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How NASA Kept the ISS Flying While Harvey Hit Mission Control (theverge.com)
An anonymous reader shares a report: In the days before Harvey hit Texas, flight controllers at NASA's Johnson Space Center outside of Houston had a decision to make: should they evacuate or ride out the storm at the agency's Mission Control Center? The dilemma wasn't just about the safety of the flight controllers. These personnel are tasked with flying the International Space Station -- a round-the-clock job that can't be done just anywhere. If there's a gap in ground communication, it could put the astronauts in danger. [...] On August 22nd, three days before the storm hit, the mission team was briefed by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, and decided the best plan was to stay put. They realized that whatever hit Texas would likely hit Round Rock, too, which is located outside of Austin. Plus, Harvey's real danger looked to be the water rather than the winds. The building containing the Mission Control Center is designed to withstand flooding incredibly well. But the team also knew they had to prepare. "Where you don't want to find yourself is just a single flight controller in any position who can't leave because there's no one to replace them," says Scoville. So the flight controllers were told to come into work early and to make sure they had a way to both enter and leave the center safely. Many showed up Friday night with "big, monstrous climbing backpacks," says Scoville. Meanwhile, cots were set up in a nearby room and in a building that serves as an astronaut quarantine facility, where astronauts quarantine before launch to avoid getting sick in space. "We have training rooms that are a mere copy of the flight control room," says Scoville. "They have the same consoles and same screens, but we turned off the lights and put some cots in there. It was interesting to see these rooms usually lit up with all these screens blacked out for people to sleep." Throughout the weekend, Mission Control operated with the bare minimum essential personnel needed to keep the ISS working safely. Normally, flight controller teams work in nine-hour shifts, swapping out three times a day. During the storm, only about six flight controllers worked each shift, and some stretched their shifts to 12 hours. Because the flooding made the roads impassable, everyone had to spend a couple of nights at NASA.
I don't know how things work in TX, but in FL, that shit is build like a bomb-shelter.
lol, 12 hour stretch shifts? man really burning the midnight oil on this one clem.
The ISS is in orbit. Aside from occasional boost or corrective burns, it will continue to orbit without any assistance from mission control. Most likely they have several people on duty to sit and watch the screens but there is next-to-no air or resistance at that altitude and it will continue to orbit without additional energy input.
Surely NASA has a backup in case of a disaster like this? What if there was a fire in the building? Can they not move mission control to Florida as a backup?
Mike @ The Geek Pub. Let's Make Stuff!
How NASA Kept the ISS Flying While Harvey Hit Mission Control?
Inertia!
That would be better spent on people here. Manned space flight program should be canceled.
I didn't know you were on Slashdot Mr. Trump.
Mike @ The Geek Pub. Let's Make Stuff!
Why not move operations to the backup site at Huntsville, AL? It is perfectly capable of handling this.
It's likely more complex than a handful of programs. The hardware setup is probably relevant, and they probably have specialized hardware. Communicating with the ISS isn't as simple as making a phone call - dishes have to be set up and pointed in the right direction, etc.
What really surprises me is that they don't *already* have at least a rudimentary backup control room in Florida just to keep things running in the case of emergency situations like this.
Doing science for the benefit of humanity. There's no -1 Douchenoodle modifier, so ...
When you get to the level of working at Mission Control, it should be no surprise that the flight controllers are that beyond dedicated - they also understand the importance of the job as well as the danger to the astronauts so the idea of working overtime where they might make a mistake is anathema to them.
Having been there and knowing that flooding happens every few years in the area, I'm surprised that they don't have backup sites where the controllers can work in the case of a disaster like this. Long term, the Mission Control Center has a lot of required resources, like the training rooms, so keeping everything in one place is the right way to do things.
I'm not sure what the communications (security) requirements are, but I would think there should be the ability to temporarily relocate. Maybe something will be planned after Harvey - although it might be as simple as equipping/converting some rooms as dormitories for the controllers.
Mimetics Inc. Twitter
According to the linked article on theVerge, Hunstville, AL is the backup control room. Should a nearby hotel in Round Rock, be insufficient.
Look up "Hurricane Andrew" to see why that's a bad idea.
I agree that there should be a backup, but maybe one of the first considerations in having a backup site is selecting a location that is unlikely to be hit by hurricanes because your primary site could get hit by hurricanes.
Mimetics Inc. Twitter
Surely NASA has a backup in case of a disaster like this? What if there was a fire in the building? Can they not move mission control to Florida as a backup?
You'd think they would have to in case of war. It may just be a few people up in space with an expensive space station NASA really don't have much interest in maintaining any more... but the loss off the space station at any time with American (or allied) astronauts on board would be a huge loss to the morale of the nation.
"That's the way to do it" - Punch
Let's give NASA credit for doing nothing.
Sometimes doing nothing is more productive than doing something.
"That's the way to do it" - Punch
You are a fucking idiot of mind-numbing simplicity
Christ you're a dumbass
Fully licensed blockchain psychiatrist
protip: put something in a stable orbit and it will stay there for a few days all by itself unless acted upon by an outside force.
Those damn government scientists with their gold-plated Corollas.
They ought to get into climate studies where the real graft is!
the preceding comment is my own and in no way reflects the opinion of the Joint Chiefs of Staff
Yeah more EBT cards a/k/a slavery reparations cards for all the socially justice responsible disadvantaged minority's you stupid fucking DEMOCRAT. Do productive humans a favor: find a mass grave, jump in.
Are we going to forget that ISS is an international project, and that Russia also takes care that it orbits correctly?
The first time you mention someone, you should give their full name and job description, e.g. Dr Scoville K. Capsacain III, mission control controller, said ... .
That way readers know who the Holy fucking Mary he is.
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
Most of the communications with the ISS are done through the TDRSS system, which is up in geosynchronous orbit. That is what gives MCC near continuous communications capabilities to the ISS, no matter where it is in orbit. To make that work, there are a set of ground stations at various points around the globe that have dishes aimed at the (stationary) TDRSS birds. These are then networked back to MCC in Houston.
There is a backup, the russion control centre near Moscow. However, given the construction of the building in Houston, its buttressing against flooding, and the overall situation, camping out in that building was likely the safest place for the controllers to be during the storm and its aftermath.
To me, it's a testament to the design and quality that they were able to maintain connectivity throughout the situation. From that room they are reaching out globally, and were able to do so.
...si hoc legere nimium eruditionis habes...
That would be better spent on people here. Manned space flight program should be canceled.
I didn't know you were on Slashdot Mr. Trump.
I don't know DJT's stance (his stances on anything can be hard to nail down), but Pence said the plan was to put boots on Mars.
He's getting rather old, but he's a good mouse.
I thought Moscow was already setup to handle the ISS in case something happened to Houston. The Russians ran Mir for over a decade I'm sure they can handle the ISS for a few days.
It's not like the damn thing is going to all of a sudden fall out of the sky. It takes months for atmospheric drag to bring it low enough where it needs a boost, and they got enough fuel on board to do that for years.
NASA consumes less than 0.1% of our nations resources ($18.6T GDP vs $18.4B NASA Budget). We literally spend far more on far less useful things, alcohol sales for example are in excess of $200 Billion per year, the lawn care industry is in the tens of billions, the luxury part of the automotive industry likely around $300 Billion and we could trim $400 Billion from the defense budget and still spend more than any other country on earth. If you're looking to "spend better" there are a lot of other things to trim before we get to NASA.
He probably works for NASA.Most people that I knew there were against the manned space program.Most scientists are.
I man the local laundromat. Turning off the lights at the end of the day, one is left in the dark with these blinking blue digital LEDs that say 25 (a quarter to start). Since this is a fairly large laundrette, it might as well be mission control, or the non-Hollywood version of the passenger-sleeper-spacecraft from Fifth Element. It is also dark outside, with the occasional floaters passing by, the homeless, the aimless pacing outside, dark silhouettes that rap on the glass sometimes, seldom dangerous unless they're high, or buzzed.
Long hours? Of course.
I can sympathize, Houston.
Orbital mechanics is what keeps the ISS orbiting, not any control center on earth. And incidentally, it does not "fly", it "orbits". Fundamentally different.
Most ACs are not even worth the keystrokes to insult them. Be generically insulted by this and ignored otherwise.
I think you are pulling that from your rear end.
On August 22nd, three days before the storm hit, the mission team was briefed by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, and decided the best plan was to stay put. They realized that whatever hit Texas would likely hit Round Rock, too, which is located outside of Austin.
So the next time I need to refresh some servers or workstations I can call NASA?
> In any given month, somewhere around 50,000 commands are sent to the ISS —
Why in the world did we put up a spacecraft that requires that much supervision to keep something in orbit running. What exactly does mission control have to do to maintain the actual spacecraft?
Do other satellites require this much maintenance or is it the addition of human personnel that bumps up the oversight?
First, ob disclaimer (in Bones' voice) : I'm a doctor, Jim, not an orbital mechanics expert.
all by itself unless acted upon by an outside force.
- That's the whole purpose of the ISS being in such a low orbit : there's still a significant (although extremely tiny) outside force in the form of atmospheric drag.
This has the immense benefit that this orbit is more or less cleaned of debris thanks to the drag.
But it also means that the ISS needs to regularly do compensations.
- There might still be other outside force that are necessary :
I suppose that once in a while, ISS must do small correction of its orbit to be sure not to be on a collision course if the debris observation network notices one not yet cleared debris of significant mass/size.
(Now, I don't have the faintest idea how much time in advance are these dangerous objects detected, and thus how long is the window of opportunity to do the manoeuvre so that later, once the ISS and the debris are in close vicinity, the risks of collision have been successfully reduced under the acceptable limit by the earlier manoeuvre).
- Last but not least : I'm pretty sure that the maintenance of the complex equipment (including all the various life support systems) is not just a lone astronaut's job but is a big team collaboration involving all the people directly in the station AND all lots of people on the ground. The non availability of ground crew can probably make some class of problems that might happen much more difficult to solve for the small crew currently in orbit.
"Sufficiently advanced satire is indistinguishable from reality." - [Tips: 1DrYakQDKCQ6y52z6QbnkxHXAocMZJE61o ]
I think the problem is that the storm was so huge that they expected possible flooding in the backup sites also.
Actually, the backup site is in Russia. No way a typhoon in Texas would cause any problem in Moscow.
It's the contrary, they decided that the building itself wasn't at risk from the storm (unlike the personnel) and thus the safest thing was to ask the personnel to travel safely there before the storm and stay safely inside during the storm as mission control kept doing the most important and urgent maintenance tasks.
"Sufficiently advanced satire is indistinguishable from reality." - [Tips: 1DrYakQDKCQ6y52z6QbnkxHXAocMZJE61o ]
Much of this is to reduce the load on the Astronauts and Cosmonauts on board the ISS. Mission controllers are constantly watching power systems, cooling systems, data systems, the various experiments, and so forth, so that the humans on board can spend as much time as possible on things that can't be done from the ground.
The commands likely range from requesting appropriate sensor data, to tweaking the cooling system, to starting and stopping experiments.
The ISS is an incredibly complex machine, in an extremely hostile environment. It's also a hugely expensive research outpost, with a limited crew. Experiments are booked years in advance, and are tightly scheduled. It's the job of the people on the ground to make sure they happen.
...si hoc legere nimium eruditionis habes...
A 'hot spare' MCC (Mission Control Center) would be extraordinarily expensive to build and maintain for what's actually a fairly rare event. Even a 'cold spare' would be very expensive.
Much of this is to reduce the load on the Astronauts and Cosmonauts on board the ISS. Mission controllers are constantly watching power systems, cooling systems, data systems, the various experiments, and so forth, so that the humans on board can spend as much time as possible on things that can't be done from the ground.
The commands likely range from requesting appropriate sensor data, to tweaking the cooling system, to starting and stopping experiments.
The ISS is an incredibly complex machine, in an extremely hostile environment. It's also a hugely expensive research outpost, with a limited crew. Experiments are booked years in advance, and are tightly scheduled. It's the job of the people on the ground to make sure they happen.
This should have been in the article. This is actual useful information!
If it can be flown from the ground, why can't it be flown from the station itself, especially by computersystems.. even if the station is old, it would be no biggy to update the system so it can be automatically flown..
The backup facility is in a closet in Hillary's bathroom. But the door is locked.
If Houston has just been nuked, I don't thing anyone is really going to notice the loss of the ISS.
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Totally doable with the current NASA budget, as long as you don't ask for people in the boots.
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The manned space flight program is the advertising campaign that makes the science funding possible.
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A pedantic, but nevertheless necessary, point: the ISS does not fly. It is in orbit around Earth - an altogether different thing.
The Russians ran Mir for over a decade I'm sure they can handle the ISS for a few days.
Well, so far they're not doing such a great job of running the US government. ;-)
I've calculated my velocity with such exquisite precision that I have no idea where I am.
Look, I know the ISS is this shitty barely-in-orbit station, but it IS still marginally in orbit, no?
It's not like mission control literally has to literally fly the thing every moment, surely?
-Styopa
I mean seriously in this day and age, my pocket phone probably has more computing power than all their terminals together.
You're getting mixed up.
NASA = ISS
NSA = ISIS
were against the manned space program.Most scientists are.
Like most statistics, this one is completely made up and hogwash.
Mike @ The Geek Pub. Let's Make Stuff!
How do I say this nicely. The ISS is in orbit, coasting. It doesn't need to be moved around much and the ground really isn't THAT important for daily stuff. The people onboard have control and it isn't like the ISS will fall from the sky in 6 months if the ground isn't there.
They have gone 3 months between boosts before, perhaps longer. I looked at some annual data and it appears the normally boost every 3-5 weeks. https://jarphys.wordpress.com/...
When I worked there, no remote access into the production MCC LAN was possible. NONE. In fact, access from outside the production LAN (only in Bldg 30S) wasn't possible. I was called in at 3am more than a few times to deal with a server issue during the initial deployment times until we traced it back to a bad libc problem. If there was a remote method, even from my normal JSC office into the MCC LAN, I would have used it.
I did have remote access into my normal workstation in bldg 12. At the time, it was accessible from anywhere on the internet with ssh. This was pre-NAT and really pre-firewalls.
When I worked there part of my job was bringing new software and data into the MCC LAN. This was done with tapes.
Outbound data went to other POCs around the world and certain data is streamed onto the relatively non-secure NASA LAN with a specific TTL that prevents it from leaving JSC. Mainly things like the current location would be in that data, but definitely some other non-sensitive stuff too.
OTOH, I haven't worked there since the 1990s, so things may have changed. Plus I was a relative noob at networking back then and didn't understand to the same level I do today after working in telecom for a decade.
Presumably their families and dependents agreed to the controllers accepting a job whose requirements include being locked into an impregnable bunker during catastrophic disasters while the family copes on its own. As a one-time employee of an old line electric company where the standard work shift was "until you are relived" [company record: 9 days] I understand the concept but in those days it was a more common family understanding than it is in the 'teens.
What would be in the boots then? Cats? A cat, in boots, on Mars? Sure, let's do it.
I am armed because I am free. I am free because I am armed.
Mother Fucking --- WHOOSH!!
Is that all that you AMA drones can think about? Drugs? Someone doesn't fit into your little Marcus Welby view of the universe you just reach for the medicine cabinet. We don't kill the messenger anymore, do we bluefoxlucid, we MEDICATE them.
They make it seem as though the ISS will fall out of the sky the second someone in Houston gets up to drop a deuce. They have all sorts of contingency plans in place in the event they can't talk to Houston, Moscow, whoever... to sustain themselves for a few days until comm links can be re-established.
My bet is that the bomb is already there, in a shipping container somewhere quiet. It's not like it needs to be on the White House lawn,
Birds are not dinosaur descendants;birds are dinosaurs, for all useful meanings of "birds", "are" and "dinosaurs"
Agreed.
So rather than pay for nothing, let's just not pay for nothing.