GEORGE DILLER: This is Atlas launch control at T minus 1 hour, 36 minutes, 23 seconds and counting.
We're here with Jim Graf, the MRO project manager from the Jet Propulsion Laboratory.
Jim, first of all, tell us how is MRO doing at this point in the countdown and what are they doing at this point in the countdown?
JIM GRAF: Well, MRO is doing great. It's sitting atop the launch vehicle and it's talking to us and it's, everything is normal.
All systems are go, and it's just a thoroughbred waiting to break the bonds that are holding it back. Release the reigns,
let it get out of 1 G and get into space. DILLER: Any effects from the thunderstorm last night that you were able to tell?
GRAF: Well, certainly we were very concerned about the thunderstorm and it came through.
But we put in lightning suppression in the circuits and there was no damage whatsoever and the spacecraft is good to go.
DILLER: Well, Jim, we've got some animation now we'd like to look at that will be a little bit about the flight sequence
and what MRO will be doing as it comes off the rocket. So we can roll that, Jim will tell us what's happening.
GRAF: Sure. Well, here's what you're going to be seeing in just what, about an hour or two from now.
It's the launch vehicle, an Atlas V 401, lifting off from Launch Complex 41 here at Cape Canaveral.
The launch vehicle is really a two-stage vehicle. The first one is a major booster which will
burn out in about four minutes and it'll separate
and then within 16 seconds after that, you'll see the second stage ignite.
So what you're seeing still is the first stage burning here.
This is the payload shroud that actually holds and protects the spacecraft during launch.
So the animation shows the booster itself falling away.
We would fire the second stage and at that point, the metal that has been protecting the spacecraft, the payload fairing,
is jettisoned, and we are separated then from the launch vehicle.
The second stage does a maneuver so it has no collision. And then its job is done and ours is just beginning.
We, the first thing we do is deploy the solar arrays. We want to get power positive, which means we want
sunlight falling on the arrays, producing electricity that powers the spacecraft.
And the minute we achieve that, we also start releasing and deploying the high-gain antenna and start communicating back to Earth.
We should be able to communicate just a few minutes after separation back to our Japanese station.
So that will be the first indication that those events have gone successfully.
After that, we leave Earth and we actually start in on a six- to seven-month cruise. We're leaving Earth and heading towards Mars.
We actually wind up a little bit ahead of Mars during this phase, and Mars has to catch up to us, and once it gets close to us,
we start falling into the gravitational well of Mars that captures us.
We will approach Mars from the southern hemisphere.
We're seeing a simulation of what we do with our TCMs right now, Trajectory Change Maneuver thrusters.
So in March of 2006, we approach the south pole of Mars, and we start burning our six main engines.
They will fire for approximately 30 minutes, enough to slow ourselves down so that we can get, in fact, captured by Mars' gravity.
The interesting thing is about half of that, about 15 minutes, will be viewed from the Earth.
The other 15 minutes, we'll be behind Mars and we won't have contact to the Earth,
so that's kind of the white-knuckle time when we're really
concerned about what's happening with the spacecraft.
The minute we actually do arrive at Mars and get into orbit, we get into a very elliptical orbit that is 100 miles by 20,000 miles
and we perform a function called "aerobraking," where we use friction in the Martian atmosphere to slow ourselves down.
When we do that, we actually slowly bring that apoapsis down. Yes, George?
DILLER: Couple of instruments here.
GRAF: What you're looking at right now is a close-up of the spacecraft itself,
and there are some pretty remarkable science instruments that are
flying on the spacecraft. The first one, in yellow, is a "context imager."
And any other spacecraft, this would be considered a high-resolution imager.
It, it can resolve features on the surface that are about the size of a,
about the size of a swimming pool or so. We also have, in the blue, is the,
is the major instrument that we're flying in terms of imaging.
It is called "high rise" and it can resolve features on the surface that are about a yard across,
so that from our 200 mile orbit, we're able to look
down and start seeing features that are right there on the surface that will help us to
understand more about how Mars evolved and, in addition, to
identify places where we'd like to go and land.
Our instruments suite is designed to actually determine where it is that we scientifically want to land,
and where it's safe to land, so that we'll be conducting not only our science studies,
but we'll be aiding in future landing missions and selecting our sites.
DILLER: And ultimately, I guess that means, you extend that way out,
what are good sites to land a man on Mars, if that's our end objective.
GRAF: You got it, George. You know, we're going to start accumulating data at a rate that we've
never seen before at Mars. We'll be starting to have increased
coverage at a higher and higher spatial resolution. And by doing that,
we get a really in-depth close-up look at Mars and we get to see a lot more of Mars.
And with that, we can start saying, hey, here are the places we want to go.
You know, NASA has been having a theme for, an objective for Mars,
which is to follow the water. And this payload is actually designed to do that very thing.
We're designing the instruments to look for the, at the surface for where the water may have been.
We're looking under the surface with one of our instruments to actually find out where the water is if
it's there under the surface. And we're looking in the atmosphere for where the water is in the atmosphere.
Once we find that water, that's when it gets very interesting. That's when we can go with landers to search for life,
or we can have human exploration of that area, taking advantage of the water that we can find.
DILLER: Is one of the keys to this trying to determine how long water may have been at a particular location,
as far as whether it might have started a life process or not? GRAF: Oh yes, definitely.
What we want to know is, first of all you want to find out where the water has been or is.
And then we want to start understanding, how long has it been there and could it have allowed the conditions to create life?
DILLER: Let's kind of zero in on what's going to happen after spacecraft separation today.
What, what is the very first thing that's going to happen as soon as spacecraft separation occurs?
GRAF: The first thing we're going to do is the Atlas, we're expecting, to give us a wonderful ride and then to drop us off. But as they separate,
they may, in fact, put a little bit of disturbances into the spacecraft.
So, the first thing we're going to do is stop any rates that we don't like and just settle ourselves down.
We immediately turn on the amplifier and start transmitting back to, back to Earth. So those two things will happen
almost simultaneously, where we'll be calling home saying, "Here we are, we've separated, we're okay."
Then the next thing we're going to do immediately is to get those solar arrays out.
Right now we're on battery power, we start battery power at T MINUS 4 minutes, and we're starting to discharge those batteries.
And we have about four to six hours of energy in those batteries, and we want to try to get the solar arrays out as
quickly as we can and get electricity flowing from those solar arrays so we can start charging those batteries.
DILLER: Now everything we want to do happens in a fairly short space of time,
compared to other spacecraft that sometimes take many hours.
This all happens in how long? GRAF: In less than 30, 35 minutes, it'll all be done.
All the solar arrays will be out, our antenna will be released
and in its proper orientation, and the spacecraft will have turned so it's in what we call our comm. attitude.
It's our communication attitude, talking back to Earth. We'll also acquire our first DSN station, Deep Space Network station,
that's at Goldstone in California. That's when we'll be calling
home, back to the NASA stations. DILLER: Now to get our first signal acquisition, how are we going to hear through
what station that we found it, it's there, we know it's alive. GRAF: Yea, here's actually two critical stations.
There is a Japanese station that will be able to pick up the spacecraft just minutes after separation.
Remember I said we were going to turn on that amplifier and start broadcasting, and that Japanese
station is going to pick it up as soon as we come into the line of sight.
For the Goldstone station, they will pick us up, and that's about 25
minutes after separation. So we are relying on the Japanese station for about 23 minutes or so to relay the data back through to us.
DILLER: And then Goldstone follows immediately, or is there some overlap there? GRAF: There's overlap. Actually,
the Japanese station covers us for hours. Goldstone will pick us up, they will cover us for an,
for about four hours, and then Madrid will take, take over from Goldstone.
DILLER: So actually, once we pick it up at about four minutes after separation,
we'll be in continuous contact with it for the duration.
GRAF: Yes we will. We'll be talking to it, we'll be listening and, I tell you,
it'll be a real sigh of relief for everybody here when we know we've got
power off the arrays, we've got good communication, uplink and downlink, and we got a good, stable spacecraft.
It's going to be a wonderful feeling. But right now, it's just very tense waiting for the launch and
waiting for that opportunity to talk with the spacecraft through our RF link.
DILLER: Well, Jim, thank you very much. We're looking forward to the launch,
as you are, and best of luck. GRAF: Thank you, George. DILLER: Thank you.