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>> My younger son, we actually came into this room years ago
and he was probably four.
And I put on my helmet on him, and put my harness
and it's dragging on the floor.
And he looks at me and goes, "Look daddy, I'm a test pilot."
>> Put this side in first.
>> I'm Nils Larson, I'm the chief Test Pilot here
at NASA Armstrong.
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It really came when I was probably a junior
in high school maybe a sophomore.
And one of my teachers handed me a book,
and the book was The Right Stuff.
I knew I kind of wanted to be an engineer or a scientist.
And I read that and I went, wow, this would be cool,
you can be both an engineer/scientist.
And you could be a pilot, best of both worlds,
how cool would this be?
>> Roll in three, two, one, mark.
>> Copy mark.
>> The test pilot answer is my favorite is whatever I'm flying
today, so I just got out of the F18,
and so that's my favorite right now.
>> Well, the role of the test pilot is
to pull it all together in the air.
Our mission here, our objectives are testing science
and technology through flight in flight.
>> Uh, let's see, flight objectives basically,
the biggest thing is to try
and get this instrumentation worked out, and you know,
be able to compare it to the airplane, and to obtain,
record it on my chest.
Mission security, mission rules, go, no go,
we talked about the 40,000 flip probably the biggest point.
So, we can go to 39,999 feet.
Let's see.
>> Keep me on my toes.
>> Yeah, exactly.
>> Okay.
>> Sure.
>> You got your helmet?
>> Yeah.
>> Okay, I'm going to give you the rundown real quick,
and then we can go up there and do what we got to do.
>> Well, what we do is, our initial concern is
to give the pilot a safe
and reliable aircraft for his mission.
Once we achieve that, then our next concern becomes the science
and the research folks that are going
to be associated with the airplane.
So, if they have attached an experiment, or they're looking
for specific data, we work with them to make sure
that they're equipment is working the way it should be,
and that it gives them the data that they're looking for.
>> You know, for us here, we work a lot more
with a project we're doing, you know,
sometimes we call it weird things with airplanes.
So, rarely are we going from point A to point B,
or if we are going point A to point B, we're going up
and down, and up and down, and up and down the whole time
when we're going there.
And our job is to try and get the people the data.
>> Santa to the speed break, see how much effect on pits.
>> Whoa! That was a good one.
>> You look, and you know, you still --
even though you're sitting in the same desk, you know,
Neil Armstrong worked here, we named the place after him.
You know, my desk used to be right where he sat.
You know, Joe Walker, you know, I sit where his desk used to be,
that's where I sit now.
And you still don't feel like you're worthy
to be sitting where they were.
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>> I'll say one thing, these pilots are
about the best test pilots probably in the world.
They're very busy, they're either flying all
across the world in sims, meetings, tech briefs.
They make things happen at NASA
and for the United States and the world.
They're the first people flying maybe a wing that was modified
or some modification to an aircraft.
[ Jet Engines Revving, Hissing Sound ]
>> We're not done with flight.
There's a lot of research yet to be done in flight.
There's a lot of gains yet to be accomplished in flight.
And to get our job done we need test pilots like Nils Larson,
like the people he works with and trains.
>> Still a little bit of side to side motion, I'm unstable,
but I'm pumping forward.
>> It's early morning and I'm watching the sun rise
over the lake bed.
It's a beautiful sunrise, and it suddenly occurs to me,
oh, my God, I made it.
You know, I'm doing what it was that I decided when I was 16
that I wanted to go do.
I always tell people that it's worth it, because it wasn't
like I was just nosing the book, you know for 17 years.
I had a lot of fun in those 17 years getting up to that flight.
And then, I've had a lot more flights like that since, so,
you know, it's totally been worth it.
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[ Jet Engine Hissing, Music ]