Good Vibes on Mars

One of my dear friends has been working on a a rocket that is sending a lander to Mars on Saturday. That is right something that will be enduring one of Mars’s roughest challenges: making it to the surface (many fail this feat… ESA’s lander was the most recent on the list of casualties #RIPSchiaparelli). So I thought I would take some of her most valuable time right before launch to answer some questions for us AND SHE AGREED.

Before we get on to the interview, just a little more about the mission that is making its grand journey on Saturday. NASA’s InSight Lander is the first mission that will be getting an in depth look of Mars’s inner workings, that is its crust, mantle, and core. It will be looking at its seismic activity (think earthquakes and tectonic plates). In addition to InSight, NASA will be making history with two cubesats heading to Mars, MarCO! These will have an important job of reporting back to Earth how InSight’s landing goes because it will be on the opposite side of the planet from us. But most importantly, they will be demonstrating whether cubesats are feasible for interplanetary missions.

Now for the main event, InSight’s launch. Maggie and I went to college together at the University of Florida. But since then she has become a stellar flight controls engineer for United Launch Alliance (dubbed America’s ride for space for its dominance of the US market). She has worked as control dynamics engineer for NROL-52 and InSight while at ULA. Now she is currently working in flight software testing for a future mission, and still working in controls. While doing all this she is “still plugging away at the master’s degree while working full-time!” But she is the perfect person to ask about this exciting launch just days away.
Stick around to the end for info on how to watch!

What do you do as a controls engineer for ULA?   

My main job is to design the autopilot with a lot of other jobs on the side – for instance separation event dynamics. The autopilot deals with engine commands and gimbaling the engine (moving the engine to a certain angle).

A human pilot in an airplane has the intuition to make choices when flying, but for a rocket this is where a control system and autopilot come into play.

 

What made you want to pursue aerospace engineering?

When I was nine years old I went to the Kennedy Space Center with the Girl Scouts and had the most amazing day! I saw the Vehicle Assembly Building, I saw a shuttle sitting on the launch pad, and I remember seeing the flame duct and how big it was. From that moment on I was hooked. Nine-year-old Maggie decided she wanted to be an astronaut. Fast forward to my junior year of high school, and I was ready to go into the navy to become a test pilot so I could be an astronaut. My eyesight is terrible, and I chickened out at the last second.

The summer before my senior year I went to a college program and was mentored by an aerospace engineer — a profession I had no idea existed. This mentor took our class to the Pratt & Whitney (now Aerojet) Rocketdyne facility where they make the RL10 engine. I decided from that tour and that day forward, if I couldn’t go up to space myself I would be part of the team that gets others up there for me. I was determined to work on the rockets I watched as a child, the Space Shuttle (in first place), Atlas and Delta. The shuttle program retired my second year of college, and from there it was onto the next rocket(s)! That’s how I ended up as an aerospace engineer and also how I ended up at ULA!

 

Are there any unique challenges this launch faces? 

This is actually an amazing challenge as an engineer! Any interplanetary travel faces certain requirements and certain things to take into consideration. For example, this trajectory changes every single day of the launch window. That means I have to think about those variations in the trajectory and what it will do to the rocket, to my autopilot and the analysis.  The Mars Cube One (MarCO) cubesats also were a unique challenge. They are so small, but it’s interesting to see the effects that they have on the vehicle properties! I had fun doing the separation analysis for the MarCO A and B.

 

What will you be thinking on launch day? 

Well I will be nervous — a healthy nervous. I will be looking at the autopilot response and analyzing my own work, as well as physically watching the rocket do what we commanded it to do (which is pretty cool!). I get a kick out of watching real-time responses.

 

Why are you launching out of Vandenberg instead of Cape Canaveral? 

Missions to other planets normally launch from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center and fly east, over water. That’s because launching towards the east adds the momentum of Earth’s eastward rotation to the launch vehicle’s own thrust. The Atlas V 401 is powerful enough to fly south towards the sea from Vandenberg Air Force Base with performance leftover to launch the MarCO cubesats.

 

What excites you most about the missions InSight or MarCO?

With InSight, I am most excited about the seismic activity! I want to learn more about the “marsquakes” and hope that we can finally confirm whether they exist on that planet or not. InSight is doing a ton of incredibly important science, but I just tend to nerd out over cool sensors and that seismometer is a beauty. Plus knowing about these “marsquakes” is necessary if we ever want to live and breathe on Mars someday!

With MarCO, I am excited to see cubesats going to Mars! This will help to advance cubesat technology.

 

Do you have any advice for someone who wants to do what you’re doing? 

1. Don’t give up! SERIOUSLY. This is not a drill. DON’T. If you want something really bad enough you put your heart and soul into it. Even when times get tough and you think you want to quit, keep going.
2. Always be willing to learn. This one is important in my job today. You don’t know everything. You never will. Check the ego at the door, pick up a pencil, start writing, soak it up, and learn.

 

Now here is how to watch. NASA will be beginning its coverage of the launch May 5th at 3:30 am PDT (6:30 am EDT/ 10:30 UTC). The launch is scheduled for 4:05 PDT (7:05 am EDT/11:05 UTC). The image below gives you a visual representation of what will be happening during the launch so you can follow along at home! You can tune into NASA’s broadcast here.

Also if you live in California, check out this map to see if you can see the rocket from your place.

 

Thanks so much to Maggie and the team at ULA for their involvement with this post.

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