Thread by @thesheetztweetz

NASA is hosting a Crew-3 post-launch press briefing, with:

-Assoc. admin @KathyLueders
-Commercial Crew manager Steve Stich
-ISS manager Joel Montalbano
-SpaceX director of Dragon mission management Sarah Walker

Thread:

@KathyLueders Lueders: "We had a little bit of a curveball that we had to work through and the team carefully assessed and restructured the plan and worked out the different options for Crew-2 and Crew-3."

@KathyLueders Stich says Crew Dragon Endurance is "doing really well," with the nosecone open now.

@KathyLueders Walker: "It was a really smooth count, probably the quietest countdown I've heard on console yet."

@KathyLueders Walker: SpaceX has "either launched or landed a Dragon spacecraft every month in 2021 except for February and March."

@KathyLueders Walker: "I think every year in my 10 years of SpaceX 'wow, this was the best year yet, it can't possibly get any better,' and somehow it does."

@KathyLueders Stich: Responses from space companies on new Commercial Crew program contracts are due before Thanksgiving.

"We're committed to continuing to fly both SpaceX and Boeing to the space station for the continued future all the way out to 2030."

@KathyLueders Walker, on the challenges of the quick turnaround between Crew-2 splashdown and Crew-3 launch: Examined any personnel overlap, assets like recovery boats, and more.

@KathyLueders Montalbano says the ISS performed the maneuver to avoid a collision risk from Chinese satellite debris, but notes that the conjunction "went from a red status to a green status."

https://twitter.com/joroulette/status/1458295149738479618

@KathyLueders Walker says the Axiom Ax-1 training program "will actually look perhaps a little more similar to the NASA missions" since its going to the ISS.

@KathyLueders Lueders, on SpaceX having launched 5 crewed spaceflights in the last 18 months:

"We're incredibly grateful with the partnership that we've had."

@KathyLueders Lueders: "In 2006, when we were started to look at cargo vehicles going up and crew vehicles coming up and we looked at the traffic modeling at that time, we thought there's no way we'd be able to do this."

The ISS, Commercial Crew, and SpaceX teams "are making that a reality."

@KathyLueders Stich says "we don't necessarily see any changes" to Crew Dragon's main parachutes after the analysis of the Crew-2 splashdown.

"Before flight when we looked at all that data, the chutes looked very normal."

@KathyLueders Walker: Every mission SpaceX looks "at every component for good candidates for reuse. This was the first time we reused a nosecone on a crew mission, although we've reused composites on previous missions as well."

@KathyLueders Walker: "Human spaceflight was the reason we were founded, so it's incredibly meaningful to the whole team" for SpaceX to have launched 18 astronauts in 18 months.

"We could not be more excited to finally be here."

@KathyLueders Stich says that NASA "will not consider the parachutes" from Crew-2 a "totally closed" investigation yet.

"We intend to go through a full data review."

@KathyLueders Lueders notes that "this was not a planned press conference" but was organized today.

"We were pleasantly surprised that you guys" (reporters) "wanted us to have a press conference and that there are people that are still here and engaged" on the Commercial Crew program.

@KathyLueders That concludes the Crew-3 post launch press conference.