United Space Alliance
USA NewsUSA News

Ares I-X Test Flight – Counting Down the Milestones

The “Vehicle Powered” sign was turned on for the first time on September 11 at the Ares I-X ops desk in High Bay 3 of the Vehicle Assembly Building. From left are: USA’s Robert “Bobby” Williams, Pad leader, NASA’s Trent Smith, a Vehicle Project Engineer, and USA’s Karl Kendall, pad leader.
In Firing Room 1 at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida, mission engineers take part in a countdown simulation for the upcoming Ares I-X flight test. The test vehicle for the Ares I, Ares I-X is targeted for the test on Oct. 31. Photo credit: NASA/Kim Shiflett

The launch team is stepping smoothly through the milestone checklist, and processing is going well with the hardware and software performing as expected as the launch of Ares I-X approaches.

USA is the contractor tasked with planning and processing for the test flight.

“We have a good chance of making the October 19 rollout date,” said USA’s Mike Chappell, Ares I-X Flow Manager. “There is a lot of work still to go, but we’re working hard to get it all done and closed out.”

One of the recent Ares I-X milestones was the successful powerup of the vehicle, which occurred for the first time September 11 in High Bay 3 of the Vehicle Assembly Building (VAB) where the rocket is stacked.

“It was rewarding to see that “Vehicle Powered” sign light up at the ops desk,” Chappell said. “It was a great effort by the integrated team, including NASA, ULA, Lockheed Martin, ATK and others.”

Powerup involves applying electrical power to the avionics hardware on the rocket, including the Fault Tolerant Inertial Navigation Units, the rate gyroscopes and the black boxes for flight instrumentation. Once powered, workers began a three-day test period called the Initial Vehicle Power Application during which they methodically checked out all the components and circuits.

The next step was to perform integrated tests to make sure all the vehicle’s systems are functioning properly. The vehicle will be powered up and down as needed during the final weeks of processing in the VAB.

In addition to powerup testing, closeout work has begun on the rocket, preparing it for rollout to Launch Pad 39B, to support a targeted launch date of October 27.

Another major milestone in the preparation for the Ares I-X test flight was the official turnover of the Launch Control Center’s Firing Room 1 from the Space Shuttle Program to the Constellation Program. Although the firing room was activated a few weeks earlier, NASA marked the turnover with a ceremony September 25. The firing room has undergone demolition, construction and been outfitted with consoles for the upcoming rocket flight test. USA was responsible for the demolition phase of the project.

Firing Room 1 was the first operational firing room constructed in the Launch Control Center, which has served as the center of launch operations for the human space flight program at Kennedy Space Center since the Apollo Program. The room is named after Shuttle astronauts Bob Crippen and John Young, who flew the first Shuttle mission.

Firing Room 1 served as the nerve center for the launch of the first Saturn V flight, the first crewed flight of Saturn V, the first crewed mission to the moon and the first Space Shuttle flight. Firing Room 1 will continue this tradition of firsts when controllers launch the Constellation Program’s first flight test. Firing Room 1 will be the center of operations for the upcoming Ares I and Orion operations.

Read more from this issue

Go to Previous Company Newsletters

USA Home Terms & Conditions
Privacy Statement
Site Map
Home

©2009 United Space Alliance, LLC.
All rights reserved.