@JimBridenstine notes that this mission will allow for 3x as much science on the Space Station due to increased crew capacity.
@KathyLueders: A culmination of a lot of work to get to this point. Excited for a Halloween launch.
@HansKoenigsmann thanks NASA for all of their support throughout SpaceX's history. Goes on to note all of the milestones that led to this point and plays a Demo-2 recap video.
SpaceX just published the video on its YouTube channel.
Bob and Doug with the SpaceX team post-mission.
@HansKoenigsmann on the lesson's learned from Demo-2: Saw slightly more erosion on the heat shield in one area than we would have wanted too. Also deployed parachutes slightly lower than they would have preferred. Design changes have been made.
(Note that those issues may sound serious, but Hans stressed that they were nothing too major.)
Also, more security boats for Crew-1.
@KathyLueders on Crew Dragon's capacity: Only plan to use up to four seats, because we also have cargo requirements for these missions.
@HansKoenigsmann on potentially flying more than four crew members on other missions: Will evaluate in the future after we get more data flying four crew members.
@KathyLueders says that the operational status of Crew Dragon will be made official at the Crew-1 Flight Readiness Review.
@KathyLueders says that the Loss of Crew (LOC) number for Crew Dragon in the Commercial Crew program is 1 out of 276.
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SpaceX is finally making a foray into the Earth observation market as part of a new service for government customers called Starshield. Starshield also includes global comms and hosted payload opportunities. Essentially, Starlink for national security.
I think SpaceX has a huge advantage over existing providers for a few reasons, which is why I think it is a very big development.
- Tremendous bandwidth
- Continuous ground station links via space lasers
- Potential for far more satellites
You can imagine a world where the pentagon says they want a photo of a particular place on Earth, and they get that photo in under a minute, or even near-constant real-time surveillance of a location.
VSS Imagine was unveiled in March, 2021. At the time, Virgin Galactic said that glide test flights would begin that summer. It still has not flown and is now postponed indefinitely, if not canceled.
If you have not already, read Test Gods. It is pretty enlightening on many topics, including how Virgin Galactics marketing department is completely detached from engineering realities.
ULA teams have worked a few minor technical issues that have led to a slight delay in the launch time for NROL-91. A forward plan has become agreed upon and pressing ahead with a launch at 3:25:30 pm PDT.
New issue. A cycle of a fill and drain valve just failed. Taking it to the anomaly net.
LIVE: SpaceX is holding a Q&A with the Inspiration4 crew
Participants:
- Benji Reed, SpaceX Director of Crew Mission Management
- Jared Isaacman, Inspiration4 Commander
- Hayley Arceneaux, Inspiration4 Medical Officer
- Dr. Sian Proctor, Inspiration4 Pilot
- Chris Sembroski, Inspiration4 Mission Specalist
Reed points out that this will be the first time that three Dragons are on orbit at once with the Crew-2 and CRS-23 Dragons at the Space Station right now.
I do not think the SpaceX commentator was reading from the right script there. Deployment is supposed to be at T+15:32 with no second stage restart.
I guess the problem with too many Starlink launches is copy and paste errors.
Are they going to come back for deployment? Or did they update the mission profile and she read the right thing? SpaceX website and the on-screen graphic are both synced for T+15:32.