My friend Dan Durda sent me a link to this very cool footage: it’s from a dashboard-mounted camera inside the Orbiter Endeavour during the launch last week, taking footage starting a few minutes before launch.
You can see three astronauts in their suits preparing for the mission, and it’s really remarkable how they act. They’re clearly excited, but mostly all business. During the actual launch, they seem to be very nonchalant, simply doing what they need to do; it doesn’t look much different then I must look as I fasten my seatbelt, adjust the rear view mirror and pull out of my driveway in my car.
It’s a really odd juxtaposition! All the usual words we hear when we watch a launch are there, but somehow I expected the astronauts to be more animated, more excited. Instead, they mostly just sit there. They look like they’re taking the bus downtown, not a multi-billion dollar rocket into space!
When they are finally into space you can start to see how excited they are; a series of bright flashes from the Orbital Maneuvering System outside the cabin makes them all laugh, and they make several comments about how cool some of the events are.
The whole video is several minutes long, but worth a watch.
March 21st, 2008 at 9:34 am
Don’t forget that they have been over and over and over this in the simulators. Gordo Cooper went to sleep waiting for his Mercury lift off.
The ones I knew in Apollo and Gemini and bothered to ask about it all said about the same thing. It was just like a sim. A little excitement, but nothing really big.
I know of one astronaut, wo shall remain unnamed, sitting on the lower deck of the shuttle, who claims to have unstrapped and looked out the window while kneeling in the seat. “I could see ignition and lift off, look up and see the sky and everything. It was really neat. The guys on the flight deck can’t really see much of anything.” I asked how dangerous that was, and he answered, “Anything I needed to be tightly strapped for would kill me anyway.”
March 21st, 2008 at 9:50 am
I seem to remember references to the shuttle as a “Space Bus.” That somehow seems appropriate here…
March 21st, 2008 at 9:55 am
How DARE they act so calm when fulfilling my dream?
In all seriousness, good find.
March 21st, 2008 at 10:09 am
I’ve been waiting to see footage like this for a long time. Never understood why they haven’t shared it.
March 21st, 2008 at 10:11 am
Actually, Don, I was thinking the same thing while watching the video. Then there was a loud “pop” I think from a reaction motor, and one of the astronauts exclaims “Is it supposed to be that loud?!” or something like that. He was surprised, and a little nervous, it sounded like to me, and I got a chuckle out of it.
March 21st, 2008 at 10:18 am
Pilots are the same. If you have ever heard black-box recordings of cockpit dialogue just prior to a crash, or life-threatening situation, then you’ll know that pilots very rarely break their sweat, even when their life (and the lives of their their crew) is on the line. I couldn’t do it.
March 21st, 2008 at 10:20 am
Great, now I’m going to spend my entire lunch watching the video. (It says it’s about 23 minutes long.)
[Disclaimer: I haven't watched it yet.]
Sure, they’ve done it a zillion times in the simulator, which is why they _can_ do everything very businesslike. That doesn’t mean that they shouldn’t be excited/nervous/whatever about this being “the real thing”. I can’t imagine running so many simulations as to make “the real thing” unexciting.
March 21st, 2008 at 10:26 am
Obviously this “launch” is a fake. I mean, c’mon, the shadows are all wrong!
Really, BA, an absolutely wonderful find.
March 21st, 2008 at 10:29 am
Can’t get the video to load, but I’ve seen that kind of shuttle video before. I love the way you can see them nearly come out of their seats when the 3G force is suddenly gone at MECO.
March 21st, 2008 at 10:41 am
@lintsniffer: +1
March 21st, 2008 at 10:50 am
I really enjoy the camaraderie we get to see shared between flight crew members before and during launch on NASA TV. Watching old post-mission presentations of early STS missions by Captains John Young and Bob Crippen you get a good idea of the crazy sense of humor these guys from USAF (and other branches) have developed about spaceflight, and the almost-offhand nonchalance with which they treat the monumentalness of their missions. You get a sense of THE FUTURE from it, that this is the good humor with which spaceflight will be enjoyed when it becomes a regular day-to-day kind of thing. As MST3K has shown us, space is more fun with laughter and one-line quips.
March 21st, 2008 at 11:01 am
During a launch in the 1990’s a German shuttle passenger recorded his thoughts during ascent on a dictaphone; the tape was later played on a radio program. Essentially the g forces just don’t make you want to jump around with joy. This astronaut uttered a particularly nice sentence on that tape: “Die Gravity ist größer als man denkt”, meaning “gravity is larger than you might think …”
March 21st, 2008 at 11:21 am
BA, do you have a video of you strapping on your seatbelt, and adjusting the mirror while backing out of your driveway? That would be exciting!
OK, just going to start the video now.
March 21st, 2008 at 11:25 am
Ooh nice! even if it did remind me a bit creepily of the first Quatermass film at times….
March 21st, 2008 at 11:34 am
Um, Don?
The lower deck doesn’t have windows.
The flight deck, with the Commander and Pilot, has a view out the front.
The med deck (?), behind the flight deck, can see out the top. The windows behind them, into the sealed up cargo area, are probably uninteresting.
The lower deck is entirely enclosed…
March 21st, 2008 at 11:41 am
“The lower deck is entirely enclosed…”
Which is good because that’s where the snakes are, right?
March 21st, 2008 at 12:32 pm
[...] Hierbij een link naar een heel bijzonder filmpje van de lancering van de Space Shuttle Endeavour vorige week dinsdag: de lancering gezien vanuit de cockpit van de Endeavour! Kennelijk hebben ze een webcam of zoiets op het raampje van de cockpit geplakt en alles gefilmd, minuten lang. Héél erg leuk om dat eens te zien. We zien drie astronauten (en af en toe een stukje arm van een vierde piloot), die op een erg relaxte manier de lancering meemaken. De piloot vooraan hoeft tijdens de lancering niet veel te doen. Af en toe eens een knopje indrukken en op een spiekblaadje kijken, maar verder is het met de handen over elkaar zitten. Af en toe zie je van buitenaf allerlei flitsen en bij één serie van die flitsen, veroorzaakt door het Orbital Maneuvering System moeten ze allemaal lachen. Er blijkt halverwege de lancering ook nog een verstekeling aan boord te zijn: een motje! Die piloot (Dominic Gorie of Gregory H. Johnson, ik weet even niet wie in beeld is) probeert dat beest nog te pakken, tijdens de lancering! Afijn, dit is echt een must-see filmpje. Bron: Bad Astronomy Blog. [...]
March 21st, 2008 at 12:48 pm
Dafyd: Technically you are right. The “lower” deck (which it was called when we were still building the prototype) is now called the equipment bay and is enclosed since it is not meant for human occupation.
I should have refered to the “mid” deck, located “beneath” (depending on what is meant by up and down and at what attitude and gravity vector) the flight deck. It has a small window which a crew member could only see out of by unstrapping. However, he got up close and looked up and down. He could not see the nose or nozzles, but he could jam in and see fire and the sky. The mid deck contains crew quarters, the head (a major technological problem), and certain mission equipment.
The flight deck seats the Commander, the pilot and some mission specialists at launch an landing. The rest are on the mid deck. The only flight deck personal who could look down are the pilots and you wouldn’t want them to. They’re busy.
March 21st, 2008 at 1:05 pm
I got a little chuckle out of the phrase “Holy Moley!” An old Vaudeville saying known these days primarily to fans and video collectors of comedian Soupy Sales, who said it when surprised by things – including odd inventions and contraptions.
March 21st, 2008 at 1:28 pm
A friend of mine performed some experiments on skydivers while they were sitting in the plane, ready to jump. Though they all seemed extremely calm, in fact their heart rates were through the roof. I’d be really interested to see a plot of the heart rates of the astronauts along the build up to launch and launch.
Great video!
March 21st, 2008 at 1:34 pm
There’s a story (no pun intended) that veteran astronaut Storey Musgrave (5 shuttle flights?) was sitting quietly in his seat waiting for launch, while the other shuttle astronauts were making chit-chat and looking around. Someone asked him why he was so quiet and he said, “Because I’m scared to death!” Everyone quieted down.
March 21st, 2008 at 1:38 pm
Apone: ‘Somebody wake up Hicks!’
March 21st, 2008 at 1:52 pm
I would like to see a little PIP of the external view of the launch for the first few minutes so we could see what they are doing compared to what we see happening on TV.
March 21st, 2008 at 2:07 pm
If you want an appreciation of how they’re really feeling read “Riding Rockets” by Mike Mullane. Fits well with Tom K’s account of Storey Musgrave.
Never heard of anybody unstrapping for launch but there was a story (pun intended) that Story Musgrave (6 shuttle flights; only person to have flown on all of the orbiters, I believe) stood up for re-entry to film the plasma through the overhead windows at the back of the flight deck.
In his book Mike Mullane said that on one of his missions he was supposed to strap in on the mid deck but stayed in the flight deck too long during re-entry and was unable to move down below due to the gravity so stayed there sitting on the floor.
March 21st, 2008 at 2:07 pm
Chip, “Holy Moley” comes from Captain Marvel in the comics around 1940. I didn’t learn to read until about 1941 and I remember reading those comics about seven years after that date when I was 10 or so.
March 21st, 2008 at 2:13 pm
It may be hard to for the astronauts to be physically animated, with the multiple-G acceleration that weighs them down.
March 21st, 2008 at 2:34 pm
Roy Batty said:
“Which is good because that’s where the snakes are, right?”
I don’t know if you heard about the sequel to S.O.A.P.?
Snakes on a Shuttle.
Let’s just say Samuel L. Jackson makes one bad a** shuttle commander.
March 21st, 2008 at 3:06 pm
Great video. Obviously, I’ll never get to be an astronaut – I don’t have enough degrees, I’m not a pilot, and I’m not (and have no intention of becoming) an American. But I’m a big fan of Exciting Simulations’ “Space Shuttle Mission 2007″, so I’ve done it virtually – I made my first docking with the ISS earlier today. It’s interesting seeing the commander flicking all the same switches once in orbit that I’ve been doing in the sim!
D
That R2 panel looks rather awkward!
March 21st, 2008 at 3:53 pm
I wonder what the checklists are like. Much better than the T-43’s no doubt.
March 21st, 2008 at 4:23 pm
bujinon 21 Mar 2008 at 3:06 pm
Great video. Obviously, I’ll never get to be an astronaut – I don’t have enough degrees, I’m not a pilot, and I’m not (and have no intention of becoming) an American.
You don’t have to be an American to become an astronaut. Doing some quick’n'dirty research from Wikipedia, it looks like people from 41 countries have gone into space (not counting the cateogories of “Hispanic” or “European”. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Astronauts_by_nationality
Looking a little deeper, the US does have the most astronauts per capita with about 1 per 850,000. That’s less than one in a million, way better odds than the lottery! Russia has about 1 per 2.95 million, although that could be wrong as they also had a Soviet category. Canada has about 1 per 3M, Belgium 1 per 3.5M. For better than average odds you could move to Azerbaijan which has had 1 astronaut, but has a population of only 2.5M. Hardly any competition at all! You might avoid India – 2 out of 1.1B.
March 21st, 2008 at 4:48 pm
I thoroughly enjoyed that, thanks for sharing!
March 21st, 2008 at 4:51 pm
Daniel, I believe the maximum G-force exerted on Shuttle crews is 3 g’s. Just think about those poor guys that came home several times on a Soyuz from the ISS when the capsule accidentally came in on a ballistic trajectory which exerted a whopping 9 g’s! For a guy like me that weighs 240 lbs…. I shudder to think!
March 21st, 2008 at 4:56 pm
Thinking of Homer in the ‘Carbon Rod’ episode when he turns into Nixon… :-O
March 21st, 2008 at 5:08 pm
Tom:
That’s true. I could become and ESA astronaut first then somehow get accepted onto a shuttle mission. NASA astronauts have to be American citizens though. Unfortunately, the British are a bit short sighted when it comes to training (or funding training for) astronauts!
Only problem is that I need a batchelor’s degree in engineering, biological science, physical science or maths. I do have an astrophysics degree, but that was ten years ago and I haven’t used it since, so that counts out the three years of related, progressively responsible, professional experience! I don’t think they’ll class a report writer in the education sector as relevant experience… And since the shuttle programme is only two years away from the end, getting three years experience could prove to be a bit of a problem. Unless Doctor Who would like to give me a quick Tardis ride!
D
Also, my eyesight is a bit rubbish.
March 21st, 2008 at 5:27 pm
Sure, they act like they’re cool, calm, and collected. But how many of them had to change their spacesuits afterwards?
March 21st, 2008 at 8:27 pm
@ dafyddon (21 Mar 2008 at 11:34 am)
Um, Don?
The lower deck doesn’t have windows.
Sure it does – the main hatch has a 6″ window right in the middle of it. (you’ve never noticed that?)
.
@ Lugosion (21 Mar 2008 at 5:27 pm)
Sure, they act like they’re cool, calm, and collected. But how many of them had to change their spacesuits afterwards?
Actually, all of them – they all changed out of their orange safety pressure suits once MCC approved they were in orbit and started the orbit setup and operations procedures.
March 21st, 2008 at 11:25 pm
As to the mentions of running endless simulations making the “real thing” less exciting, I can think of at least one thing that I simulated over and over again when I was in high school. I precticed nearly every day, sometimes twice a day, and I was still excited and jumpy when the “real thing” came around.
Awesome video, but I wish there was ambient audio as well as the radio communications. We just have to imagine the roar of the engines and boosters pushing thousands of tons of machine and a few hundred kilograms of organisms into orbit.
March 22nd, 2008 at 1:21 am
This is so amazing.. I’m so entirely jealous!
I can’t wait until we do this on a daily basis.
I got a speeding ticket tonight.. just made me think.. oh no, what kind of speed limits will there be in personal space travel?
March 22nd, 2008 at 5:49 am
Things you’ll never hear an astronaut say during lift off;
“are we nearly there yet, Dad?”
“stop the bus, I want a wee wee!”
“first one to see the sea gets a sweet”
March 22nd, 2008 at 7:07 am
BA, do you have a video of you strapping on your seatbelt, and adjusting the mirror while backing out of your driveway? That would be exciting!
I get the joke and the metaphor, but shake my head at the comparison.
I wish that there had been some film like this of the Apollo missions. Some of those guys are real jokers.
March 22nd, 2008 at 7:50 am
You couldn’t pay me to get on a space shuttle. Two complete destructions out of 90 or so launches is too high for me.
March 22nd, 2008 at 11:47 am
bujin said:
“That’s true. I could become and ESA astronaut first then somehow get accepted onto a shuttle mission. NASA astronauts have to be American citizens though. Unfortunately, the British are a bit short sighted when it comes to training (or funding training for) astronauts!”
Hate to break it to you, but you’re a little too late. The Shuttle will be retired in 2010, so I doubt anyone else who applies at this late stage will get to go on a Shuttle.
Your best bet is to cough up $20 million to ride a Russian Proton to the ISS for a two week stint. Or, you could wait until Sir Richard gets his Virgin Galactic off the ground sometime in the next two years and cough up $200,000 for a five minute stint of weightlessness.
Barton, the stats say you’d be much safer flying with the Russians. Sure, they use 1960’s era technology, but it gets the job done safely!
Dave Morton:
How about this one: “Commander, can we turn around? I think I left the front door unlocked?”
March 22nd, 2008 at 3:53 pm
Michael wrote:
“Your best bet is to cough up $20 million to ride a Russian Proton to the ISS for a two week stint.”
*digs deep in pocket*
Think they’ll accept 50p and a half-chewed Jelly Baby? ;o)
March 22nd, 2008 at 6:48 pm
“Barton, the stats say you’d be much safer flying with the Russians. Sure, they use 1960’s era technology, but it gets the job done safely!”
Are you sure?
They’ve had, by my count, 96 crewed launch attempts with the Soyuz of which 2 were failures though the launch escape system saved the crew. Call the failed but saved ones a draw and count that as 94 launches. They’ve had two fatal re-entry accidents killing a total of four people so actually, overall, the Shuttle with two fatal accidents out of well over a hundred missions is slightly safer though there’s not enough difference to be statistically significant, of course.
Also, the Russian accidents were early in the missions so some might argue that they’ve sorted out their problems and are much safer now. However, there have been a few incidents since which indicate that maybe they’ve just been lucky. Not that the Shuttle hasn’t had a few near scrapes, too, of course.
March 22nd, 2008 at 8:28 pm
“Smooth ride”…. like it’s a Cadillac or something. GREAT video!! I wish NASA would do more of this stuff!!!! I’ve been watching NASA on TV hoping to catch some of the Dexter stuff… but so far no luck. It would be nice if they compiled this and did some editing and came up with an hour highlight show of each mission or something.
Space is so cool.
March 22nd, 2008 at 9:51 pm
Phil, you said, “During the actual launch, they seem to be very nonchalant, simply doing what they need to do;”
Personally, I think the brave men and women doing this have many reasons to appear nonchalant during the launch. For one thing, they are sitting on approx. 535,000 US gal of liquid propellant, and approx. 2.6 million pounds of solid rocket boosters, all controlled using equipment designed mostly in the late 1970’s by the lowest bidder. No wonder they have diapers in their spacesuits!
Once the riskiest part of their journey is over, they are clearly elated to just still be alive!
Space travel is indeed risky. 2 failures out of 121+ Shuttle launches is what, 1.65% chance of failure? Or rather, 98.35% chance of success. Far worse odds than getting hit by another car on the road, That’s one reason why so few people get to do it. If I had the chance, I would ride a rocket to space in a heartbeat. I’m probably not in the majority, and that’s another reason so few have gone.
March 23rd, 2008 at 9:52 am
[...] otro, vía Bad Astonomy Blog, muestra el interior de la cabina del Endeavour [QuickTime, 23 minutos aproximadamente] durante las [...]
March 23rd, 2008 at 10:17 am
[...] flight deck of Shuttle Endeavour during the final countdown and into low orbit of STS-123. As the Bad Astronomer says: You can see three astronauts in their suits preparing for the mission, and it’s really [...]
March 23rd, 2008 at 10:24 am
Further to Don Wiseman’s report of an astronaut unstrapping and kneeling on the mid-deck seat (a/k/a seat #5, conveniently located immediately in front of the toilet) to look out the side hatch window during launch. That must have been pre-Challenger.
One of the post-Challenger changes was to install an extendible bail-out pole that would stick out the side hatch to facilitate crew bailout, in an extreme emergency. Therefore, seat #5 next to the hatch was eliminated. That crewmember now sits in a seat forward and to the right of that position, and acts as sort of a jumpmaster, jettisoning the side hatch in an emergency, extending the pole, etc..
I haven’t asked anyone, but cannot imagine an astronaut unstrapping from any of other middeck seats and tumbling down behind them to be able to see out of the side hatch window during launch.
Thanks for an interesting story, Don!
March 24th, 2008 at 12:01 pm
[...] Orbiter Endeavor Launch Watch the March 11 launch from a dashboard-mounted computer. This is how astronauts act as they go into space. (via BA) [...]
April 1st, 2008 at 1:05 pm
[...] Orbiter Endeavor Launch Watch the March 11 launch from a dashboard-mounted computer. This is how astronauts act as they go into space. (via BA) [...]