WEBVTT

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George Diller/Ares I-X Commentator: From 
the Kennedy Space Center in Florida, this is

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Ares Launch Control at T-2 hours, 38 minutes, 15 seconds and counting.

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Launch of the Ares I-X is on schedule for 8 a.m. Eastern time this morning at the opening of a four-hour launch window.

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The countdown for the launch team began at 1 a.m. this morning.

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The upper stage access arm is about to be retracted away from the vehicle.

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And following that, the next major milestone 
in the countdown is the retraction of the

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gantry-like rotating service structure at 5:25 a.m.,

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which is providing much of the primary access to the lower portion of the vehicle.

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Launch today is being controlled from the 
Young-Crippen Firing Room in the Launch

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Control Center -- that is Firing Room 1 here at complex 39.

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With the launch support team located at the 
Mission Director's Center on Cape

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Canaveral Air Force Station in NASA Hangar AE.

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The countdown began at 1 a.m. this morning when work to power up the Ares I-X flight test vehicle began.

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Since then, guidance and navigation system checkout has been under way.

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Also, purge umbilicals for the various environmental control systems that provide cool,

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dry air are being disconnected from the vehicle -- that activity is just concluding.

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And just completed is the alignment of the inertial navigation system, and navigation testing is now under way.

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Coming up after the rotating service structure has been pulled back, the Tel-4 tracking station will align its antenna with the rocket,

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and there will be a checkout of the tracking, data and telemetry systems.

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And there'll also be some software checks of the flight computer, some of which are already under way.

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Right now, checks with the Eastern Range have begun -- that began just a few minutes ago.

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And also there will be a first-motion check, that's a verification of the sensor on the launch pad that verifies that

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Ares I-X has in fact lifted off and the exact time that it lifted off.

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Weather-wise our forecast is unchanged from what we've been seeing the last couple of days.

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There is a 60 percent chance of not meeting the launch weather criteria,

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primarily due to a chance for 
flight-through-precipitation and the

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triboelectric rule that is a relatively unfamiliar flight rule to many.

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And this essentially is dealing with a 
condition that's associated with a static

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electricity of charging that can build up on the fairing that can disrupt signals.

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At T-2 hours, 34 minutes, 17 seconds and counting, this is Ares Launch Control.

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