STS-2: Postflight Press Conference

[Music] april 1981 columbia the first space shuttle orbiter glides to a pinpoint landing at edwards air force base california ending its spectacular maiden flight but unlike spacecraft that had gone before columbia would not be retired from service to become a museum piece its future as a space transport vehicle had only begun after its successful first flight columbia was carried back to kennedy space center there the process of turn around was set in motion [Applause] there were system checkouts minor tile repairs and replacements an experiments package called host to one was placed in the payload bay the package rests on a platform built by the european space agency the canadian built remote manipulator system was installed the system includes a 50-foot long mechanical arm in early august columbia was moved over to the vehicle assembly building here it was mated to two new solid rocket boosters and an external fuel tank three weeks later it was rolled to the launch pad once again shuttle flight 1 brought many firsts shuttle flight 2 would bring another the first time in the history of space flight that an attempt would be made to launch the same spacecraft a second time [Applause] [Music] during the next three weeks launch preparation crews worked in three ships trying to meet the early october launch date all had gone smoothly up to the point of loading the hypergolic fuels that process had barely begun when nitrogen tetroxide has discovered spilling onto the orbiter approximately 15 to 20 gallons of the oxidizer had spilled down the side of the vehicle and into the propellant tank compartment of the nose section it had also seeped between the orbiter's thermal protection system tiles and dissolved the bond holding the tiles on the spacecraft eventually over 350 had to be removed cause of the spill was failure of a quick disconnect valve to close the valve could not close because of concentrations of iron nitrate in the head and hardening of lubrication in that area with columbia still on the launch pad workers were able to gain access inside the nose compartment and replace soaked thermal blankets they were also able to reach the soaked tiles therefore it would not be necessary to move back to the orbiter processing facility for repairs the tiles were put through a very speedy decontamination process to remove the oxidizer within three weeks after the spill all 378 tiles had been removed decontaminated and re-bonded launch was rescheduled for november 4th but columbia was not destined to return to space yet only 31 seconds away from ignition the launch computer halted the countdown the pressure in the liquid oxygen tank was below the predetermined limit necessary for liftoff meanwhile controllers were also becoming increasingly concerned about the high oil pressure in two of the three auxiliary power units after analyzing this problem further they decided to scrub the launch for the day the apu's are vital to colombia's safe ascent and entry for steering the engines during liftoff controlling the aerosurfaces during landing and for lowering the landing gear it was suspected that oil pressure rose in the units because the filters were clogged the problem would have to be solved before another launch analysis revealed that a wax-like substance had formed on the oil to clog the filters the substance was created by a chemical reaction between the oil and hydrazine fuel the hydrazine seeped into the gearbox over the seven month period since the apu's were last used and contaminated the oil although many thought technicians simply forgot to change the oil normal maintenance procedures did not require it indeed a key factor in shuttle's reusability is quick turnaround with minimum maintenance the apu's were flushed with new lube oil new filters were installed and fresh oil was added working on a very tight schedule ground crews completed the work within a week the shuttle was again ready to be launched [Music] astronauts joe engel and richard truly commander and pilot for the second shuttle flight [Music] commander engel who joined nasa in 1966 was part of the backup crew for apollo 14 and the first shuttle flight three of his 16 x-15 flights went above 50 miles qualifying him for astronaut rank but he had not yet been in orbit nor had richard truly pilot for this flight truly who joined nasa in 1969 was capsule communicator for three skylab missions and the apollo soyuz mission he was also part of the backup crew for colombia's first flight both men had flown the shuttle before in approach and landing tests at dryden flight research center in 1977 that was over four years ago it was now 1981 november 12th to be exact richard truly's 44th birthday countdown now being conducted by the launch sequencers onboard the orbiter the srb nozzles have been moved to start position t minus 10 9 eight seven we have go for main engine start we have main engine start okay roger on a roll columbia houston your go at 40. [Music] [Music] okay let's get a return stannis here final go booster okay we're going to proceed past negative return mark negative return sounds good [Music] columbia houston you're go at eight and it's time to go up man [Music] okay you didn't wake up good night you can ignore the imu bytes [Music] roger on the set [Music] okay let's get another one on the nominal delta a141 [Music] go for apu off columbia houston uh your goal for nominal homes one for apu shutdown on time okay then and we'll maneuver to attitude now roger [Music] as colombia continued toward orbit the srvs parachuted to a safe landing in the atlantic ocean 160 miles downrange from the launch site they were recovered and will be used again on a later shuttle flight all orbital maneuvering system burns were successful putting colombia into a 138 mile orbit around the earth the payload bay doors were open to deploy the heat dissipating radiators and expose the osta experiments so began the many tasks of the five-day mission that lay ahead [Music] however not long after achieving orbit at about two hours 27 minutes mission elapsed time the crew reported a high ph level indicating alkalinity in one of columbia's three fuel cells the cells which produce electricity and water for the spacecraft and crew are essential for operating the many systems on board flight controllers having dealt with almost every conceivable problem during flight simulations immediately began working to find a real-time solution to this problem but meanwhile the cell's capacity to generate electricity continued to deteriorate at about five hours mission elapsed time it was decided to take the fuel cell offline and safe it drain it of all its energy this would prevent a potentially dangerous reaction from occurring that could damage the spacecraft but according to a mission rule made pre-flight the failure of a fuel cell would reduce the 125 nominal mission to a 54-hour minimum mission a mission management meeting was held to decide whether to enforce or override the rule whether to come home after 54 hours or stay up for the full duration [Music] at a press conference on day two of the mission johnson space center director christopher kraft explained why the decision was finally made to shorten the mission well we certainly don't have any other problems on board i think that we think it's the prudent thing to do at this point in our test program uh we think we can really get everything out of the mission that we have planned with the ex with the exception of time so we just felt from a more prudent position we had we had thought it out very carefully uh pre-flight that that was the best thing for us to do indeed virtually everything was gotten out of the mission that was planned all high priority objectives were accomplished and ninety percent of the overall objectives were completed even though this was a test vehicle on a developmental flight cut short 71 hours of top priority were the remote manipulator system tests completed on the morning of day two sally ride first female capsule communicator guided the astronauts through the tests and we've got a great picture from camera delta of the arm going down into the cradle hey good i'll tell you the old live ball looking out the window is the best alignment device i think and now we got a picture of the plt moving the arm the rms which is a major subsystem of the orbiter is designed to deploy and retrieve satellites and other payloads and operational flights [Music] although the arm did not actually grapple a payload the end effector was able to come within six inches of the target and maintain that position two very important objectives of the test you can do that if you get it locked up okay we'll do that we've got a picture of the flag back and we'll coordinate with enco [Music] one of the things that has surprised me at least i didn't think it'd be this way but we have not felt the rms move move the orbiter at all okay we copy that columbia houston we've got the we've got the elbow camera okay hi mom in addition all five operating modes of the system were evaluated ranging from manual operation by the astronauts to a completely computer controlled operation the three and a half hours of tests done on the arm proved highly successful a real tribute to the designer the national research council of canada and the builder spa aerospace limited canada absorbed all expenses related to research and development of this first system the first package of scientific instruments to be flown on shuttle from nasa's office of space and terrestrial applications was designated osto one although all the visual results are not yet available from the shuttle data takes each experiment has already flown on aircraft or satellites the shuttle imaging radar instrument used side-looking radar to create map-like images of the earth's surface showing relief when supplemented with previously recorded landsat satellite data which could identify rocks and vegetation types the composite revealed geological structures of a type which could possibly contain valuable mineral deposits such as oil with the osta experiments mounted in the payload bay of space shuttle columbia at an altitude of 160 miles worldwide data was obtained proving that sensors previously used on costly individual satellites could now be flown in groups on shuttle along with low-cost commercial-grade sensors that could only be flown on aircraft before this will greatly reduce the cost of such experimentation in the future putting it within reach of low-budget researchers the ability to map earth from space also demonstrated the potential for these instruments to map other planets yet unexplored even through dense cloud cover as the shuttle imaging radar experiment was able to do at the end of the second day mission control had a special visitor joe dick this is ronald reagan hello mr president let me just say i'm sure you know how proud everyone down here is and now this whole nation i'm sure the world but certainly america has got its eyes and its heart on you well thank you very much mr president we're uh we're awfully honored that we've got the opportunity to uh to take part in this we certainly do appreciate uh you're taking the trouble to show all the people working on the space shuttle how much you care and it makes us mighty proud well i care and again god bless you both and all of us here are watching with great pride thank you very much sir thank you very much thank you with all the priority one objectives completed the crew was ready to come home entry and landing would be their last test for seven minutes roger and the port door is coming closed and i want to at least get it close here and stop the midwing talk okay that sounds good richard scale operator assume all of you check the configuration i'd like to come around the horn and get a go no go for the deal but burn fido guidance um girl he's still maneuvering his attitude understand dps we're dope like command go go eagle tnc go prop go booster go surgeon no go ops fall go hang on go and [Music] houston we have a go for the orbit burn three minutes remaining in this pass thank you the landing like the first mission would be at edwards air force base in california [Music] entry on this mission would test the vehicle's response to maneuvers not performed before [Music] and the role reversals will still be as updated at columbia houston the role reversals will still be as brief that there will be no significant effect on that early turn on the first roll reversal over roger i understand thanks rick [Music] the first maneuver done at the beginning of the communications blackout was executed at mach 24 the fastest speed at which manual control had ever been exercised in winged aerodynamic flight close to 30 maneuvers took place as the shuttle sliced through the atmosphere at speeds from mach 26 down to mach 11. at about mach 10 and a half colombia was expected to regain communications with mission control columbia houston through buckhorn configure aos you're about 25 miles south of ground track your nav is good your energy is good we'd like you to check your attack in mls and radar altimeters on over okay rick good to hear you and we're showing 10.5 fox 10 165 000 feet now roger everything's looking good your energy is very good the nav is good the first visual sighting of colombia was aided by plumes from reaction control system jets which were fired during a pitch 100 000 feet mark 3.6 you have positive [Music] [Applause] seats and we have a wind update for you and a weather update uh you've got a very thin layer at 25 000 the winds airborne are as brief and on the ground 2 2 0 18 knots gusting to 2-4 [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] let me houston we show you intercepting the hack and a reminder you've got the strong winds out of the west now out of 38 000 feet okay thank you [Music] and rick the maneuvers have been going very good the bird is real solid good solid bird all the well we love hearing it [Music] feedback's coming close [Music] roger slightly below glide slope if you have a gopher auto land okay rick thank you sir okay rick leonardo [Music] thank you [Music] okay 2500 feet speed bricks are closed for 270 knots chase concursion [Music] three down [Music] one hundred fifty thirty twenty ten five three touchdown nose gear fifteen 10 ten five three touchdown welcome home thank you chase [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] okay joe it's a great day for the ace moving company welcome home [Applause] although this second shuttle flight only lasted two and a half of the five and a half days planned it did answer some formidable questions the orbiter is truly a reusable spacecraft that can be launched again and again instruments in the payload bay can map earth's resources on a global scale and the remote manipulator system has met this flight's test objectives the completion of this flight marks the halfway point in the shuttle flight test program columbia's third flight commission of up to seven days duration is scheduled for the spring of 1982. the problems encountered so far are not unexpected during developmental flight testing indeed it is only through such testing that confidence in the vehicle its systems and its flying characteristics can be built the columbia is a totally new concept in manned space flight it needs very conservative very comprehensive testing before it can become operational making access to space something it's never been before routine you