{"id":16059,"date":"2015-09-16T00:15:48","date_gmt":"2015-09-15T16:15:48","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wp-productionenv-bjg9h2g2bgg5b8aa.southeastasia-01.azurewebsites.net\/news\/build-up-of-crew-access-tower-begins-at-atlas-5-pad\/"},"modified":"2015-09-16T00:15:48","modified_gmt":"2015-09-15T16:15:48","slug":"build-up-of-crew-access-tower-begins-at-atlas-5-pad","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/news\/build-up-of-crew-access-tower-begins-at-atlas-5-pad\/","title":{"rendered":"Build-up of crew access tower begins at Atlas 5 pad"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"The
The first tier of the Atlas 5\u2019s crew access tower was transferred to the launch pad Sept. 9 and hoisted into position Tuesday. Credit: NASA\/Dmitrios Gerondidakis<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

A new fixture on the Cape Canaveral skyline began rising Tuesday, with the placement of the first of seven segments for a 200-foot-tall crew access tower at the Atlas 5 rocket\u2019s seaside launch pad for astronauts boarding Boeing\u2019s new commercial CST-100 Starliner spaceship.<\/p>\n

The first two tiers of the tower transferred to the Atlas 5 rocket\u2019s Complex 41 launch pad Sept. 9, and a giant crane at the launch site positioned the first segment over the structure\u2019s concrete foundation Tuesday, according to a United Launch Alliance spokesperson.<\/p>\n

Construction crews assembled the seven tiers at a nearby worksite beginning earlier this year, and now attention turns to stacking the tower at Complex 41.<\/p>\n

Astronauts flying into space aboard the CST-100 Starliner crew capsule will ride an elevator up the tower and then crawl into the spacecraft through a climate-controlled enclosure called a white room.<\/p>\n

Boeing is developing the CST-100 Starliner spacecraft under contract to NASA, which awarded the aerospace giant an agreement worth up to $4.2 billion to finish certification of the crew capsule and fly up to six full-up crew ferry flights between Earth and the International Space Station.<\/p>\n

NASA signed a similar contract SpaceX worth up to $2.6 billion for the Crew Dragon spaceship outfitted for humans. SpaceX\u2019s crewed flights will take off on Falcon 9 rockets from a decommissioned space shuttle launch pad currently being modified for the purpose.<\/p>\n

The commercial crew program will end U.S. reliance on Russian Soyuz spacecraft to carry crews to the space station.<\/p>\n

Engineers are using down time in the Atlas 5 rocket\u2019s busy launch manifest to build up the crew access tower at Complex 41, according to Howard Biegler, head of human launch services at ULA, the Boeing-Lockheed Martin joint venture which builds and operates the Atlas 5.<\/p>\n

\u201cAll seven tiers, which make up the center core of the crew access tower, are fully constructed,\u201d Biegler said in an interview with Spaceflight Now. \u201cThe towers are fully outfitted. We\u2019ve got stairwells, all the piping, fire extinguishers, elevator shafts, you name it.\u201d<\/p>\n

Construction crews at the launch pad, situated a half-mile from the Atlantic shoreline, have built up a crane to lift the tower segments.<\/p>\n

\"Artist's
Artist\u2019s concept of the Atlas 5 rocket, CST-100 Starliner and the crew access tower. Credit: NASA<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The launch pad will not have a permanent tower until the crew access structure is erected. The Atlas 5 rocket is built up on a mobile platform inside a nearby vertical integration facility, then rolled out to the launch pad the day before liftoff.<\/p>\n

Biegler said the plan calls for all seven segments to be hoisted by the time of the Atlas 5\u2019s scheduled launch of a new GPS navigation satellite Oct. 30. Some of the tiers will go up before the Atlas 5\u2019s next mission, which is set for Oct. 2 with a Mexican communications satellite, and ground teams will add the rest before the Oct. 30 launch.<\/p>\n

\u201cAfter our GPS launch at the end of October, all of our outboard steel which makes the top part of the tower for storing the crew access arm, emergency egress and other equipment will be added,\u201d Biegler said.<\/p>\n

The stacking of the crew access tower comes after teams poured 300 cubic yards of concrete for the structure\u2019s foundation just to the northwest of where the Atlas 5\u2019s mobile launch platform parks over the launch pad\u2019s flame trench, according to John Mulholland, vice president and program manager for Boeing\u2019s commercial crew program.<\/p>\n

While workers poured the foundation, a team nearby constructed the seven 28-foot-tall 20-by-20 foot sections for the crew access tower.<\/p>\n

Biegler said the structure will be completed by January.<\/p>\n

\u201cThen we\u2019ll start running cables and outfitting it,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

A 42-foot-long crew access arm is taking shape at a construction yard in nearby Oak Hill, Florida. The appendage will connect the tower to the CST-100 Starliner mounted atop the Atlas 5 rocket, allowing astronauts to board the capsule in the final hours of the countdown.<\/p>\n

Located about 172 feet up the 20-story tower, the arm will swing away after ground teams close the Starliner hatch, clearing the way for liftoff.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019ve got the torque tube, the structural arm, the white room and the environmental seal, and the drive system, which we call the hydraulic drive system, will be integrated on a test stand and we\u2019ll run it through its paces,\u201d Biegler said. \u201cThat\u2019s a critical path item. When we bring it out to Complex 41 in the June timeframe of next year, we want to know exactly where it\u2019s got to be positioned on the tower, and know that everything works and the timing works perfectly.\u201d<\/p>\n

ULA and Boeing managers are working out the details of how to load the astronauts into the CST-100 Starliner.<\/p>\n

Engineers evaluated Apollo- and shuttle-era white rooms, including artifacts on display at the Kennedy Space Center Visitor Complex, when designing the Starliner access arm.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019ve got an environmental seal on the end of it that is 7 feet by 5 feet by 5 feet on the end of (the white room),\u201d Biegler said. \u201cIf you take that into consideration, we\u2019re actually bigger than shuttle (white room), but for the most part, it\u2019s comparable.\u201d<\/p>\n

A closeout crew similar to the team that strapped astronauts into the space shuttle will be at the launch pad to help crew members into the CST-100 Starliner. The ground team will likely be a mix of ULA, Boeing and NASA personnel, but the exact makeup has not been finalized, according to Biegler.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re going to have as few people out there as we need to make it efficent because we want to be able to get this done in a quick manner, and get them out,\u201d Biegler said.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s also pretty hazardous,\u201d said Tony Taliancich, director of ULA\u2019s east coast operations. \u201cWe don\u2019t want to take any more risks than we need to take. We\u2019ll have a fully loaded vehicle with hydrogen and oxygen, and be ready to launch at that point.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Atlas 5 launch team will fuel the rocket with propellants before the astronauts arrive at the pad. A built-in hold at T-minus 4 minutes, which usually lasts a few minutes, will be extended up to three hours to give the crew time to get into the capsule.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn our normal process, we\u2019re within four minutes of launching at that point, so we\u2019re just waiting for the astronauts to get on-board,\u201d Taliancich said.<\/p>\n

The CST-100 Starliner can carry up to seven astronauts, but the capsule\u2019s standard mission will likely include a crew of four plus supplies for the space station.<\/p>\n

Another feature of the crew access tower will be a slidewire escape system similar to the emergency egress baskets used at the space shuttle launch pads.<\/p>\n

Boeing\u2019s capsule will fly on a version of the Atlas 5 with two solid rocket boosters, a dual-engine Centaur upper stage, and an emergency detection system to detect faults in flight and trigger an abort, if necessary.<\/p>\n

Officials said all of the crew access tower construction should be completed by late 2016, in time for the first uncrewed CST-100 Starliner test flight scheduled for May 2017, and the first human demonstration mission in September 2017.<\/p>\n

Email the author.<\/i><\/b><\/p>\n

Follow Stephen Clark on Twitter: @StephenClark1.<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The first tier of the Atlas 5\u2019s crew access tower was transferred to the launch pad Sept. 9 and hoisted into position Tuesday. Credit: NASA\/Dmitrios Gerondidakis A new fixture on the Cape Canaveral skyline began rising Tuesday, with the placement of the first of seven segments for a 200-foot-tall crew access tower at the Atlas […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[724,524,1565,3932,1306,750],"class_list":["post-16059","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news","tag-atlas-5","tag-commercial-crew","tag-cst-100","tag-space-launch-complex-41","tag-starliner","tag-united-launch-alliance"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16059"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=16059"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16059\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16059"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=16059"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=16059"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}