z Interview: Julie Kramer White
18 |^
APRIL 2015
AEROSPACETESTINGINTERNATIONAL.COMfly: mechanical testing as well as a lot of
electrical and software avionics integration
testing in labs. Then we’ll do a final four-
score certification test here in a couple of
years’ time on the final configuration.”
TESTING THE LAUNCHER
In mid-November 2014, construction
of the first SLS began using the new
welding system at NASA’s Michoud
Assembly Facility, where major rocket
parts will be assembled. The assembled
rocket will be able to remain at the
launch pad for a minimum of 180 days
and can remain in stacked
configuration for at least 200 days
without destacking. In January 2015,
NASA began test firing RS-25 engines
in preparation for use on SLS.
What is incredible is how such
advanced technology can face simple
and basic testing, right up to the
last minute, as Kramer explains: “This
is not just a new launch vehicle but a
massive launch vehicle – and being
able to test that is a bit of a challenge.
We’ve worked really hard with the
space launch systems team at Marshall
Space Flight Center over the past
couple of years to lay out what testing
we will be doing at the spacecraft level.
So what will happen when I put those
two pieces together and what options
will I have available to me?
“I don’t know if you’ve seen old
pictures of Saturn V, where basically
they would take it into the vehicle
assembly building at Kennedy, and the
guys would go up to the top levels and
they would basically push on it to see
how it would respond. They did do
more sophisticated things, but I just
think it was always interesting to see
the pictures of these engineers just
pushing at the top.”
However, testing does not stop when
the vehicle leaves the VAB. “What kind
of data can we gather while I’m rolling
to the pad?” says Kramer. “What a
great opportunity – the whole thing
is stacked and it’s sitting on a mobile
launch platform and it’s moving, so
you can get a lot of information about
what’s going on with that stack
dynamically right there and then.”NEXT STAGE
It has been more than four months
since the successful completion of the
Exploration Flight Test 1 (EFT-1)
mission, and Orion is back at the space
agency’s Marshall Space Flight Center.
The protective component will now be
inspected with sections of the heat
shield being extracted. The analysis
follows the successful test-firing of
a five-segment solid rocket booster,
which is planned for use on the SLS.If everything goes according to
NASA’s plan, an Orion spacecraft will
be perched right at the top of an SLS
booster for the Exploration Mission 1
in November 2018. This will be the
first flight of the SLS, and the second
for Orion. The spacecraft will conduct
a circumlunar flight around the Moon.
Kramer is pragmatic about the next
stage: “NASA is constantly under
evaluation by Congress and the Executive
Branch, so whether it will continue to play
this way, or whether they’ll ask us to try to
accelerate a manned mission, it’s difficult
to say. I’ve given up trying to guess
because I’m usually wrong. So we’ll
continue to build as fast as the budget
allows, and to put as much capability into
that spacecraft as we can, and at some
point the mission will come together with
the spacecraft and the launch vehicle will
be ready for people.”
It’s an awful cliché, but only time
will tell, and whether we will see the US
President onboard a Mars mission... zMAIN IMAGE: US
Navy personnel
aboard a rigid hull
inflatable boat help
recover NASA’s
Orion spacecraft
following its
splashdown in the
Pacific Ocean after
its first flight testABOVE: After
splashdown,
NASA’s Orion
spacecraft has
been recovered
and is positioned
on rubber ‘speed
bumps’ inside the
flooded well deck
of the USS
Anchorage