Josh can you hear us great landing of calypso I don't think obviously we did have really a great show we were able to see the cameras that you are watching too from the wb7 from the Cessna from the International Space Station but can I interrupt you yes concur it's been a really amazing day we were hearing a bit from space to ground there uh but I think they've concluded unfortunately uh we'll see if we can get a recording of that for uh folks uh listening at home but Leah go ahead with your update yeah sorry about that couldn't hear that one here so uh but MC here Rick just wanted to offer that he's got one more hour here hey it's his birthday here yeah and that's what counts yeah it was a it was a good Landing it's pretty awesome you guys are are the best you are the best thank you Sunny Williams there uh offering a a slightly early happy birthday to Flat director R 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 um on uh uh September 7th in at the International Space Station but Leah if you were still with us we will 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 happened but the most unexpected part was when I could hear the main parachutes being deployed it was very Fain 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 gold team will will move in and begin their assessments and then uh once they declare that uh operations proximity operations can begin uh the recovery obstacle will really get underway and with that I think uh we were going to 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 thanks so much Josh and Leah it's great to see Star ler home and uh I I envy you the up close view but we appreciate your updates I do too star liner Starliner has returned safely well done to the entire team for completing the mission with a successful undocking deorbit and Landing all right quite a lot of audio in the last few minutes as Joseph and I and you at home were listening into commentary from NASA uh we heard from flight directors we heard from Sunny Williams the astronaut left up there in space uh as decided to bring the Starliner home without her and her fellow astronaut um and and Joseph we're we're taking it all into watching these convoys roll out NASA's had a chance to give their last thoughts and I want to give you a chance to give your last thoughts here too before we wrap up our live coverage yeah definitely I think NASA might be actually wrapping up as well yeah I think another screen that's a little ahead might have actually wrapped up um but yeah I mean it's a good there we go that's very interesting that they wrapped up early they don't usually do it that early but um it's it'll be interesting it's interesting in general that you know they brought it home and it still performed well um but it's still a s of relief that they brought it home on another spacecraft um just for the sake of safety um hopefully they go through the data and figure out what um was the reason for it um but uh yeah another successful Landing looks like it was fairly close to the vo uh which is good but uh we'll just see what the followup is on the next couple flights because we don't know now how when the next um Starliner one operational flight will happen because of these um anomalies in this Mission so the the the aftermath in terms of uh follow up on the schedule of flight cre flights the station it'll be interesting to see what NASA and Boeing decide based upon this Mission since all the objectives were obviously not met yeah I I think you're absolutely right I'll be curious to see what NASA and Boeing decide to do with the Starliner program I'm sure they're going to move forward but when uh is the question and we will see a launch from Boeing's competitor SpaceX to bring up crew n to the International Space Station scheduled for later in this month slightly delayed because of the decisions that were being made with the Starliner program and that SpaceX crew n Mission only going up with two astronauts as we mentioned because the two Boeing Starliner astronauts still up in space you know we're we're distinguishing between who's a Boeing and who's an astronaut uh with SpaceX but that's not really the correct way to distinguish them they're all NASA astronauts uh but just trying to keep the seed assignment straight for you as we're talking about the different space craft so we look forward to uh seeing what comes next with Boeing as Starliner operations what comes next for the crude n Mission up to the International Space Station and really just frankly what's next in the years ahead as we look towards the end of life for the space station and possibly hopefully fingers cross the return to the Moon uh with the Artemis program all of that in the years ahead as NASA looks to explore and expand human space flight further and further into space but Joseph really appreciate your expertise and your commentary tonight helping us break down what it is we were seeing and hearing couldn't do it without you so thank you so much for joining us here tonight happy to do uh I'm James Bron in Charlotte we appreciate you watching along with us wherever you are watching from uh stay tuned uh and be sure to like And subscribe wherever it is that you are watching for continuing coverage of this and the other days news and weather uh for now I will send you a ad do have a great weekend and we'll talk to you again real soon