[Kyle Herring] While the crew continues its work we'll take the opportunity now
to welcome Cheryl Malloy to the International Space Station Flight Control Room.
Cheryl's on a phone but she's located down at the Kennedy Space Center in Florida.
Cheryl welcome.
[Cheryl Malloy] Thank you Kyle.
It's a pleasure to be here.
I wish I'd been able to squeeze in a trip down to Houston and be in the control room with you.
[Kyle] Well next time we'll hopefully get you here.
Cheryl is a partner manager for the, for United Launch Alliance, one of the seven partners
in the Commercial Crew Program and I wanted to take an opportunity to talk
to all seven, Cheryl will close out our week.
And Cheryl I always start with a little biographical information.
So tell us all about yourself, where you grew up and how you got to NASA.
[Cheryl] Oh, okay.
I was born and raised on the Florida space coast.
So I've been watching rockets launch from my backyard all my life.
My parents both worked for NASA during the Apollo era.
So that sort of makes me a second-generation space baby.
I like to tell folks I've been at NASA forever
and I think you got a picture with my proof there.
Most folks assumed that I would just follow naturally in my parents' footsteps.
That's not quite the case.
I went to the local community college, Brevard Community College,
and graduated as a medical lab technician and worked in the local hospital for a while.
And then I decided I wanted to be an electrical engineer and I didn't know it at the time
but that's pretty much a natural step for med techs.
I went to Florida Tech which is, used to be Florida Institute of Technology
and while I was there I cooped with NASA's Biomedical Engineering Group and that sort
of blended both experiences really well.
And after I graduated, NASA offered me a job working life science SpaceLab missions.
You remember SpaceLabs?
[Kyle] Yep.
Absolutely.
[Cheryl] Yeah.
My favorite was SpaceLab Japan working with their Japanese life science teams.
That was a great opportunity.
NASA's also provided me an opportunity to go to school at night and earn my Masters
in Engineering Management from the University of Central Florida.
And just recently I got a certificate in Space Systems Engineering
from the Stevens Institute of Technology.
And I think just, you know, excuse me, learning is just a part of NASA's culture.
[Kyle] Yeah, no kidding.
How, so, you know, that's how you got here.
But what did you do before you joined the Commercial Crew Program?
[Cheryl] After SpaceLabs I actually moved over to Launch Services Program.
They moved that program down here to Kennedy Space Center
and I helped start that program here.
And I had the opportunity to lead teams launching NASA missions
on expendable launch vehicles including those termed ULA.
So that's where the relationship started being built with ULA.
And LSP offered me a whole range of opportunities from being responsible
for sending teams downrange to Africa and Australia to capture downrange telemetry
and also doing the first orbital missions from the Kodiak Launch Complex in Alaska.
[Kyle] Wow.
That's a pretty impressive.
[Cheryl] It's a wide range for sure.
[Kyle] No kidding.
Well, talk to us a little bit about your role now as a partner manager.
What do you do as a partner manager for ULA and what is your role?
[Cheryl] Partner manager sounds like a jam job, doesn't it?
I'm going to go out and manage partners.
And that is so not the case.
First and foremost we're partners with ULA.
I serve as an interface between our pit crew, I think you talked about that,
our teams are partner integration teams and ULA.
And we foster a good relationship, we foster collaboration in areas
where we have experience that they might be looking for.
We're trying to break down barriers and facilitate an understanding that,
our understanding of what commercial means to them and their understanding
of what human space flight means to us.
And something I'm not sure you've heard too much about for the,
for the partner managers is we also advocate for our partners within the program.
That sort of sounds like I've changed badges but that is not the case.
What the program needs to hear from the seven partner managers is how decisions
that they're making are affecting the partners and their program gets cross-view
of how those decisions may be impacting several partners.
And so each of the partners does that advocacy back into the program and allows them
to see how decisions could be affecting all of the partners.
[Kyle] You talk about the pit crew and, you know,
Ed Mango mentioned that earlier in the week.
It's a pretty impressive group of people that you guys put together, you know,
to support you I guess in the role as a Partner Manager right?
[Cheryl] That's true.
My pit crew, if I can brag on them for a minute, there,
actually they are mentors and Ed did mention that.
They're from Marshall and JSC.
We've got some time Langley and KSC, all together with the Launch Services Program
as well and they bring a wealth of experience both
in human space flight and Atlas-V experience.
Again, that's why the Launch Services Program is currently flying.
And, you know, we've got folks that have worked shuttle and Ares and 1-X.
And so all of that experience together allows them to gain an understanding back and forth,
as well as share that data with United Launch Alliance.
[Kyle] Talk about the Space Act Agreement part of this.
It's a new way of doing business.
But how are you integrated with ULA?
[Cheryl] Ed did mention earlier in the week that there were 4 fundeds
and 3 unfundeds and ULA is an unfunded.
We are further along in the, in the technology and we're talking about that fundeds went to,
you know, development risk areas
and United Launch Alliance has 29 successful Atlas-V launches already.
They've been flying that heritage vehicle for a very long time and although it's, you know,
it's not suitable for human space flight right now all of that data
and technology has allowed ULA to gain confidence in their vehicle,
so they really know how it operates.
And that will allow them to, to make the unique accommodations
that are required in human space flight.
It'll allow them to do that better with the understanding
of how their vehicle already flies.
[Kyle] I know, I'm going to jump around a little bit,
cause we've only got about five more minutes or so.
But, I know you had a video that you asked us to prepare for you.
If this is a good time I'd like for you to either show that
or talk to it for us if you don't mind.
[Cheryl] Sure.
If you want, if you went go ahead play it I'll talk to it.
And what I'm showing you, and actually it starts with an Atlas-V launch and processing.
And those always get your blood going.
One of the design modifications that ULA will require is an emergency detection system
and they've already done some work on this.
ULA developed the prototype of emergency detection system and the processor
and the software that are going to require, be required to monitor the launch vehicle.
So in using this vehicle for human spaceflight you've got to also have the ability
to abort the crew in case something's going wrong with the vehicle or the spacecraft.
So what you're watching is just some interaction between my team and the ULA team on looking
at the software and algorithms in doing the bottom of the purview
on how those failures might be detected, which sensors you would be looking at,
and what is the backup corroboration sensor that would say, "Yeah,
the tank pressure might be falling.
Are we losing acceleration?"
Those types of measurement and after they've done an extensive review of the software
and we actually took it to the SIL lab, or the Software Integration Lab,
which is a high fidelity laboratory, and demonstrated with hardware
that the emergency detection software was doing what it was supposed to.
What's really important about this is you want to be able to do two things
with an emergency detection system.
You want to be able to get off a rocket that's got an issue,
or a spacecraft that's got an issue.
You want to be really, really sure you don't get off a bad rocket.
You want to be able to do that in both directions.
You want that detection system to work just right.
[Kyle] Well you probably touched on it in your video.
But with a couple of minutes we have left can you talk about some of the milestones
that ULA has accomplished thus far and what's ahead of them?
[Cheryl] Okay.
So last September they did a Design Equivalency Review and that's where ULA decided
that they would do their own evaluation of the design they are flying
against Commercial Crew Program's 1100 series.
So that allowed them to see if there were gaps in where they would need
to do something different with the Atlas-V.
I, and that started, you know, started the conversations between our team and their team
on what would meet the intent and what would be acceptable for human space flight.
They finished that, that review with a tailored systems requirements review in December of 2011.
And it came down to four major areas that would require modifications to fly humans.
One was the emergency detection system that you've already heard about.
They're going to do what's called the managed flight profile for structural reasons.
One thing we don't think too much about is that this vehicle will launch from launch complex 41.
And that has no way to get the crew in or out at this point, or an egress system.
So that's one of the ones that's kind of obvious.
Then they're going a look at a dual engine Centaur
which will improve the capability of the vehicle.
So those are four main things that we're working on right now.
And they're evaluating and doing the testing on that.
So their upcoming systems requirements review in mid-June will report
out on how they're doing and developing those designs.
[Kyle] And it's just a tremendous amount of work.
And I think you've layed that out beautifully in the, in the time we have here.
I really appreciate you taking the time,
in fact all of the Commercial Crew Program experts that joined us all week.
But that was a great way of wrapping up the week Cheryl.
We appreciate you joining us here in Mission Control.
[Cheryl] Oh, well thanks very much for having me.
[Kyle] Thanks again.
That was Cheryl Malloy, the Commercial Crew Program's Partner Manager
for United Launch Alliance, one of the seven partners involved
in the Commercial Crew Program.