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good day and welcome to mission control

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houston uh today with us is paul blauer

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the lead ice officer in the control room

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working with a lot of the dragon spacex

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activities on this mission uh why don't

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we start off with you explaining what an

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ice is what's the acronym mean paul sure

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so we're the integration systems

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engineer and uh our our job is basically

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to integrate with all of our visiting

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vehicle partners that come to the

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international space station on the us

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segment

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so my job is to kind of be in

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communication with those guys

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i'm supposed to be the expert here in

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houston

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on their vehicle systems and and how

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they connect up to the international

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space station so i kind of keep an eye

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on what their systems are doing and what

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our systems are doing and make sure that

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we can all uh play well together in

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space in orbit okay now we've all heard

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a lot about the visiting vehicle officer

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and this is a little bit different from

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what they do can you compare those a

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little bit sure so the the visiting

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vehicle officer they're actually from

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our our division here at nasa that's

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responsible for trajectory so they do

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orbital mechanics and guidance and

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they're basically looking at at how the

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vehicle is approaching the space station

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how it's coming in from a guidance

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perspective and we're looking at all of

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the systems so we're looking at the

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communications we're looking at the

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power levels we're looking at the

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propulsion system so uh the vvo uh sean

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o'rourke for this particular mission and

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i we work really closely together to

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make sure um together that we understand

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how that spacecraft is working and that

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it's gonna come safely to the space

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station okay uh well

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what

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specifically have been your big

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challenges of this mission ah there's

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there's been a few uh you know the first

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time you fly a new vehicle it's it's

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always challenging right you never know

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what you're gonna expect and we spend a

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lot of time with the spacex team we

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spent a lot of time here in houston

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trying to prepare for whatever might

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come our way but inevitably what happens

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on orbit is never what you expect

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exactly right so we had a few challenges

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with this this particular flight we had

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some computers on the dragon

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decide to lock up on us and you know

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they were able to reboot them we had

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some sensors go bad as we were flying

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some sensors on some of the propulsion

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system

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and you know we had to to take care of

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that

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and then we had some problems a little

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bit with some of the laser rangers and

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some of the thermal imagers that they

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used to figure out how far away they are

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from the space station as we were coming

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on the approach and that was on the

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dragon side

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on the space station side we actually

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had a couple problems with our gps

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system

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on the space station right before their

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mission started so

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we were a little bit worried we actually

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replaced one of the gps's on the space

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station we had the crew go do that

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but those those locked up on us a couple

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times and we actually use that gps data

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we send it over a radio link to dragon

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so the dragon can kind of figure out

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where it is and where the space station

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is and fly to us so

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it was definitely an interesting and

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challenging mission but i think in the

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end we we won against all the demons

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coming after us so

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that's great um how's it been to work

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with the dragon team

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uh it's it's been a really really cool

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experience you know i i remember uh when

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i first started working with those guys

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about about three years ago we went out

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to lunch and we were we were telling

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them some of the stories that we've had

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to of things we've had to deal with on

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the space station you know we've had

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shuttle missions where we've had all the

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five russian computers locked up and you

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know we've had

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loss of attitude control and we're

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trying to recover from all that and i

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remember watching the spacex guys their

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their eyes kind of getting wide as

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they're listening to all of the the

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challenges that we've had to deal with

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in the past and

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they've done a phenomenal job you know

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coming in and having to deal with some

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of those same kind of things themselves

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on this mission so

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i really think they did an excellent

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uh excellent job working with us getting

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contingency procedures ready and just

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really calmly handling everything that

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happened on this flight to get to get us

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up to the space station so you know

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usually communications about various

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issues especially problem issues are

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really crisp on the nasa side

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is it the same way working with the

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spacex folks

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yes i think maybe the the only exception

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is you know being their first flight i

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could hear a lot more cheering in the

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background but their team was the team

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that was actually flying the vehicle i

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mean very professional uh very calm and

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very crisp uh flying the mission but you

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could hear in the background you know

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they had almost their their whole

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company i think standing behind the

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glass of mission control watching and a

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lot of those engineers would you know

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poured five six seven years of their

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lives into this mission cheering loudly

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so so every time

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we were trying to get something done

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right at the very end at a big moment

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like the capture moment you could hear

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those guys in the background which is

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which was pretty exciting actually

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so have you had a chance to visit the

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spacex control room yourself uh yeah

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actually we went over there quite a few

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times as we were getting ready for this

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mission we got to see

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sort of what they have it set up but

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i was actually you know pretty amazed we

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end up you know they designed their

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their control center completely

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independently of us designing ours but

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we kind of ended up with a lot of the

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same sorts of tools you know we have

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plotting tools and mission control and

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things that monitor telemetry and give

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us little warnings if something's going

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wrong and they end up with a lot of the

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same kinds of things in their control

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center as well

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they have

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come at things a little bit differently

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that from some of the other visiting

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spacecraft and and cargo vehicles we've

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dealt with in terms of the japanese htv

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and the

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european space agency's atv

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they've taken a a unique approach in

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some of these can you

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pull out one of those and talk to us

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about an example of what how those

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things differ uh yeah you know i think

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um

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probably one of the

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the most interesting things about their

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team is i think

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you know here here at nasa we have uh

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people who are sort of dedicated to

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mission control you know they just do

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operations and we have people dedicated

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to engineering

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their team has started out a lot smaller

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and so a lot of their people were very

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much wearing many hats right they they

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had you know people who were running

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simulations who are also going to be

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mission controllers who were also

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designing and actually going out and

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helping manufacture pieces of hardware

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and so i think that's one of the more

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interesting things that i've seen from a

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smaller startup company that's a lot

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different from how we we do business

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here but you know of course they're

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dealing with a smaller spacecraft and a

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newer company so it's been uh it's been

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pretty interesting

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okay well hey tell us a little bit about

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yourself uh where are you from

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originally and what was your path to get

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here to nasa uh so i'm from new jersey

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uh the great tiny state of new jersey

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and

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i went to purdue university i got a

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bachelor's degree in aerospace

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engineering and i always wanted to work

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for nasa i always wanted to be in

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mission control so this is kind of a

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dream come true for me

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when i was at at purdue i did a bunch of

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space societies and i did some

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experiments actually where we flew on

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the zero gravity nasa zero gravity plane

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i designed some experiments that we flew

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up there so i got really involved in

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nasa early on i did our co-op program

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here and then

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came here to work in mission control

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that's great um and are there any

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special qualities that you and any ice

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team member you feel brings to bear here

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in mission control i mean everybody

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there's a different set of skills for

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every uh position here uh what's what's

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the thing that makes ice

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people stand out

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i think um

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you know most of the the controllers

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here today you know we've had the space

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station up for 10 years and a lot of

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them have have a pretty i'd say stable

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system in that it's not you know we're

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not building up the space station much

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anymore the ice team

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has to deal with a lot newer stuff now

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than

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most of the other

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controllers who now have you know got

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their procedures sort of matured over 10

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years and so we're dealing with a lot

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more uncertainty which is a lot of what

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the space station was 10 years ago when

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it was first being built but i think

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that's what makes us a little bit

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different today is that we have to be

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prepared a little bit more uh for the

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unknown being that these are brand new

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spacecraft coming up for the first time

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and you just never know what's going to

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happen

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uh you touched on earlier uh

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the level of excitement at spacex uh

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associated with this mission can you

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share a little bit of that from behind

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the scenes on on how that's manifesting

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itself with your team sure um you know

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you actually you can you can watch the

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the video from the caption you can

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actually see me in the little corner and

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my wife said my my eyes lit up like i

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just you know won the lottery or it was

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a little kid in the candy shop right i'm

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cheering and clapping um a lot of us who

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have you know poured our hearts into

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into this mission for three or four

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years and certainly the spacex guys have

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done so you know 10 times more than we

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have here at nasa um

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it's really just it's a moment you you

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can't even describe when you finally get

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to

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accomplishing such a difficult and

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challenging task that you've been

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working on for so many years and to see

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it actually happen on orbit is it's just

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an indescribable feeling i mean that's

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the reason i love working here is to

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have that that moment

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and this isn't the end of the new things

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we've got another commercial spacecraft

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that's being readied for flight

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that's going to be the orbital vehicle

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um are you going to be working with

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those folks

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uh yeah i i'm not personally assigned to

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that mission but you know our

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assignments change a lot i might be but

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yeah this is certainly um just the

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beginning you know we have the orbital

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folks coming online and then hopefully

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down the road we we're talking about

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commercial crew and there may be other

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vehicles coming down the line so this is

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the hopefully this the start of a very

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exciting era for nasa and for the

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commercial sector as well

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and of course now that we've

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accomplished the first demonstration

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mission for spacex and dragon they've

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got a formal

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commercial resupply flight that's

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scheduled to happen later this year are

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you gonna be working that one yes i'm

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actually i'm assigned to be the lead on

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that one we're already talking about you

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know getting our little planning

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meetings together to prepare for that

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mission so uh yeah it's gonna be a busy

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year for my group for sure

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great well hey paul barb thank you so

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much for being here from the ice console

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today in mission control we really