If you’re fascinated by the idea of humans traveling through space and curious about how that all works, you’ve come to the right place.
“Houston We Have a Podcast” is the official podcast of the NASA Johnson Space Center from Houston, Texas, home for NASA’s astronauts and Mission Control Center. Listen to the brightest minds of America’s space agency – astronauts, engineers, scientists and program leaders – discuss exciting topics in engineering, science and technology, sharing their personal stories and expertise on every aspect of human spaceflight. Learn more about how the work being done will help send humans forward to the Moon and on to Mars in the Artemis program.
On Episode 209, NASA Artemis I flight directors Rick LaBrode and Judd Frieling detail what it will be like in Mission Control Houston during the agency’s next flight around the Moon. This episode was recorded on July 6, 2021.
Watch the full episode on video here!
Transcript
Gary Jordan (Host): Houston we have a podcast! Welcome to the official podcast of the NASA Johnson Space Center, Episode 209, “Artemis Flight Directors.” I’m Gary Jordan, and I’ll be your host today. On this podcast we bring in the experts, scientists, engineers, astronauts, all to let you know what’s going on in the world of human spaceflight. We’re gearing up for the first mission of NASA’s Artemis program that will return humans to the Moon in a sustainable way. Step one is the testing and verification of the SLS, or Space Launch System rocket, and the Orion spacecraft. The mission: Artemis I. We’ve discussed the mission objectives and mission profile before on this podcast, notably on Episode 180 with Artemis Mission Manager Mike Sarafin. Today we’ll be diving deeper into the operations of this mission profile. Joining us are two key flight directors for the Artemis I mission. We have Rick LaBrode, lead Artemis I flight director, and Judd Frieling, Artemis I ascent and entry flight director. Together the duo walks us through the Artemis mission from the perspective of sitting in Mission Control Houston. How have they prepared? What decisions are they making? What are the critical moments? So, let’s dive deep into the operations of a new era inside mission control on a journey to the Moon. Enjoy.
[ Music]
Host:Hey, everyone, thanks for joining us for an on-camera version of Houston We Have A Podcast, we’re going to be talking with flight directors Rick LaBrode and Judd Frieling today about what it’s like in mission control for an Artemis mission, specifically for Artemis I. Gentlemen, thanks for coming today.
Rick LaBrode: Pleasure.
Judd Frieling: Thanks for having us.
Host:Cool. Awesome, let’s get right into it. I wanted to talk mainly about the Artemis mission, we’re going to dive into the operations inside mission control, but first I want to understand a little bit more about you, your history and what got you into this position. Rick, we’ll start with you, I know you have a lot of experience with shuttle and some other stuff as well.
Rick LaBrode:Yeah, well, I started, actually this, the end of this month, it’ll be 36 years I’ve been working in mission control.
Host:Oh, my gosh.
Rick LaBrode:I started as a shuttle flight controller in the instrumentation and communications officer position. We have that same position in the Artemis program now.
Host:Cool.
Rick LaBrode:And basically, the comm[unications] guy, so responsible for the, all the communications with the shuttle. It’s the audio, the telemetry, the commands and video. So, I did that for 13 years, I was a contractor, and then I was just at the right spot at the right place in my career at the right time, and they opened up selections to flight directors to contractors, so I applied, and I was selected as the first contractor flight director. When I, when I joined the office then I became a civil servant. And when my class had four in it and two of us went ISS [International Space Station], two of them went shuttle. So, I started off on the ISS side.
Host: OK.
Rick LaBrode: And I did about the first half of the assembly sequence as an ISS flight director, and then I transferred over and was certified as a shuttle flight director and did the last half of the assembly sequence on the shuttle side. And because I was considered one of the more veteran flight directors in the office, I was able to, I worked the last three shuttle flights.
Host:Very cool, very cool. From the shuttle end?
Rick LaBrode:Right, right.
Host:OK, very cool. So how does that time, you look back on it now working with International Space Station, working with shuttle, what are some of the things you remember?
Rick LaBrode:Yeah, it was great, I mean just becoming a flight director is an amazing experience to start with, but and then going ISS. And I started in ’98, so it was just before we started the assembly sequence for the International Space Station, and I was fortunate when we launched the Expedition 1 crew, I was actually the flight director resident in, in Moscow in, in the control center in Moscow. So that, it was so, it was a completely different culture, but it was really enlightening to see how the, how the Russian flight control team operates. You know, we’re very similar and it’s a technical job and communications are paramount, so in that regard, they are very similar to what we do, and, but the culture is very different than anything I experienced before, so I really, really enjoyed that part of it, so.
Host:But that’s a big part of especially being an International Space Station flight controller, right, is you’re not, it’s not just a, it’s not a one mission control kind of thing. This is, it’s called an International Space Station for a reason.
Rick LaBrode:Right, right. Yeah, it’s a challenge, right? There’s challenges that come with it, there’s pros and cons, like everything, right?
Host:Yeah, yeah.
Rick LaBrode:They bring a lot to the table. They had a lot of experience in stations, right, with their Mir space station, and their experience, really, they brought a lot to the table. And we do things differently, but it was just great to have each other to lean on, so it was really a good experience.
Host:At what point did they call on you to say, hey, Rick, we’d like you to start working on Artemis now?
Rick LaBrode:That was pretty good, too. So, it was towards the end of the — it was, so it was probably 2008, so it was actually Constellation then.
Host: Wow.
Rick LaBrode:Yes, so Ares, and Orion was still there, but we had an individual in our office that was prime and he was, he had been a flight director for a while, so they wanted to give someone — offload, it was getting really busy, so they wanted to offload some of his work and they asked me to help him out, so I started doing that. And then he left the office and so I became prime, and then it was shortly after that the Constellation was cancelled, but Orion survived and then became the Artemis program, and so I kind of, I’ve been involved ever since and it’s, yeah —
Host:With different forms of what is a Moon mission or exploration?
Rick LaBrode:Oh, yeah, so I’ve seen it all.
Host:Very cool.
Rick LaBrode:Yeah, it’s been really neat.
Host:Awesome. Well, we’re going to get into a lot of what goes behind that, what you have been planning since 2008 when it comes to a Moon mission. We’ll get into that. Judd, I want to learn about your experience that led you to this, this Artemis role?
Judd Frieling:Sure, so I started actually a year before Rick got selected as a flight director, so.
Host:As a flight controller?
Judd Frieling:I was a flight controller is where I started. I started at the International Space Station, so I was a flight controller. I did the command and data handling portions, you know, all the onboard computers. I, we put a program together to kind of do multiple positions. I did that where not only did I, you know, watch over the computers of the space station, but also the attitude control determination system and also the comm system of the station. I did that for about seven years or so in the station, then I — had an opportunity to become a civil servant and to work on the, the shuttle side, so I was a shuttle flight controller in the DPS area, the data processing system, so it’s basically the computers on the shuttle network. So, I got to be an ascent/entry flight controller for, for shuttle and a DPS officer, so I did that a few years, even got to work the last missions as shuttle was retiring. And, and after the shuttle retired is when I got selected to be a flight director, so that was 2011, and I’ve been a flight director for space station ever since.
Host:Very cool. Now what, how do you compare those two roles, for those that might not be familiar is you were a flight controller for a long time, now you’ve become a flight director, so what are the responsibilities that you assumed?
Judd Frieling:Yeah, you know the — when you’re a flight controller really what you’re focused specifically on a system that you’re, you’re controlling, right? So, for instance, you know, when I was in charge of the computers, and so I had a real detailed knowledge of all the computer systems and — how failures might manifest, you know, how, you know, how they — kind of how they fit in with the other systems. But as a flight director, you really are looking at all of the systems and how they integrate together and you’re really more on track with how you can use those systems to perform your mission, and how, how you can bring the team together, what are the mission objectives, and, and know a little bit about a lot.
Host:[Laughter] Now you have to do it for Artemis, so when did you get the call that says, hey, we want you to move away from station and start doing more Moon missions?
Judd Frieling:Yeah, so I had completed a stint as an increment lead flight director for the station and was starting to, to get other lead assignments. So I had had a couple of, you know, spacewalks that I led and cargo missions, cargo vehicle missions that I led, and they were looking for, well, we have an area where, you know, we need, we need you to provide some help to our ascent/entry flight director at the time, Tony Ceccacci, and so I became his backup and, and started learning from him, you know, kind of what is this Artemis I mission all about, you know. And that was really in the development phase when we were really trying to, to psych out all the mission rules, all the how are we going to, you know, put this whole thing together, what are the limitations of the rockets and what’s the limitation of the capsule, those kinds of things. Not too long after that, I think it was maybe a year or so after, after I was, you know, Tony’s backup, he retired, and so then I was a little bit, got a field promotion.
Host:[Laughter] Filled in, perfect.
Judd Frieling:Right, yeah. [Laughter]
Host:It sounds, you, you mentioned lead, you were lead increment, lead for spacewalks, for cargo missions; sounds like that’s a little bit different. As a flight director you’re the lead in the room, but now it sounds like there’s a little bit more that goes to being a lead for a certain part of what is the International Space Station missions. What goes into being a lead?
Judd Frieling:Yeah, so just like Rick is the lead for Artemis I, you know, we have leads for various dynamic missions in, in the space station as well, right? So, things that take a little bit more planning and a little bit more coordination than just your average day-to-day life on the station, right? So, we assign leads to those little bit more dynamic phases, so spacewalks is a really good example. There’s a lot of intricate planning and detailed, you know, coordination among the different team members that, that you really need somebody to kind of, you know, honcho and help pull together and lead, and so that’s what we assign that. So, cargo missions is another great example, you know, there’s multiple different teams from multiple centers, you know, that we need to make sure that we’re all, you know, looking at the same sheet of music, essentially.
Host:Got it. So, so Rick, from your lead position of Artemis, what responsibilities, aside from sitting in mission control and actually being the flight director for whatever your shift is, what are the lead responsibilities that you’re helping out with?
Rick LaBrode:Yeah. I think, and this goes for any lead, any lead role, whether it be for an increment in ISS or a cargo mission or Artemis, is the lead is, is really, ultimately responsible for building the mission and then executing it. And that’s, that’s, you interface with the programs, with ESD, the Exploration System Division at Headquarters. They provide us the mission objectives, the mission priorities that they want us to go and accomplish, and then we take those, we build a plan, and we train to that plan, and then we go and execute that plan. So, and it’s a constant back and forth, so the lead is this point person really that’s interfacing with the up and out, and then conveys it down and in and works with the various piece parts to build that plan and then go and train it and then execute it.
Host:So essentially, it sounds like it’s a high level plan first, like the goal is we want to put, you know, human boots on the Moon, that’s what we want to do, and you’re saying here’s how we get there from an operational perspective, here’s what we need to accomplish, here’s what we need to verify to get to that goal.
Rick LaBrode:Yeah, they rely on us to actually put together the mission to achieve their, their mission objectives.
Host:That’s it, OK. Now let’s dive into mission control. So, what do you do? So, there’s a lot of different pieces to this, this is specifically about when it comes to an Artemis mission, what are you doing in mission control. So, the grander picture, Judd, I’ll go to you, the grander picture when it comes to an Artemis mission, what is the responsibility, what is the purpose of mission control?
Judd Frieling:Essentially to be responsible for all of the execution of that mission, that particular mission, so whether that be, you know, uplinking plans to do burns, whether that be, you know, coordinating all the communication requirements, things like that. That’s essentially what mission control does, is it controls the vehicle. And so, so, we, we do that a number of different ways, we talked about a little bit, you know, being a flight controller versus a flight director, you know? We divide the vehicle up into different systems. And so each one of those systems we represent with a flight controller, right? So, one of those systems could be the computer systems, one of them could be the communication systems, one of them could be the navigation systems, one of them eventually will be the environmental systems when we, we put humans on Artemis; thermal systems. And so, we look to each one of those flight controllers to advise us on, hey, what’s going on with that system, you know, how best can we, you know, complete our mission objectives based on conditions that we, we encountered?
Host:Got it. Now, Rick, this — taking everything that Judd just said, for Artemis I, what is that mission that you guys are controlling, what is Artemis I?
Rick LaBrode:Yeah, so the biggest thing with Artemis I, our primary objective really is to test the vehicle, validate its capability before we put astronauts on Artemis II. So, we have — we’re building and we’re still doing it right now, we’re building the timeline that’s going to include just operating the systems, to understand how they’re going to perform in the cislunar environment or during ascent and entry for Judd’s team. You know, they’ve done testing, so we have a feel for how the system is going to operate, testing at Plum Brook [Station, now known as the Neil A. Armstrong Test Facility] where they do a thermal vacuum and they bring it all the way down to vacuum, they heat it, they cool it. And so, we see how the system has responded in the test, but it’s a different environment when you get — when you leave low-Earth orbit and you’re heading to the Moon. So we’re building a timeline, a mission plan, a flight plan, that’s going to, just going to just test all the various systems and each of the disciplines that Judd spoke of, they are responsible for their systems and operating it and doing these, we call them detailed flight test objectives or flight test objectives; operating the system to see how it’s going to operate, how it’s going to function and, and just we’re following the timeline. Now a big piece about the mission control also is when things don’t go as planned, for whatever reason, we run into something we didn’t expect, then we have to replan, we retimeline, we may move — hey, that didn’t turn out the way we planned it, but we understand, or we’ve got to look at the data, we understand. So, let’s try it again, and so the team has to rebuild the plan that we spent months building and now we’ve got to replan it. So, there’s, there’s execution shifts, there’s replan shifts, and so it just continues 24/7 we’re just working on executing the mission and then updating the flight plan as necessary to get all those mission objectives accomplished.
Host:That’s it, so when it comes to, Judd, like all those things that are coming in, what, like that are monitoring, really let’s just, let’s just say like the avionics position, all the data is coming in and they say, ooh, this is not what it’s supposed to be, because I know what it’s supposed to be at this, so this is where those replans, this is where those, those different operations come in that says, you know, this is how we’re going to deal with this scenario.
Judd Frieling:Yeah, so, so in your example an avionics person says, hey, I’ve got a computer that’s throwing me a piece of information that is not right, or, or you know, forbid, that the computer, one of the computers has failed, you know, completely, yeah. So they’ll say, hey, these are the things that we can do with it, you know, to try to troubleshoot, you know, these are the capabilities that we have lost, these are the capabilities that we still have, and so, then you put that together with, well, what are the forward objectives that we have for the vehicle, you know, coming up, you know, are they still compatible, are we going to have to move those down, you know, down the line a little bit further until we, you know, completely troubleshoot what the problem is that you had in this particular system?
Host:So when it comes in the room, the flight director, it sounds like is the person that’s really absorbing all the information from that avionics guy, from, you know, wherever, ground control, make sure all the satellites are working and make sure you’ve got the systems in mission control, you’re the one absorbing all of that information. Give us a lay of the land. So, it sounds like, it sounds like, if I were to look at a picture of mission control you guys have rows of different flight controllers, you’re in the back, you’re listening to all this information, you’re looking at a lot of data. You know, what’s sort of the lay of the land when it comes to, you know, mission control? Is it just the one room of people, what’s, what’s happening in there?
Rick LaBrode:Yeah, so, so, you know, for each one of those systems, those systems flight controllers that represent a system on a vehicle, they, they have multiple support, you know, people that they can call upon. Sometimes they’ll — usually have a backroom, you know, another person that’s really in the down and in, you know, detailed part of the system, whereas the flight controller out in the front room, they’re more, they absolutely have that knowledge but they’re also looking to kind of integrate and try to understand how they’re going to impact the other systems. In addition to the backroom support that they have, you, you have mission evaluation, you have engineers that have worked on the, the vehicle, have in many cases built the vehicle, and so you can reach back and draw upon their experience to try and troubleshoot something that maybe you haven’t seen before or try to understand, you know, did we expect this or was this a feature of the vehicle.
Host:So, you have the flight controllers, they have their own support networks. You’ve got some engineering support. And if I’m, if I’m understanding this correctly, all of that feeds up to the flight director?
Rick LaBrode:Right.
Host:Now the flight director, do they have the ultimate authority over the mission?
Rick LaBrode: Absolutely. You know, if everything goes as planned, we don’t have to really, our job is very easy, we just let the team execute the timeline and get the data and it’s a great mission, but that’s, that’s not very likely. So, when things don’t go as planned then they look to the flight director to, to weigh the options, you know? We understand the priorities that have been given to us from the programs or ESD, and then we weigh the options based on inputs from the flight control team, their MPSRs (multipurpose support room), the engineering team, the program provides comments. And we ultimately have the responsibility to make a decision as to how to proceed from here, what is our, what’s our next step.
Host:OK, so and it’s kind of like they’re advisors, the flight controllers are sort of advisors to you. And you say, hey, Judd, this is happening, what should we do? And you’re the one that has to make that ultimate decision, and that’s the culture. The culture is very hierarchical, it’s very leadership, if you say that’s what we’re doing, that’s what we’re doing.
Judd Frieling:Yep.
Rick LaBrode:Yeah.
Host:OK.
Rick LaBrode:I mean over the years, you know, and the culture, you mentioned, we’ve developed an incredible relationship across the, it’s a family, so there’s a trust factor that has been developed over the several years that we’ve been working together on this mission. You know, it’s a team effort to build the timeline and then we go and train it, and we’ve been through all these scenarios the training team has thrown at us, all these failures, and you learn how each other, each other works. And so, it’s just amazing how, how it becomes a cohesive team and how it, it becomes easy. I mean the hard part is, you know, when you get two things that are just equal, how do you decide which way you want to go, and that’s where the flight directors, you know, come in. And you know, through experience, though, you know, gut feelings sometimes, you know, and through discussion amongst the team here, we talk amongst ourselves and try to figure out, weigh the options and, but it’s — really the team effort that really helps us drive, you know, drive the decisions.
Host: That trust factor seems super-important too because you have to rely — these are your advisors, they’re making recommendations to your, you’re the one that has to say this is what that is and then have to go execute it, but it has to go back to that training that you said, so there’s this training. So, Judd, what are you guys doing to train, to prepare all the different team members so that you can and when the moment comes trust them?
Judd Frieling:Yeah, so I mean back to the first point, back to the first point, though too, you know, it’s not as if all situations are like that, where, where we, you know, we always have to, you know, kind of figure out what to do. We try to write a lot of those things down before the mission, right, we try to write down, you know, what are the scenarios we think of, of, let’s say, we lose this one piece of equipment can we continue on the mission? And we write those down in what are called flight rules, and those flight rules are pretty much a contract with the enterprise, the programs, that say, hey, for these types of scenarios we’ve kind of pre-thought those out beforehand and, and, so we all agree this is the avenue we’re going to take, right? It’s when we’re outside of those kind of pre-thought-out things is when, you know, what Rick is talking about a little bit there is that we, you know, we talk about options, we talk about, you know, is there something that’s in line with the philosophy of our mission rules. And so to your point on, on training, what we do is in training is we, we present the flight controllers and the team with scenarios that are maybe right on the edge of, you know, they’re not exactly what the flight rules would say we would do, they’re kind of in a little bit of a gray area, and so they push the boundaries, right? So that helps, you know, our controllers be more of methodical thinkers and talk about, you know, what’s the methodology, you know? We have a rule, we have a mission rule that says we’re going to do this X, but I mean what happens if it’s not exactly that, you know, that exact, you know, way that the failure presents itself, you know, what’s really the intent? And that’s really what we’re trying to teach when we do these simulations, right, is how do you not only communicate really effectively with not only your flight director, the rest of the team, but also how do you convey the intent of what previous mission rules have told you, you should, you should be after? How do you, how do you convey that in a precise, concise, methodical manner?
Host:So, it’s not only understanding the vehicle and understanding the operations and you don’t, you know, it goes, to your point it goes beyond understanding just, you know, what happens in a normal scenario, you have these rules that are helping to guide your decisions and make the recommendations, all thought out ahead of time, that’s awesome; but really, what the training does is it helps you to think about that flight rule, what is, how should I interpret that, because it’s not exactly within those parameters, so how can I interpret that, how can I make recommendations? But it sounds like communication is a huge piece of it too?
Judd Frieling:Huge.
Host:Not only being able to digest the information, but to calmly and correctly assess and deliver that information to you, the flight director?
Rick LaBrode:Yeah, when we evaluate a flight controller to be certified to operate their console for whatever specific phase of the mission, that is, that is the first item that we evaluate is communication skills. Because without that then they can’t work as a team, they can’t, they could be the smartest person in the room, smartest person on — that system, and if they can’t articulate that to the flight director, to other team members, their own team members, then it just, it won’t work, it just won’t work. So that, communications is paramount.
Host:That is huge. OK, let’s get into the Artemis mission. So, we’re going around the room, we’re looking at all the different roles that have to contribute advice to you, the flight director, Judd, what are those, what are those roles in the room with you, what are the different flight control positions?
Judd Frieling:Yes, so we start off in the ascent phase and we have a little bit more flight controllers in the ascent phase than we do —
Host:Right, not just in the room.
Judd Frieling:— because we have a whole different other vehicle, right? We have actually two other vehicles with us, so we’ve got a booster that, that takes us up and not only the SLS core stage, Space Launch System core stage, but we also have a second stage which is the interim control propulsion module, ICPS (interim cryogenic propulsion stage). And so, I have a flight controller that represents the booster, right, you know, and really with the booster it’s that first and second stage. So, there’s a booster flight controller and he, he knows all about all of the, you know, the cryogenics, the valves, the engine performance that’s supposed to happen with all of the engines. But then I also have a control position, who is really in charge of understanding how does that rocket, not only the core stage and the ICPS, how is that supposed to be controlled, you know? What are the, you know, guidance and navigation control inputs and outputs for the rockets, both the first stage and second stage? So, in addition to that, I’ve got, you know, folks that are responsible for looking at the capsule. So, the Orion capsule, you know, making sure that the systems are good on the Orion capsule because eventually the rocket is going to drop Orion off, you know, in translunar orbit and we want to make sure that the capsule is still looking good as far as we can tell when it goes, heads towards the Moon. So as part of the capsule systems we have, you know, guidance, navigation, control officer, GNC, looking to make sure you know where you’re at, you know how to get to where you want to go. We’ve got a flight trajectory officer, you know, a FDO, flight dynamics officer, and they’re really in charge of, well, where is that place that you need to go, right? You know, how do we get there, you know, what’s the correct burn trajectory? Where do we need to burn, at what — speed? And then we’ve also got, you know, for the other systems part, we’ve got an electrical officer, who is not only electrical officer but also is in charge of the mechanics part of the Orion vehicle as well, so it’s a kind of a dual role of EPS, electric power systems, and the mechanical. We call them an MPO, it’s mechanical and power officer, right? So, they’re advising us on all the solar array inputs from the service module that’s connected to the Orion space capsule. They’re advising us on the mechanical systems, so the pyrotechnics that have to be fired in order to make things move in all manners. We also have an environmental systems operator, even though we don’t have a full life support system on Orion for Artemis I, we do have thermal control and we’ve got somebody that needs to look after all of the thermal control aspects of that, and so that’s the EECOM (Emergency, Environmental and Consumables Manager), you know, environmental control officer. Obviously, we’ve got a ground control, you know, person that’s kind of in charge of all of the ground stations, communicating, you know, when we, when we need to get all the ground stations, you know, at the right times. We’ve got a communication officer, INCO (Instrumentation and Communications Officer), which was what Rick was formerly a controller for back in the shuttle days, so they’re in charge of all the communications. And then we’ve got a CDH officer, a command and data handling officer, who is in charge of the avionics or the computers onboard.
Host: So, Rick, this makes me think about you were talking about people and the communication skills and everything because one thing that’s going through my head is you have all these different, they sound very technical, you know, you’re getting the flight dynamics, you’re thinking about trajectories, guidance navigation and control, all these different systems of Orion and the boosters. There’s got to be a reason why you can’t just let data do the work and then it just gets fed to you, and then you can make decisions, why do you have to have all these different people?
Rick LaBrode:Well, so we have a good idea through testing on how the systems are going to operate, but they’re not going to operate exactly how they tested here on the 1 g on, on Earth. So, the team is there to monitor and then control the system to make sure it’s operating the way it’s designed to and the way we need it to in order to execute the mission and achieve the objectives. You know, if things go perfectly there’s an onboard sequencer that in a lot of ways, will, you know, change the configuration of the system as we go through the timeline, but there’s, it’s very manual, also there’s a lot of interaction that the team has to do. They have to be building commands continuously to configure the vehicle: their system, both pre-burn in order to execute the burn, and then post-burn, get back into the coast configuration. And so, there’s a lot of care and feeding that the team has to, has to do, and that’s one of the, I don’t want to say it was a challenge but one of the differences that in working with Lockheed Martin, the prime contractor for Orion, is their, their expertise, most of their experience base, has been the uncrewed deep space probes, which were totally automated, right? So, when you put humans onboard there’s a whole new aspect, and so we’ve had to work with each other and learn how each other works, you know, to get along, and because there’s dramatic differences in the way we operate. So, the flight control team and mission control are really responsible for making sure that the system operates the way it’s supposed to.
Host:So, there’s, it goes beyond the data that’s just being delivered, it goes into the, it sounds like it’s like the interpretation of that data. Each, each system is wildly intricate in its own way, and you said each of them have different support networks, too, that are thinking about even more intricate details.
Rick LaBrode:Yes.
Host:And so, you just need those levels of understanding to have that information be — so ultimately when it’s delivered to you, the flight director, it is delivered by a human, that human has digested all the information, thought about it, they’ve studied, they’ve put in the work, and now they’re the ones making the recommendation to you. You need that person.
Rick LaBrode: Absolutely.
Judd Frieling:Yeah, I mean it’s — true in most systems, you know, when you cross boundaries, whether it’s an interface boundary, whether it’s with, with hardware or with people, you know, the greatest chance of you losing, either dropping communication or to get communication garbled, is those boundaries between two different systems or two different teams, right? And so, that’s, that part is really what we need a human in the loop to help us out with, like interpret, you know, what is, what is the, you know, the correct communication that needs to happen between these two things.
Rick LaBrode:A good example, there’s going to be phases throughout the mission where whenever we do a major burn we have to position the solar arrays in just, a position that will support the loading from the actual burning of the engine, and then also, thermal from the thrusters that are firing; we want to protect them. And when we go to these positions, we’re no longer generating power, or severely reduced power generation. So we have batteries on Orion that will then provide the systems the battery, but depending on how long we’re out of attitude and where those batteries are with respect to state of charge, we may not be able to handle the next worst failure of losing a battery. So we, we may have to do what would be called powerdowns or crossties, and these flight controllers, the MPO officer, mechanical and power officer, who is going to have to come to us with recommendations on what should we do in order to configure the vehicle to ensure that we can successfully make it through this burn and achieve, ultimately achieve the objectives.
Host:Because it’s not just about that next thing, that person is thinking about the step after that and making sure, OK, what — if I make this decision how is that going to impact downstream?
Rick LaBrode:Yes, we’re really good about always thinking about the next worse failure.
Host:Yeah.
Rick LaBrode:And putting ourselves in a configuration that will be able to support that.
Host:So, Rick, earlier on you mentioned, you know, what is the purpose, you know, what are we trying to accomplish for Artemis I, and you said we have, you know we designed a mission profile for Artemis I that is going to help us to meet some objectives. So, tell us a little bit about that profile, what is, what is the booster, Orion, what is everything going to do to meet the objectives that you want to meet for this mission?
Rick LaBrode:Yes, well, so it’s two pieces, let me start with. So we’ve done a lot of testing, there’s a lot of analysis on how the systems are going to operate, what, what thermally, what’s their boundaries, you know? So, the engineering team have done a lot of analysis, so they have a pretty good understanding, but without real data there’s a lot of margin in those analyses. And the analysis really, they put constraints on how we operate the vehicle, so most of the time as we’re coasting to the, to the Moon, we’re tail to the Sun, so we’re putting the rear end of Orion towards the Sun, and the solar arrays are out parallel and they’re, direct sunlight onto the arrays generating as much power as we can. And if we were to leave that attitude, rules right now the analysis show we can leave it for three hours at a time, and then when we come back we have to be in attitude for ten hours to recover. Those are pretty significant constraints on if we wanted to do some, some other mission objective. This mission, the data, we’re going to go out of altitude for periods of time, we’re going to see how the systems respond, we’re going to come back in altitude, we’re going to see how long it recovers. So after our mission all that data is going to be used to update the engineering models, so the next time we fly this vehicle, with the astronauts onboard, we’re going to, we’re going to, there’ll be less conservatism in it, so it’ll make it easier for us to be able to operate that vehicle. So that’s kind of the big picture part of it. The other piece, so ascent, obviously testing the rocket to make sure it can insert the vehicle and Orion into the right spot, and — every mission has a different profile. So, they’re testing the performance of the rocket itself and the solid rocket boosters, and then the same thing with the upper stage, you know, how — it’s going to be completely different on our mission, Artemis I, it’s going to do the translunar injection send us on the way to the Moon, but it’s not going to do that for Artemis II, it’s going to put them in a high lunar orbit where they can test the systems out for 24 to 36 hours, I think, before they actually commit to the Moon, and it’ll be the service module that will actually do the last burn, TLI (translunar injection) burn, to get Orion going to the Moon. So, we’re testing the systems to prove that they’re capable of doing what we need them to do when we put astronauts on there. And then Orion itself, you know, when we go to the Moon we’re going to be using all the big engines, the OMS (orbital maneuvering system) engine, which is the ones at the backend, that was actually a heritage shuttle engine that we used on the shuttle, that had been used on Orion, and then it has the auxiliary thrusters, those are our main means of doing large translational burns or big burns, essentially, so we need to test those, the capability of those, of those systems. And then, and then on the way back, one of — before we get back, there’s a lot of pieces that need to operate. We have an optical nav[igation] system that is used to update the onboard nav state in the event we lost comm, a permanent loss of comm, the optical nav system actually could be used to update the, update the onboard state vector so that we could bring Orion back successfully. There’s star trackers, there’s all the thermal control system, we’re going to be wringing out that system, testing that, where’s the edges of the box, you know, really getting that engineering data so we can update our models and really understand how it works. And then one of the, one of the major pieces of the mission, one of the major objectives, is to test the heat shield, coming back at lunar velocities, to make sure that it will support keeping Orion intact and then so the astronauts can safely splashdown coast of California.
Host:Perfect, so you are, this is definitely a mission to really, you said put it through the wringer, to really wring out, test, push the limits of this, of these vehicles, you really want to understand, because it sounds like you can’t really do it on Earth, it sounds like this is something you have to test in space, all these different, the thrusters, you know, you can put in a sim[ulation] as many times as you want, but when you actually put it into space, what’s it going to do? Turning the solar arrays away from the Sun, not something you want to do with humans onboard, but let’s test it out, let’s see if those limits are what we expect? You can only test in space, that’s really what it comes down to.
Judd Frieling:And you can only test it as an integrated vehicle, you know, so one of the first things that they’re going to test is going to do a modal test, you know, to kind of vibrate the whole thing and see how everything shakes and make sure it doesn’t shake itself to death, right?
Host: Yeah.
Judd Frieling:You know, and so you can only do that, you know, when you’re in space with the whole vehicle, right?
Host: Without putting the crew in danger.
Judd Frieling:Exactly.
Host:Test it now before you put the crew onboard.
Judd Frieling:Right, you know and it’s incremental steps too, right? I mean you test this, you, you kind of get the data that you need to anchor all your engineering models, you know, because their best guesses right now and that’s why Rick was talking earlier about how, how heavily constrained some of these things are. It’s because from an engineering point of view, you just don’t know how, how much of fidelity you have on the models, right? And so, the way you anchor, though, is you get test data and then, you know, all the way to the end where you know you’re making sure that, that whole capsule can come back, you know, do a mission, come back safely, you know, and be intact so that you have high confidence that when you put humans and astronauts onboard, you know, that they’ll come back safely.
Host:You mentioned earlier on, Rick, that it’s a long day, the launch day is a long day, so we’re going to, let’s jump there, let’s jump to launch day for Artemis I. Judd, you’re on first, right? So, what are some of the first things that you’re looking at on launch day for Artemis I?
Judd Frieling:So, you know, we start off the day, obviously, you know, the launch team at Kennedy Space Center has prepped the vehicle, they’ve put it together, it’s taken them months and months and months to put the vehicle together. They’ve loaded up all the fuel onboard, they’ve started to turn on all the systems, so all of the lights come on, all the computers come on. We start to get data; they start to get data. Once they’re ready and they’ve met all of their constraints, they’ll launch the vehicle and then hand it immediately over to my team. And, of course, we’ll be following along with them lockstep, but we’re more of advisors, you know, when we’re still on the ground. We’re saying this is how, you know, if you had this failure here, this is how it would affect the mission going forward, you know, but we’re not really the prime folks that are going to say things or you know troubleshoot or things like that. But as soon as the rocket is lit then my team is in control, we’re making sure that, you know, from the get-go that we’re doing the right thing that we’re supposed to do, we start that roll maneuver out and keep on going towards, you know, our max dynamic pressure throttle bucket. You know, once that’s complete that we’re, you know, ejecting the solid rocket boosters, you know, they do their job after about two minutes, and then we continue on with just the core stage engines. And we’ll follow that all the way up to MECO, main engine cutoff, of those four major engines. And then the ICPS plus the Orion service module and Orion capsule, they will, they will separate from the core stage, core stage will fall back to Earth in, in the ocean, and ICPS and above will continue on, and ICPS then goes and does a series of burns. And before it does its first burn, which is a perigee raise maneuver, so perigee is the closest approach to the, to the Earth, when it does that burn, before it does the burn to raise that altitude of perigee we go ahead and deploy the solar arrays. So, so up until that point the Orion spacecraft is on batteries this whole time through the mission. So at about 16-ish, 17 minutes or so, we start to deploy the solar arrays and make sure that they deploy, first of all, and that we can get them in the proper, you know, as Rick was alluding to, the proper angles and sweep in order to do that first perigee raise maneuver burn that’s going to be done by the ICPS.
Host:ICPS is the…
Rick LaBrode:It’s the interim control propulsion module, so it’s the second stage.
Host:Second stage, OK.
Rick LaBrode: Yeah.
Host:Cool.
Judd Frieling:And so that second stage burns PRM (perigee raise maneuver) and we go through another series of, you know, ICPS takes us through a bunch of kind of roll maneuvers, just kind of to make sure that the thermal heating on all sides of the whole vehicle is heated and cooled equivalent. We, we start to use our ammonia boiler systems on the Orion spacecraft at that point to start cooling the interior. So, we’ve got a heat exchanger that exchanges ammonia on the outside with the coolant loop, which is a glycol-type of coolant on the inside. And we make sure that we reject all the heat, that all the avionics and all of the interior part of the Orion is, and we make sure that that’s working OK. And then eventually about an hour-and-a-half or so into the mission we do the translunar injection burn with ICPS, that second stage, and hopefully that takes us on our trajectory to the Moon.
Host: There you go.
Judd Frieling:Right.
Host:You have to activate the spacecraft, check everything out, make sure it is good to go before you get to that point.
Judd Frieling:Yeah. Right.
Host:At what point are you taking over, Rick?
Rick LaBrode:Right after Orion separates, after the, the upper stage does, performs translunar injection.
Host:OK.
Rick LaBrode:And then Orion pops off and does a — that’s we’re going to do a quick handover then because, as Judd mentioned, the modal survey, that’s one of the first things we have to do, and it’s just a series of RCS reaction control thruster firings, and we have accelerometers in there doing video, watching how the solar arrays are going to flap. I don’t know if you’ve ever seen it, but there’s some old video of a bridge, and I think it was in California, that the winds came by and hit a resonant frequency and it basically destroyed itself.
Host:Was it the bridge that was sort of doing a sine wave kind of maneuver?
Rick LaBrode:Yes, so the winds caused it to hit a resonant frequency that caused it to basically self-destruct. We’re testing an onboard system to make sure the gains on the control systems are set such that that doesn’t happen.
Host:Got it.
Rick LaBrode: So, we’re going to do that quick test. Until we do that test we’re limited on how long of burns we can do or they can only be — the OMS burn, the big engine, it would ultimately get us to go into the distant retrograde orbit, 30 seconds, and that’s not near long enough to do anything on our mission. So we’ve got to get a good modal survey, and then also on my shift, we will do the first, they’re called outbound trajectory correction, they’re correction burns, they’re small burns, but the very first one we’re actually going to, it’s going to be the OMS checkout burn. So we’re going to burn the OMS engine for 30 seconds to make sure it’s good to go because the first time we use it actually is for the outbound powered flyby, and that’s setting us up to the distant retrograde orbit and you want to make sure it works well, so it’s going to test it there.
Host:Got it.
Rick LaBrode:So, those are the primary things on Flight Day 1, and then after that we do, we’re — it’s just a series, a couple days as we coast up to the outbound trajectory flyby, we have a couple trajectory, trajectory correction maneuvers. We want to make sure when we go by the Moon, which by the way it’s going to be around 60 miles off the surface of the Moon.
Host:Close.
Rick LaBrode:Crazy. So, we’ve got to make sure we don’t get too close, right? And that’s what those trajectory correction maneuvers are really important, targeting that outbound power flyby, and then we’ll burn that guy and that’ll take us up to the distant retrograde orbit where we’ll do an insertion, and depending on if we launch in November it’s around 14 days, I think we’re up in that orbit, it’s either half a lap or a lap-and-a-half, so.
Host:Got it.
Rick LaBrode: And that’s all, it depends on what time of the year we launch and that’s all to set up for lighting at splashdown for Judd and the recovery team. We want it to be lit so that the recovery forces can watch the, watch the capsule come down, watch the chutes deploy, just see how it functions, and then recover all the piece parts.
Host:Lit meaning the sun is shining in the sky —
Judd Frieling:Sun is shining, yes, off the coast of San Diego.
Host:— right, off the coast of San Diego, there it is. So, and that burn happens at the Moon?
Rick LaBrode: It does.
Judd Frieling:Pretty much, yeah, it’s like what, six or seven days before splashdown.
Rick LaBrode:Yeah, so it starts when we actually depart, it’s DRD, distant retrograde departure burn, which starts heading us back to the Moon and then ultimately, you know, where the shuttle used to have the deorbit burn, our deorbit burn is actually is happening as we go by the Moon, and Judd is going to take that shift, so it targets the — but when we leave the DRO (distant retrograde orbit) it actually sets up for when we’re going to actually do that return powered flyby.
Host:So, before we head back to Earth and talk about some of the things there, what are some of the checkouts that are happening in the — lunar vicinity?
Rick LaBrode:You know, actually around the Moon it’s very similar to the things we’re doing on the way there and on the way back. The optical nav system checkout —
Host: Systems, yes.
Rick LaBrode: — we have a series of payloads, we have a series of PAO (public affairs office) events where we’re doing, taking Earth and moonshots as we leave or get closer.
Host:Oh, those would be really cool.
Rick LaBrode:One of the big things when we’re in the DRO is to look, look for that first Moonrise, that shot.
Host:Earthrise, yes, yes, that’s a big one, yes.
Rick LaBrode:Yeah, so that is a big one. So and again, it’s all testing the systems, we’re doing different mode operations for the systems, like the radiators we go to a flow control versus speed control, which is just a different mode of operating it, just to see how it’s going to, going to operate.
Host:Very cool, yes. So, when we get to recovery, Judd, what are some of the key things that you’re going to be looking for? We already, we have spoilers with the heat shield, there’s a couple of other things that you’re going to be looking for, what are those key things?
Judd Frieling:Yes, so, so once we’re way back at the Moon and we do the burn to get us out, you know, we’re looking for a very tight corridor to, for entry interface. You know, it all has to do with the geometry and, and the speed and everything, you know, if you’re too shallow you bore in to the Earth too much and you burn up the heat shield too much; if you’re too shallow — no, sorry, too shallow then you’ll skip off, if you go bore in too hard then you, you know, you have too much heating on the, on the thermal.
Host: Goldilocks kind of approach —
Judd Frieling:So, you’re trying to get right at the right part. We’re also trying to do an objective where we get to a point where we do what’s called a skip entry, we do, we intentionally get at an angle where we skip a little bit and then come right back in, and that’s in order so we get like a double heating profile so that we test the heat shield to make sure if we ever want to do that, you know, on future crewed flights, that we have that capability to have a double thermal, you know, heat shield objective so that it gives us more flexibility in future missions to have a different EI corridor or EI constraints, or entry interface constraints.
Host:OK, and you’re doing that purposefully for Artemis I?
Judd Frieling:Artemis I.
Host: Just to test it and then you won’t do a skip entry unless — but now you know you can.
Judd Frieling:Now we know we can, yes, we can. So maybe if that, you know if the mission dictates it in the future, we know that the heat shield can take it, and that’s exactly what we’re looking for, right? We’re looking to see how does the heat shield perform, so that we know for future missions, you know, how do we modify or create those missions such that you know we take full advantage of the capability of the vehicle. So, once we hit entry interface, you know, we’re pretty much along for the ride. It’s really quick from there, it’s about 20 minutes —
Host: Wow.
Judd Frieling:— till we splashdown from entry interface. Obviously, we’re looking to make sure that all of the systems come online, you know, we have baroaltimeters that tell us you know what the altitude is because you need to deploy your drogue chutes and your main chutes at certain altitudes and that’s heavily reliant on what altitude, what pressure that the atmosphere is at that determines the altitude. And we have GPS [global positioning system] receivers that come on and also tell us that, not only tells us altitude in addition to what the baroaltimeters tell us, but also tell us where we’re at and so, kind of how do we steer, how do we steer ourselves into the wind as we’re coming in, right?
Host:Cool.
Judd Frieling:And so, so we’re making sure that all of those systems come online properly and are able to, you know, meet the demands of the splashdown.
Host:That is quite a mission, there’s a lot to that. When you’re looking at it and looking at what there is left to do to, to build up to this moment, what do you guys still have to work on from now, the time that we’re recording this, to, to when we actually are ready to go on the launchpad for Artemis I, what’s there left to do?
Rick LaBrode:Probably the most significant thing is to train the team and certify the team to be ready to execute the mission.
Host:OK.
Rick LaBrode:As we, as we do that, though, we’re, we’re refining our rules. Judd talked about the flight rules, our contract with the programs and the enterprise. We’re learning, we’re learning as they test the vehicle and they’re assembling it out at KSC and they’re testing it, we’re learning idiosyncrasies of it that may affect our rules and the way we’re going to operate it. So, we’re training, certifying the team, and we’re making sure our products are, are ready to go, those are the primary objectives.
Judd Frieling:Yeah, and I would say in addition to that, so up to this point the individual teams have trained together really well. Like so, for instance, the flight control team in Houston, we’ve done a lot of simulations and Rick talked about those together just as a Houston team. Down at KSC the launch, you know, the launch team has done a lot of training events for just that launch team. You know, the, the mission evaluation engineering guys they’ve trained individually. So, what we’re really focusing on now is making sure all of those teams come together and function as a cohesive unit, right? You know, the recovery team, so they know that we’re all on the same page. The launch team we know. So — it basically becomes, you know, a seamless end-to-end mission that starts, you know, with the folks at Kennedy Space Center, you know, transitions over to us at Johnson, and then back, you know, at that splashdown in San Diego to, to the folks at Kennedy and with the help of, of our Navy friends.
Host:And it all works together.
Rick LaBrode: Yes, we refer to those as joint integrated simulations, and we’re also taking advantage of a lot of the things they already planned down at KSC, like when they do a wet dress rehearsal or a prelaunch sim, Judd and his team will be on console just to start, continue to build these relationships, you know, in the flight environment, so it really is very important to be successful.
Host:It’s all coming up real soon, and it sounds like you guys have a lot that you need to focus on, a lot to do, but when it comes down to it we’re doing a mission to the Moon, around the Moon. We’re going to see Earth rise, we’re going to see a lot of cool stuff. When you look at, Rick, what are you looking forward to most?
Rick LaBrode:Wow, that’s a good question. Just the whole experience of leaving low-Earth orbit. I’ve been doing this, as I said, 36 years, and you know, all of it’s been low-Earth orbit until now. And I was mentioning to Judd that I’m every bit as excited about this mission as I was the first day I walked in the doors, coming out of college, you know, walking into mission control for the first time. It’s, you know, there’s a lot of responsibility, so I’m going to be really, really nervous.
Host: Yeah.
Rick LaBrode:But just the team is amazing, that we’ve got so much support from across the globe, really, it’s going to be so exciting, I just, yeah, it’s going to be hard to contain myself.
Host:Very cool. Judd, what about you?
Judd Frieling:I’m really looking forward to splashdown, right, off San Diego, and it’s not so much, you know, that it’s the end of a mission, it’s the beginning of a campaign, right? You know, it is the beginning of a campaign of, you know, reengaging that, you know, pushing the boundaries of human exploration to go to the, to the Moon and beyond to Mars.
Host:Beautiful. And we’ll end it right there. Gentlemen, thank you both so much for coming on Houston We Have A Podcast. What a cool discussion. Thank you.
Rick LaBrode: Oh, a pleasure.
Judd Frieling:Thank you.
Rick LaBrode: Thank you for having us.
[ Music]
Host: Hey, thanks for sticking around! Hope you enjoyed this episode of Houston We Have A Podcast and you’re looking forward to a new episode next Friday. But maybe one week is just too long for you, you can’t get enough of that NASA story! So, if you can’t, check out NASA’s Curious Universe podcast on your favorite podcast app. Here’s a sneak peek of the kinds of stories that they feature.
Brooke Medley: I’ve been to Antarctica three times and it’s my absolute favorite place on the planet. Antarctica is a very special place you go, and you fly into McMurdo, which is a station run by the National Science Foundation. It’s kind of this little city of like a thousand people right on the coast. When you go into the deep field you take these itty-bitty little planes, there’s just five of us, they land; they never turn the engine off because they want to make sure that they can fly away again, right? So, you don’t want a plane to get stuck there. It’s this mad rush to get all your gear off the plane as quickly as possible and then the plane takes off and there you are with five people standing in this flat white nothing in every single direction, and it’s like exhilarating and terrifying all at once. So, then the first thing you have to do is, you know, make a fire so that you’ll be safe and then you start putting your tents up. The one thing that I do remember the most about being there is just, it’s so quiet. I’ll never, ever, you know, experience anything where there’s just no noise. There’s no wildlife, there’s no planes, there’s no cars, there’s no people. It’s just you and…you can almost hear your brain working, I mean that’s how quiet it is there.
Host: If you like this clip and want to learn more about how NASA scientists are studying our home planet, you can check out NASA’s Curious Universe on your favorite podcast app or at NASA.gov/podcasts. They have just released a new season full of adventures with NASA scientists, engineers, astronauts, and other experts. Our universe is a wild and wonderful place, and, in this show, NASA is your tour guide. So, for this episode, the “Artemis Flight Directors,” I really hope you enjoyed listening to Judd Frieling and Rick LaBrode today. Thanks for sticking around. If you want to know more about the Artemis program, we’ve got a website for you, NASA.gov/artemis, and then of course you can check out some of our other podcasts at NASA.gov/podcasts. This episode, we actually recorded on video, so if you’d like to check out the video version of this podcast, is the same conversation really but you get to actually see Rick and Judd, go to our episode webpage and you can find a link there where you can watch our video version of the podcast on YouTube. If you want to talk to us, we’re on the NASA Johnson Space Center pages of Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram, use the hashtag #AskNASA on your favorite platform to submit an idea for the show and to make sure to mention it’s for Houston We Have A Podcast. This episode was recorded on July 6th, 2021. Thanks to Alex Perryman, Pat Ryan, Norah Moran, Belinda Pulido, Jennifer Hernandez, Kathryn Hambleton, Rachel Kraft, Laura Rochon and Courtney Beasley. And of course, thanks again to Rick LaBrode and Judd Frieling for taking the time to come on the show. Give us a rating and feedback on whatever platform you’re listening to us on and tell us what you think of our podcast. We’ll be back next week!