George Diller/Launch Commentator Joining us here at the console in the Mission Director's Center at
Vandenberg Air Force Base is Omar Baez, who was our NASA launch director and
NASA launch manager for tonight's countdown.
And Omar, tell us, how did the flight look to you? How did the countdown look? How did the flight look?
Omar Baez/NASA Launch Director The flight was just awesome. We hit the orbit right on the money.
The apogee, perigee and inclination of the spacecraft looks right where we wanted it.
The count, you know, with a NOAA launch, we've always had a tough time. Came in today, and a couple rain storms around.
We had concern with thick clouds, cumulus clouds and upper-level winds.
And we're violating all three of those parameters as we walked in.
Had a couple of problems starting up the count with our front end
processors on our control data and processing systems on the ground control.
So it was one of those launch attempts where there's a lot going on at the very beginning to,
to make it rough. And things started to smooth out as we went along and the weather held up.
We didn't get rained on as we were expecting and the upper-level winds calmed down quite a bit.
And we were able to get it off first, first try of the very beginning of the window.
George Diller/Launch Commentator One thing that seemed a little different to me was
the number of COLA cutouts that we had. Isn't nine a little unusual?
Omar Baez/NASA Launch Director It's not unusual. We actually, it depends on how you screen them.
And, and what we were screening for was satellites today and not debris.
If we were screening for debris, we'd probably see a lot more.
So nine was what we were looking at today, and that was nine satellites.
And we also had the International Space Station as part of one.
So we actually had 10 COLAs within a 10-minute window.
And it, it virtually eliminated about four or five minutes of the 10-minute window.
But we were clear at the very beginning and we had the very end of our 10-minute window available for us.
And so, we knew that we had a good opportunity today.
George Diller/Launch Commentator Well Omar, let's look ahead to our next Delta II launch.
That's back at the cape, correct?
Omar Baez/NASA Launch Director Absolutely. Our next Delta II launch is Kepler and that's on March 5.
But even ahead of that, the team transitions back here at the end
of next week for a Taurus launch -- the OCO spacecraft.
George Diller/Launch Commentator Orbiting Carbon Observatory.
Omar Baez/NASA Launch Director Yep.
George Diller/Launch Commentator And, yeah that's Feb. 23. -- just a couple of weeks away.
Omar Baez/NASA Launch Director Feb. 23 -- we have the three launches inside of 30 days for the Launch Services Program.
George Diller/Launch Commentator Well Omar, thank you very much. And of course, congratulations.
We all feel wonderful about the launch knowing that the weather had really set in for
several days -- and to draw the right card at the right time here tonight certainly is a good,
good feeling for everyone, I'm sure.
Omar Baez/NASA Launch Director Absolutely, George.
George Diller/Launch Commentator Thank you very much,
Omar. And we'll see you back at the cape for Kepler.
Omar Baez/NASA Launch Director Thanks you very much.
George Diller/Launch Commentator At, let's see, we're one hour, 12 minutes,
five seconds into the flight now of NOAA-N Prime. This is Delta Launch Control.