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it was a year ago this past april when

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kathy leaders officially was named

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manager of nasa's commercial crew

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program she spends a lot of time between

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the program office at the kennedy space

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center and here at johnson as well as

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conducts frequent trips to locations for

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those companies developing human rated

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spacecraft that will deliver crews to

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and from the international space station

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we're pleased to have her in houston and

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inside mission control to talk about the

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state of the commercial crew program a

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lot has happened in the past year

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and we'd like to welcome you back kathy

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thank you i appreciate it

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well from my vantage point um the last

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12 to 14 months has been

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kind of a blur relative to uh the

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commercial crew activity um how has how

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fast has your first year gone by has it

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been a year

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sometimes i feel like it's i'm in one of

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those uh

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matrix movies where the time phasing is

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kind of messed up you know and so

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um we're um i'm actually in houston

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right now for a quarterly and we've been

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kind of looking at all the things that

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have happened over this past year and

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it's just amazing

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well of course

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last fall boeing and spacex were named

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as the two companies that the program

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would put under contract to fly

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astronauts to and from the international

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space station

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um your team hit the ground running uh

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once those contracts were announced

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right

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yeah we had to really we were preparing

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all summer really to

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get through the award and um were

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pleasantly surprised

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the agency was able to make awards

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because competition was very important

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for us

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and with that investment we knew that we

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as a as the program had to be ready to

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execute and so the team had to gear up

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staff up and then be able to

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start moving out on our first milestones

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which were the certification baseline

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reviews

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then from there obviously the companies

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are off and running and

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so we've been frantically working with

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them on their key certification products

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while they're really doing the tough job

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of starting to get their hardware moving

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and so both

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boeing went ahead and started put money

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down on their first two

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launch vehicles to get ready for their

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uncrewed mission and their uh crude

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flight test very exciting to start

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numbers those are long lead items too

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obviously yeah long lead items um so

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united launch alliance is getting ready

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all already those vehicles are starting

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to

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be developed and processed in their

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decatur facility in addition spacex you

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know is has been working frantically on

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getting their design unsolidified and

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moving towards their cdr time frame

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which will be happening in the fall and

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then moving out on executing on their

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crude uncrewed mission and their crude

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flight test so very exciting times for

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us

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of those companies the commercial crew

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is under several different phases

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of course there are technical terms for

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that but they just completed a fairly

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big milestone

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the spectacular and fast pad abort test

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describe the importance of that

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milestone under the previous phase of

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the

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program

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as it relates to ensuring astronaut

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safety for flight

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so

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you know the paddleboard or really the

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abort feature for these crewed vehicles

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has been a feature that not only our

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commercial crew vehicles have but

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obviously orion has too it's an

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additional

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feature that that's been a requirement

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for crude test flight that had been

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there previously and under the previous

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programs but was used in a different way

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during the shuttle program and so

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um spacex during their sa milestones had

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in their unique way had decided that

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they wanted to

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use their saa milestones as a way to

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prove out that capability and so we were

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fortunate enough enough to have that

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they were able to go ahead and do that

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test

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and

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i mean when you look at it it was short

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test like you said from engine ignition

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to splash down two minutes but what it

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showed is that if you have a problem out

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on the pad the crew is able to safely

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get away from that problem in a very

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i don't want to say immature but not as

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mature design was able to to

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successfully deliver that capability to

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us so a real kudos for spacex um for at

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that development phase for that

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vehicle to be able to accomplish what's

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a very very very tough job

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well these two companies boeing and

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spacex obviously working on their

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separate

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spacecraft and integrated rocket designs

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but

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earlier this year we

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i guess it was this year yeah back in

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march february and march we conducted or

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this team conducted three spacewalks

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with the crew on orbit

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and they were directly related to

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commercial crew by

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setting the stage for the delivery of

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the first of two

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docking adapters talk about the how the

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ideas as they're called international

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docking adapters are now showing that

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we're not only

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the program working separately but it's

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actually now integrated with the space

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station real-time flight control team

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and the crew on orbit i think people

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forget that it's not just us getting the

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commercial crew vehicles ready it's

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really station had to make the first

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major modification to its overall

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architecture since really assembly right

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to be able to enable the commercial crew

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vehicles to come so tremendous effort to

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be able to

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integrate the com systems and the

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docking systems that are really required

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for these vehicles to be able to come up

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and dock with the international space

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station

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what my favorite part of the story is

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really that the two companies that are

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working on the commercial crew vehicles

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are the same companies that are making

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that happen so it's just so much fun for

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me to be able to see that boeing

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designed the docking adapters and spacex

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is going to be flying

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the hardware that boeing developed up to

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the international space station coming

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up in a couple weeks so actually next

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week so so very very exciting time

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and really

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shows the

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total collaborative effort that's

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required to make this happen

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and while all of that is going on

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obviously the

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program is continuing to work and

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support two other companies blue origin

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and sierra nevada

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through some space act agreements and

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what's new with the work that they're

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doing and what we're doing to work with

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those companies so one of my favorite

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parts of being in this program is is

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also being able to

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have the ability to work with a diverse

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set of companies and i think our team

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really learns from

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the progress that they're making out

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there on their own to develop their crew

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capabilities and so it's been

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very fun to see blue origin really

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emerging with the work that we've been

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doing with them on their engine

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development now emerging as a player and

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and this new vulcan you know

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launch vehicle strategy huge huge uh

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benefit

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the collaborations that we've been

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building on over the last few years and

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sierra they have been slogging away and

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and

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working so hard to get ready for their

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second drop test with us and so what's

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phenomenal is their vehicles really

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coming together now and and making

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tremendous progress and we are really

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looking forward to the work and effort

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um working towards their second drop

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test that's be coming up at the end of

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this year

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pretty exciting they

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that what may not be as exciting but as

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important probably you can describe this

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is

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here on the ground at the ken at kennedy

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and across the bay there at the cape

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canaveral air force station there's

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infrastructure work going on um

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that is as vital probably if not equal

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to the the other activity that's going

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on for the rocket development

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yeah you know the last time i came and

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talked to you we talked about how

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after shuttle after shuttle retirement

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how it was kind of sad to see those pads

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empty and what's amazing right now is

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that those pads aren't empty anymore you

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know you've got 39a

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spacex has just done a phenomenal job

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erecting a 300 foot a horizontal

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integration facility

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starting to build the major

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pieces and components of their

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new falcon heavy capability and their

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the new

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falcon capability that we'll be

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flying our vehicles to and so when you

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see that all coming back up again along

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with the orion work along with going

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over and looking at launch via launch

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complex 41 and seeing the crew

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access

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capabilities coming in and starting to

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see the tower being built

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in the middle of and honestly ula has

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done a phenomenal job figuring out how

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to do that in between their whole launch

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campaigns that they're doing you know

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you realize that in the

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2017-2018 time frame there's going to be

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three human spaceflight capabilities at

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the kennedy space center what a

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never before in history will that have

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happened and this is just going to be a

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phenomenal achievement for

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the aerospace industry in the united

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states as a whole

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well it's it's very exciting and uh

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kathy we really appreciate you taking

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some time out from your meetings to come

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over and talk to us and give us a

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progress report

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a year to 12 to 14 months after you came

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on board it's it that just shows how

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much work it has been done and we really

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appreciate you stopping by i appreciate

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you letting me come over and talk to you

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kyle