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[Status check to proceed with terminal count.]
There is a moment at the start of every

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mission when everything comes together. A moment when years of preparation and

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planning are put to the test. [Clear to proceed.] There are no second chances. [You have permission to launch.]

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Success or failure is just a heartbeat
away.

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A spacecraft and it's rocket on the pad fully fueled and ready to launch. [Status check. Go Atlas. Go Centaur.]

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In that moment a controlled explosion
released with such an intense power

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it can propel a spacecraft off the
earth and into space for the benefit of all.

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We call this moment T-Zero, this is its
story.

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NASA is about to do something we've
never done before. Nestled along the

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mountains on California's Central Coast
is a little talked about Space Launch

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Center known as Vandenberg Air Force
Base. From here history is about to be made.

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This is the first time we've had an
interplanetary launch from Vandenberg

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Air Force Base in California. The cool
thing about this launch is that we've

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got such a capable rocket the Atlas 5, we
don't have to launch from Florida.

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InSight is gonna be the first time we've
had a spacecraft leave Earth's orbit

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launching from California. We've actually
done studies for it even up two decades

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ago but it just comes down to whether or
not the mission I had extra propellant

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left over and whether there was an
operational reason to switch from an

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East Coast launch to West Coast. This is
just the first time all of it came together.

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What we're gonna do is we're
gonna unload the spacecraft really

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really carefully and then we're going to
drive it a couple of miles to the

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Astrotech facility where they have a
clean room all set up for us. We've got

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about two months here. All we got to do
is clean it up test it out put the fuel

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in the tanks and bolt it on the rocket
and off we go to Mars. InSight is NASA's

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next groundbreaking mission, literally
designed to break ground on Mars using

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probes and seismometers insight will
listen for Mars quakes and measure how

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much heat the planets interior gives off.
If we're going to truly understand how

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rocky planets like Mars and Earth were
created we need to look inside.

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It's unlike other missions that we've done in
Mars we have a number of orbiters a

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number of Landers that we've
successfully explored this amazing

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planet but this this actually is the
first mission where we're really looking

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on the inside the inner space of Mars.
Sending a science mission to the red

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planet is never easy. Landing a probe on
the surface is even harder. To accomplish

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this, InSight will have to shed its many
components

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in a matter of minutes bit by bit like
peeling an orange until only the lander

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is left so the crew stage itself is the
critical component that that actually

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gets us to Mars there's an aeroshell
that absorbs the heat as we re-enter the

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atmosphere that aeroshell enables us to
go through the the atmosphere of Mars

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successfully without getting the inside
the lander itself too hot we deploy a

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parachute that parachute does two things
it really ensures the stability of the

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aeroshell as it started to get closer to
the surface it also slows down the

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spacecraft further until finally we drop
out of the combination backshell and

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parachute and then we do a propulsive
descent down to the surface. We know

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water exists on Mars and where there's
water there could be signs of life but

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we must ensure any organisms we discover
weren't simply stowaways from Earth.

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This is where the planetary protection team
comes into play. Planetary protection is

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what we do to responsibly explore other
planets and moons in

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our solar system in order to do that we
need to make sure that we send a clean

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spacecraft there. We would hate to get to
another planet or moon and think we

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discovered life but it was actually
something that we brought with us. So we

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collect our samples on InSight, any part
of inside that's going to land on the

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surface of Mars, we bring it back to our
lab and we process it using a NASA

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procedure. If we run into a situation
where you take a sample and it comes

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back as having higher number of bacteria
than what we want then we make sure that

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the engineers go back and clean those
surfaces for the whole idea that we

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don't want to cloud our ability to
potentially find life on another planet

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or moon.
Lockheed Martin's space of Denver

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Colorado built InSight with an extremely
efficient design streamlining what needs

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to be done at the launch site. They ship
the spacecraft to Vandenberg with no

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assembly required. Simply check it out,
fuel it, test it, encapsulate it and it's

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ready for launch. The processing for our
spacecraft has been very smooth a lot of

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the processing had to do with fueling
the spacecraft removing some removed

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before flight items everything else was
pretty much already installed on the

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spacecraft in Denver Colorado before it
was shipped here and that's to call a

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ship and shoot, which means there's not
too much to do except for to fuel the

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vehicle and do some last-minute power on
checkouts of the onboard computers and

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subsystems. These preparations are
crucial everything must be working

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perfectly before InSight leaves earth. This effort

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is designed to ensure a safe arrival and
landing following the six-month trip

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from Earth to Mars. In the meantime,
United Launch Alliance or ULA is busy

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at their Launchpad, slick-three,
assembling the world's most successful

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rocket the Atlas 5. Well I mean we're
building a rocket what's not

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exciting about that. I'm really excited
to be able to launch the first planetary

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mission from the west coast
first ula stacks their Atlas 5 booster

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onto the launch platform. Atlas 5 is
powered by the mighty rd-180 rocket

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engine. The rd-180 is a powerhouse
burning highly refined kerosene known as

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RP 1 and liquid oxygen for thrust. For
this mission the rd-180 has more than

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enough power to get insight off of Earth
and heading towards Mars. When the

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Boosters fuel is spent the Centaur's
second stage kicks in and finishes the

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job. Centaur won't actually hit Mars it
will fly just past it. Final course

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corrections will be done by InSight
itself to enter the Martian atmosphere

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and land on the surface. Once fueling and
testing is complete the team from United

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Launch Alliance will encapsulate InSight
inside its payload fairing, the shell

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that keeps InSight clean and safe
during its dangerous ascent to Earth's

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atmosphere. We're at the face of the
mission where we're encapsulating with

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the launch vehicle and the ula team with
their fairings now come in and they take

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the two halves of the fairings and they
make a clamshell

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around the spacecraft to help protect it
for the environments that we see during

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launch and we do that because as we
leave the Earth's atmosphere the air and

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the molecules in the atmosphere would
tear up our spacecraft otherwise the

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fairing is there to protect us.
With InSight encapsulated in its fairing

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it's time to move the payload out to
slick-three but this California

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coastline comes with its own set of
challenges

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the surrounding marine layer can swallow
up a launch pad

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reducing visibility to under a couple
hundred feet. So right now it's on the

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transport vehicle and it's ready to roll
and we'll be rolling out around to a

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2:00 a.m. at that point we'll have a
convoy that drives very slowly from the

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payload processing facility out to the
slick-three Atlas 5 facility, and once it

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arrives we'll hoist the encapsulated
spacecraft up to the top of the mobile

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service tower and place it on the launch
vehicle. This morning when it was sitting

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on the truck and they put the crane on
it they started lifted up that's the

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last time this the spacecraft's ever
going to feel the ground of Earth.

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I'm just just kind of jumping out of my
skin this is so exciting we're getting

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so close to launch and it's been a long
long road. This has been a challenging

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program I mean we've had a lot of
technical issues to overcome so we

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actually had to stand down back in 2015
but since then we've gotten it all

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together and things been going so
smoothly the last year we really feel

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really confident about this launch. We
got it on top of the rocket

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we're going to blast it off in just a
few days and when it gets to Mars and

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lands finally we'll have solid ground
under its feet again and get to work on

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probing the depths of Mars. But InSight
won't be traveling alone hitching a ride

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to the Red Planet are a pair of CubeSats, twin satellites called Marco A and

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Marco B.
So Marco is a dual payload riding as a

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secondary mission on its way to Mars. So
Marco is a pair of CubeSats and CubeSats

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are really small spacecraft they're
essentially the size of a large cereal

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box about this big. It's going to be
relaying telemetry from the entry

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descent and landing of InSight back to
earth in near real time. After InSight is

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deployed on orbit and is heading to Mars
Centaur, which is behind me, injects Marco A

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into orbit and it will slowly rotate
itself so that Marco B ejects 180

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degrees on the other side of the vehicle.
But Marco is a technology demonstration

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mission it's actually one of the
smallest spacecraft we've ever launched

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interplanetary space it's the first
interplanetary CubeSat so in of itself

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it has all of these technology that
we've never tested in deep space before.

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So if Marco works this time one of the
cool things that we could do is actually

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replicate that system and fly it with
other missions in the future and whether

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you go into Mars or Venus or it may be
even further away to an asteroid and you

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could think of it as bring your own
telecom relay. So everything went well

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today with the lift of the spacecraft
and mate onto the rocket it started off

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very foggy and windy
and right now it's a beautiful day this

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typical California weather and now we're
ready to go to Mars.

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But just as Twilight falls across the
base the fog returns cloaking the coast

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with a bone-chilling mist that will last
until daybreak. As we get closer to T-Zero

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liftoff time a number of activities have
to happen. There's a mobile service tower

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around the Atlas five rocket and the
InSight spacecraft is on top of the

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rocket enclosed in the payload fairing
so we're gonna back that mobile service

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tower away from the rocket to leave it
exposed just beside the umbilical tower.

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[Engineer proceed with roll to park position. Roger MST shall be

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closed in park position. Roger.]

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The final launchpad preparation is
underway once the mobile service tower

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is rolled back InSight and Atlas 5 are
just hours away from T-Zero. Basking in the

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searchlights of the West Coast facility
they are presented with the glamour of a

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Hollywood premier fitting treatment for
such an historical mission

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So there's a lot of excitement within
the NASA launch team about the InSight

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mission first time we're going to launch
from the California coast going to Mars

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and what is really exciting to the team
is this is the culmination of a lot of

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work. The teams have been working on this
mission for over five years and today is

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the day that they will see all of their
hard work rewarded.

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[Status check to proceed with terminal
count Atlas systems propulsion go

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hydraulics go pneumatics go 
water go Centaur systems propulsion go

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pneumatics go LH-2 go facility go
reigns coordinator clear to proceed

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launch director. LC you have permission
to launch go Atlas go Center go InSight.

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Proceeding with the count. We're at 
t-minus eight seven six five four three

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two, one, zero.

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And liftoff of the Atlas-5 launching the first interplanetary mission on the west coast and NASA's

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InSight the first outer space robotic
explorer to study the interior of Mars.

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Seconds after liftoff the rocket punches
through the marine layer lighting the

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night sky for miles visible all the way
down to Los Angeles. An infrared camera

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showing the long tail of the exhaust
plume captures some of the ascent as

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well as an onboard ascent camera. And
we're nearing booster engine cutoff.

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We're back to 4.6 G's in preparation blue space cooldown has completed.

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Shutdown looks good. Stage
separation. We have box and fuel prestart

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between two purge firing, the RCS is
underway. We have ignition and full

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thrust
and we have indication of payload

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fairing jettison it looks like a good sep.
And the payload fairing that was

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encapsulating the InSight spacecraft has
been jettisoned. The RL10C engine the

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second stage of the Centaur continues to
burn. An hour and 28 minutes into the

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mission the InSight spacecraft and the
Marco twins are deployed from the Centaur

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upper stage beginning the long
voyage to Mars where InSight will go to