Preflight
Interview: Scott Altman
The
STS-109 Crew Interviews with Scott Altman, commander.
I'd
like to first of all ask you some of the background about yourself.
Why did you decide to become an astronaut?
Well, you
know, from the time I was 3 years old - my folks will back me up
on this - I turned to them while I was watching a TV show called
Sky King and said, "I want to be a pilot. I want to fly when
I grow up." And it's been really a constant dream and goal
of mine to learn to fly. And then, as I flew with the Navy and became
a fighter pilot, it was more or less a series of challenges as I
looked for things to do. I remember the Moon landings, back in the
late Sixties and early Seventies, and just being thrilled by all
of that stuff. And then, when I was a test pilot, we came down here
for a tour. And I looked around and I saw what all the shuttle program
was doing and I said, "You know, boy, I would just love to
do what those folks are doing!" And applied, didn't make it
the first time. But applied again and became a shuttle astronaut.
A
little bit more about the academic and I guess professional things
that you did along the way to help you achieve your goal.
I grew up
in a small town in Illinois. And went off to college, and then joined
the Navy. That was my role into aviation and to becoming a pilot
after I graduated with a degree in aeronautical engineering from
the University of Illinois. Flew with the Navy for 14 years, becoming
a test pilot. And there's really two types of shuttle astronauts:
there's the pilots and the mission specialists. The pilots are the
folks who actually fly the orbiter and land it when it comes time
to come back from a mission. And the mission specialists are the
career scientists and people who help operate and do the experiments.
I fit into the pilot path. And to become a shuttle pilot, you pretty
much have to have a military, high-performance jet background and
have worked as a test pilot. So that was my avenue into the program.
Okay.
If you can think of just one, or maybe not just one, your most memorable
experience since becoming an astronaut.
Well, it's
hard to top the first time you walk out to a shuttle that's sitting
there on the pad, waiting for you and your crew to come out to it
and take it to orbit. Just that, that feeling when you walk up to
the pad and you look, stand there and look up at the vehicle and
realize, "Wow! We're taking this thing into space." That's
a tremendous feeling. And then, when the solid rocket boosters light
off and you feel the whole thing shaking and that powerful kick
in the back, it's just a incredible feeling of exhilaration and
excitement! And something, you know, I know I'll never forget as
long as I live.
How
do you keep your mind on what you need to do with all that going
on around you?
Well, it's
a lot of sensory input and overload. The thing is, we train so much
at, in the simulators that while you're sitting there on the pad,
you almost forget that you're in the real vehicle and this is launch
day until, and I felt, before my first mission, that the sims were
a great preparation, that this was going to be just like what I
felt, and then when it was the real launch day and the engines really
started, and we started shaking and rocking-and-rolling and I felt
that thrust, it was like, "Wow! This is not the simulator!
This is the real thing!" But you are so well-trained that you
look at your displays and you just feel like you're ready to go
when it's time.
Okay.
Everybody has influences in their life. People, places, but let's
stick with people, I guess, for this. Who were or are still the
most influential people in your life?
You know,
it's hard for me to top my parents for all the impact they had in
my life. From the moment I turned to them when I was 3 and I said
I wanted to be a pilot, their attitude was, "You can be whatever
it is that you set your mind to be if you're willing to work hard
and be dedicated to that goal," you know. So, it wasn't always
easy or straightforward. For instance, I thought I was going to
join the Air Force because that's where growing up in a little town
in Illinois, without big oceans around, I didn't realize the Navy
had aircraft. So, I said, "I'm going to the Air Force Academy,"
and when I took the Air Force Academy induction physical, they said
I was too tall to be a pilot. You know, so there I thought my dream
had collapsed. But their guidance was kind of like, you know, if
you really want something, don't give up the first time you run
into a bump in the road. So, I went to school at University of Illinois
and found out that the Navy had different height standards, and
there was another way to get where I wanted to go.
How
tall were you at the time? And how tall are you now?
I'm 6-4. [I've]
got a tall sitting height.
Okay?
So...
Wow,
okay. When all is said and done and the STS-109 crew is done servicing
Hubble on this mission, what impact professionally and personally
do you think having played a part in such an important scientific
tool will have on you?
This mission
is really impacting me on several levels. You know, professionally,
there's just the incredible experience of being around the Hubble.
It's an incredible piece of machinery that's been up there, you
know, over 10 years and just continuing to send down incredible
scientific discoveries and breakthroughs in astronomy. And, I'm
really happy to be a part of that. And, also professionally, being
the mission Commander, being in charge of this mission, trying to
bring everybody together, that's a real thrill for me professionally
and personally as well. Working with the crew, the people on the
ground who support us, the trainers that get us ready to go, the
people who work the Hubble to make sure that everything all comes
together, in this launch and this successful mission, is really
a great source of inspiration for me, just, all the tremendous people
that are a part of the team.
Let's
talk a little bit, if we can, about this your first commanding job--
Yes.
--flight.
What kinds of challenges have you faced? And how has it been trying
to train a crew, and also, I guess, train yourself in the commanding
role?
Right. You
know, as you move from being the Pilot over to the left seat, I'd
always looked over there and thought, "Well, you know, it doesn't
look like all that much is going on. We can probably do that."
But then, when you get in the seat and you realize the responsibility
that people are willing to invest in you with this billion dollar
national asset and going up to another billion dollar national asset
(in this case, with the Hubble Space Telescope), it's kind of a
sobering responsibility, a reality that you face into. And in a
personal challenge that I've really enjoyed dealing with, bringing
people together. Coordinating all the folks on the crew, the training
folks. Trying to make sure that everybody works together well to
end up with the perfect product, and that is a successful mission.
Okay.
Each of your previous flights has been, I guess, somewhat different
logistically in what has gone on within the mission. You seem to
be kind of following a trend with this. Any thoughts on that?
Well, you
are right. There's been a big difference in each of my flights.
You know, one flight with a, basically a life science experiment,
Neurolab, STS-90; the last flight, STS-106, where we went up to
station, people told me it was the blue collar mission where we
outfitted the station and got it ready. We were like the finish
carpenters and plumbers coming in to make sure everything was ready
for people when they moved into their house. And now this mission,
which is basically going up and is primarily five different space
walks, where we refurbish and make the Hubble an even more incredible
scientific instrument than it is right now.
Okay.
Having piloted the shuttle yourself, what kinds of things are you
and Duane Carey, I guess, what kind of feedback are you giving him
or advice? Because you two are going to work closely together anyway.
What have you lent him from your experience?
Well, you
know, we are working very closely. And, it's a lot of fun to bring
somebody along, especially in a seat that I know I just sat in the
last mission. And to try and pass along the things that I got out
of those first two flows that I went through to help him get ready
for this whole experience. There's a lot of little things. We cover
the big things very well. But then, you wind up in, on orbit, you
know, "Like, wow! What do we do with our dirty clothes?"
And things like that. And try to pass some of that along to him.
The little tidbits about living and working in space to make things
go better. He's just been a tremendous asset to us. I've loved working
with him.
Okay.
I guess to kind of help us set the stage for what you and your crew
are going to do on this mission, can you talk a little bit more
about why we even have Hubble? Just in your understanding of it?
You know,
Hubble was envisioned as a way to have an observatory in the highest
place. We always put observatories at the top of mountains to get
above as much of the light pollution and atmospheric effects as
possible. And Hubble has just a tremendous location, being over
300 miles up outside the atmosphere, all that distortion, and away
from all the light pollution on the ground. It's just a, an incredible
perspective and a great place to have put, to be able to have the
technology to put an observatory in that location is really impressive.
And then, to have it be the Hubble Space Telescope, with the capability
that it's demonstrated. I think it really is a shining jewel in
NASA's cap with the discoveries that it's been responsible for over
the years.
It's
been called the crown jewel. Can we talk a little bit about the
goals of the mission. What are the main goals of the mission? And
just a little overview of--
Sure.
--the,
and we'll talk specifically EVA a little bit later. We're just kind
of in a nutshell the goals.
Well, I think
the big picture is that Hubble is in pretty good shape right now,
and it's making incredible discoveries almost as we speak. I just
read about discovering an atmosphere on a planet near a star. So,
it's working and working very well right now. Our goal is to make
it better, and to give it a longer life. So, more power, better
instruments, and just an overall tune-up to make sure that it can
take us through, into, you know, into this new century to continue
making those incredible discoveries.
Okay.
The first thing you have to do is actually get there. So the work
can be done. Can you take us through the scenario of rendezvous
and grapple, and highlighting what you'll be doing, for that, for
those events.
Well, we do
have four EVA crewmembers who've been training even longer than
the flight deck crew on being ready to go out the door and do the
space walks to improve the Hubble. But I keep reminding them, as
you said, they don't have anything to do until we actually get there
and grab a hold of it and berth it back in the payload bay. Rendezvous
is really a very interesting dance, choreographed between us and
the Hubble as we move up and slowly and yet surely, join up with
it. From launch until rendezvous, everything is planned and watched
over by people on the ground and us in orbit as we do different
burns, modifying our altitude so we can kind of catch up to Hubble
by going faster in a lower orbit, and then sending, bringing us
up to the point where Hubble and I are both flying in formation
17,500 miles an hour, you know, 5 miles every second. And yet, approaching
very gently apparently until the point where it's hanging motionless
over our payload bay and Nancy can use the robotic arm to just go
out there, reach out, and grab it. And then we'll berth it in the
back and go to work.
How
intricate is that? I mean, you have burns you have to do. Again,
catching up with it. How much is there to think about? I guess.
Got to be a bunch.
It is a very
complicated task. And I'm glad we have a great support structure
on the ground to help, with figuring out how to do the burns, how
to choreograph this dance really. To the point where we can see
it out the window. From that point on, we're actually hand-flying
the orbiter up to the final rendezvous. You know, a lot of people
think that the shuttle is always flown by computers and it's not
as much of a hands-on flying task. And, in rendezvous that's certainly
not true. You know, the computers get us close; but then we rely
on the pilots to take us the rest of the way home until we can rendezvous
and just be there in the same spot of space, flying formation around
the Earth.
How
much has the, training's obviously helped. But has it been extremely
realistic, I guess? Is, has that kind of helped you see what exactly's
going to go on?
Exactly. You
know, the training is phenomenal here. I just, I don't think it
could be any better. One of the facilities we use is a 360-degree
dome that projects the image up on it so you get a very 3-D sense
of joining up on the Hubble and rendezvousing with it. We also train
in a full simulator with, that has video displays out both the windows
that really gives you the sense that you're in orbit, you're doing
everything just the way we will on the actual rendezvous day.
Okay.
As you see the mission unfolding, if you can envision it, what,
in your opinion, are going to be the most challenging activities
and why?
Well, I think
the mission, you know, has a pretty clearly defined beginning, you
know, middle (the meat of the mission), and then the end. And, the
beginning runs from launch which has its own unique sets of challenges
- making sure that we get up there safely - through the rendezvous,
to the point where we grapple the Hubble and put it in the bay.
Then, the meat of the mission really is those, our five different
space walks, where we go out and remove components from Hubble,
add new pieces of equipment, and go through that whole evolution,
improving the Hubble space telescope. Then near the end, we release
it, functionally checked out, make sure that everything is working
well, and then come back to land. And, the landing, of course, is
another challenging aspect of the mission as it's another part that's
not flown all the way by computers but has a human pilot at the
controls every time the shuttle touches down.
I
think I read this someplace, but you're actually coming down steeper
than a normal--
Oh, much steeper
than a normal jetliner. About seven times. A normal airliner comes
in on a 3-degree glide slope and has, you know, a relatively shallow
descent rate, very controlled, and one big difference: engines,
in case there's something wrong, somebody's on the runway, or it
doesn't look right, you push the power up and take it around for
another try. The shuttle doesn't have that. You're a glider, basically
a glorified brick, falling through the atmosphere. And the whole
approach is set up so that you're in the right spot to trade your
energy for a break in the descent rate so that you can have a smooth
touchdown at the Kennedy Space Center (hopefully).
You're
going to be flying Columbia which has gone through some upgrades.
What's it going to be like? What differences will we see in the
shuttle?
The big difference
on Columbia now is the new, modified electronic display system.
It basically brings the shuttle fleet into the 21st century with
CRTs (cathode ray tube) displays, like TV screens, that all the
data can be displayed on. It gives you a lot more flexibility, a
lot more capability than the old-fashioned displays we used to call
"steam gauges" in the older cockpits. And, I think as
we move forward with this new design architecture, we'll even improve
the displays that we have and make the crew that much more capable
and that much safer.
Okay.
It's going to be awful crowded, too!
It is. You
know, it's two weeks in a minivan, I tell people, because when you
look at Columbia, we've got the flight deck and the middeck; and
with an internal airlock, you know, the middeck feels like it's
about that wide, even thought I know it's bigger than that. And,
there's seven of us up there, sleeping, working, living, getting
all our equipment in and out. So I think that's going to be a challenge.
And, one of the things I've set as my goal as a commander is trying
to get all of us to know each other pretty well, because we are
going to be living in close quarters. Everybody needs to be able
to get along pretty well,--
Okay.
--and I think
we're doing very well at that.
Okay.
Can you take us through the scenario of ungrapple and deploy? What
will happen for that?
At the end
of the mission, once all the EVAs have been successfully completed,
we're going to use the robotic arm to reach out and grab the Hubble
where it's been sitting, berthed at the back end of the shuttle
for the last 6 days. We'll let go of the latches, and Nancy, actually
Mike Massimino will smoothly raise it up and bring it forward so
it's just sitting right over the middle of the payload bay. Then
when we're ready, she'll release it and back the arm away. We should
be motionless at that point, just flying together. I'll do a couple
of burns with the stick, again manual inputs, and Hubble will appear
to pass right over the top of the orbiter. It really is an incredible
separation in the sims. And, I know when you're looking out and
you see that giant telescope going right over the outside of the
window, it's going to be incredibly impressive.
Okay.
As for the EVAs, can you explain to us what your duties will be
for the various EVAs? And, if they differ at all from EVA to EVA?
I'm kind of
wearing two hats during EVAs. One is as the mission Commander, looking
at what's going on and just kind of trying to evaluate, making sure
that we're doing the right thing, and just keeping the big picture.
Trying to help out as much as possible. I'm also backing Nancy up
with the arm duties, using the robotic arm, so that when she needs
a break, I can jump in there. We're using the arm to fly people
around during the EVAs, so it, to help them move quick, more quickly
from place to place. So, I'll be able to jump in and back her up.
And then, on a couple of the EVAs, I'll be performing some tasks
as the prime arm operator, where I'm training and planning on being
the person up there at the controls moving them around.
What's
that been like, working with the arm?
The arm's
a very interesting piece of equipment. It's also relatively complicated
when you think about the computer commands that are necessary to
translate the commands that I input into a seamless motion of the
other end of the arm with all these joints moving in concert. And,
we really see that's true when we do single-joint ops, where we're
responsible to move each joint individually. It is just about like
your own arm. And, if you imagined having to move your hand from
here to there by thinking of it as a sequence of movements of your
shoulder and then your elbow and wrist, you see it gets kind of
complicated--
Sure.
--and we're
happy that our brain figures that all out for us, and we have computers
on board that help us with that. But, we also have to be able to
figure it out in the single-joint mentality so that we can move
the arm one piece at a time and still get it to the point that you
want it to be at the end.
Okay.
Can we talk a little bit about some of the equipment that you're
taking up?
Sure.
First,
the Advanced Camera for Surveys. In your understanding of it, what
does it do? What's it going to do for Hubble?
Well, it's
really, I think, the heart of our mission. It's the piece of equipment
that is going to most directly impact Hubble's ability to do science.
It adds about a 10-fold increase in Hubble's ability to do science,
to look that much further back into the corners of the universe.
And, really we think of it as looking further back in time. And
just to be able to take [an] instrument that's already an incredible
piece of machinery and make it 10 times better, just phenomenal!
So, I can't wait to see the pictures that we get back after the
advanced camera for surveys is operational.
Okay.
The cooling system for the NICMOS, just an overview of how that
will help NICMOS. NICMOS right now is sick.
That's right.
Its cooling has ceased to function. So, what they've developed is
a new cooling system that we're going to take up and install as
part of that and bring that sensor on line. You know, something
that I didn't appreciate before this mission is the fact that Hubble
uses more than one sensor to discover all the things that it has
been responsible for. NICMOS operates in a different spectrum, and
it's something that actually has had a lot of exciting discoveries
in the past, about the speed at which the universe is expanding
and the fact that that's changed has been responsible due to NICMOS.
Now we're going to bring that back to life and enable scientists
to use that instrument again and continue the study of that aspect
of astronomy.
Okay.
EVA-3, that's the one that is expected to take the longest. What
is it about that EVA that makes it so, I guess makes it so critical?
Well, it's
certainly the EVA that we see right now as one of the most challenging.
And, the real reason is that during EVAs, it's difficult, people
say their hands get tired first because you're moving against the
pressure of the space suit. And, what we're doing on that is disconnecting
36 different fasteners that are on a power control box as part of
that EVA so we can put a new box in place. So, disconnect 36 different
fasteners, all with a myriad of pins in the middle, none of which
can be bent, for this to be successful, and all that stress and
strain on the EVA crewmembers' hands as they're operating and manipulating
those connectors. Connectors are also something we've had trouble
with on Hubble in the past. Getting them to disconnect. You know,
this box was originally not seen as something that would be very
easy to change out in orbit; and as a result, the new box that has
been designed to replace it has had some changes incorporated into
it to make it a little bit easier to install. But, it's still the
one thing that every experienced EVA crewmember looks at is and
is kind of nervous about, manipulating, using your hands in that
intensive manner, for a long period of time. And, it's a very, very
tightly choreographed evolution to exchange those two boxes in 1
day.
Okay.
Can you talk a little bit about your crew? About the different mix
of talents they possess that they bring to the table, that is going
to make your job easier and make the mission go smoothly?
We really
have just a tremendous amount of talent on the team! I'm really
honored to be able to work with all the folks. The EVA crewmembers
bring a very broad mix of talents to the table, which I think ends
up producing a product that's really greater than the sum of the
parts. You have John Grunsfeld with a very strong astronomy background, and yet a very good operational flair to be able to put this mission
together as the payload commander. You know, Jim Newman has space
walking experience on previous missions; he brings that talent to
the table to supplement the capabilities of our rookie space walkers,
Mike Massimino and Rick Linnehan. And, both of them have just done
tremendous jobs in working in the Neutral Buoyancy Lab practicing
for the mission. And, I think they're just going to do tremendous
work in space.
Okay.
Scott, something happened late last year to kind of change the complexion
of the mission. You guys have a new top priority in the mission.
Can you talk a little bit about what happened, and how it's affected
the mission?
Sure. You
know, Hubble takes those scientific observations. And, it's critical
that it's able to point in the right direction, and hold that perspective.
And, there's an assembly called the reaction wheel assembly that
uses, that is used to point the telescope in the right place and
hold its position so that you can take those very detailed scientific
observations. One of those units (there's two of them on the telescope)
started displaying some off-nominal signatures. It wasn't performing
exactly correctly. So, the program talked about it; and really,
just about exactly a month ago, decided that it needed to be changed
out on our mission. So, it's a very late addition. This reaction
wheel assembly is critical for the science, though, in that it helps
the telescope point where it needs to. If you don't have that, then
you can't point it where you need to, you don't get the science.
What's
it been like having to change your focus, as far as priorities,
now so late in your preparation for this mission? You've got, you've
had to change gears now.
It's certainly
been an added issue. We spent a lot of time working on our choreography
of all the EVAs up to this point, saying, "There's a most efficient
way to do this. We need to timeline everything and try to do this
first. There are get-aheads, efficiencies." And, the whole
set of five EVAs are really interlocked with each other to make
sure that it was the most efficient. So, now you take this giant
jigsaw puzzle that you've put together and you throw another piece
on the table and say, "Put that in, and make it look perfect."
It's, so it's taken a lot of time and effort on everybody's part
- the training team, the flight controllers, and the crew - to work
together and come up with a plan where we can take what were already
five very full EVAs and add an additional task, and still feel relatively
confident that we can get everything done in five space walks.
This
would probably be a little easier on a less complex mission, I imagine.
If your timelines
weren't as full as ours are, yes, it'd be easier to add a task at
the last minute. But that's what we're going up there for is to
make sure that Hubble is ready to go; a scientific machine. So,
we want to do the best that we can to make Hubble, and to put it
in great shape prior to the next servicing mission, which is a few
years down the road.
Okay.
There's a lot of unknowns surrounding this mission as far as tasks
that have never been done before. And to throw this new task into
the mission, what concerns are there about how that would affect
the mission?
I guess the
biggest concern is just, you mentioned the difficulty of some of
the tasks. Some of the other tasks that we're doing have not been
done before. There's a level of difficulty that we feel is maybe
well above some of the things that we've done with Hubble in the
past. Now, the reaction wheel assembly change out, though, is a
task that is well understood by itself. We know how long it took.
It was done on STS-82 successfully. And, we've practiced it; and
our times compare well with what was done on STS-82. So, it's not
the reaction wheel assembly task that we look at as being very difficult
or more challenging or unknown. But, it's the addition of that task
to the rest of the schedule, I think, that is the biggest issue.
That we do it in an efficient manner. However, it is the number
one priority now on our mission, so it's something we want to make
sure that we get done and do correctly. So, we're fitting it in
very early in the mission.
Do
you want to elaborate a little bit more on your understanding maybe
of how this thing works? Or it works in conjunction with the gyros,
I guess, just to point it?
Right. It's…there
are some gyros that have exhibited an off-nominal signature. But,
there's enough of those that the program feels right now that if
you balance all the priorities to fit everything into the mission,
the gyros haven't made it up to the top. They just don't fit in
the amount of time that we have to do. I mean, we want to increase
the scientific capability of the telescope by adding the Advanced
Camera for Surveys, getting the NICMOS instrument back up by adding
a cooler to it so that it can function properly. And then, making
it more robust by adding the solar arrays and the new power control
unit. And then, you say, "Well, now we have reaction wheel
assembly 2. That's critical for science. If it goes, you're one
failure away from maybe losing the telescope." And that's something
we certainly don't want to have happen. And then, the gyros, you
say, "Well, there's a little more redundancy there. Maybe they're
not as high a priority." However, if by some chance we go way
ahead, our training really paid off and we were much more efficient
than we think, we can be, it's a task that we have out there kind
of in our job jar that we'll add in. Or, if something happens and
the whole mix of EVAs gets corrupted, I guess, where we don't get
a task done in the nominal timeline and we have to juggle what we
have time to do, there may be a chance to do a gyro change out as
well there near the end of the mission.
Speaking
of the training and where it's at, when this happened, where were
you guys, as far as where you should be in your training? In your
mind? Were you way ahead? Or, how did it fit in?
I felt that
we were basically sort of coming to the end. That you peak in your
training curve as you come up to speed, and then hit kind of a plateau,
and maybe, curve up slightly at the end. But, I felt like we had
all the issues identified. We were just polishing. The addition
of this task required a little more work, a little more time in
the water. And, it just took a little bit of the polish off. But,
I think, with the additional 2-week slip, spending a little more
time in the water, by the time we go out the door to do the task,
we'll have a very high level of confidence that we've done everything
that we can prior to the flight to make sure that it can be a success.
Hubble's shown in the past that there's…it's capable of throwing
us a curve. Something that we don't expect. So, we're going to try
and just use our skill and our training as a backup so when you
get into those scenarios that you didn't anticipate, you know the
right thing to do and then coordinate all that with the ground and
all the folks here at JSC.
So,
is there a certain, I guess, level of comfort in knowing that this
is actually a task that's been done before?
In our EVA
task, I think we have a little bit higher sense that, "Yes,
we know what the threat is, how it works, and what we need to be
careful with."
Okay.
Do you want to talk a little bit maybe about the EVA? About what,
how they're going to do it?
Yeah. We've
decided to add the reaction wheel assembly change out task to EVA
number 2, which is Mike Massimino and Jim Newman out the door. They're
going to be putting on a solar array as the first part of their
day; and then, near the end, going to the very aft part of the payload
bay and getting the reaction wheel assembly out of its protective
carrier, handing it from a free-floating astronaut to one that's
on the robotic arm, and then he'll move up to the bay that it goes
into and actually install it while the old one, that's been removed,
goes back in a protective carrier and gets brought back for analysis.
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