Celebrate Halloween with our new coloring sheet featuring kids dressed up as members of the NASA Commercial Crew team! Boeing’s CST-100 Starliner and the SpaceX Crew Dragon are highlighted on their launch pads in Florida getting ready to carry astronauts to the International Space Station passing overhead. To get started, print out the coloring sheet linked here and start filling it in. Happy Halloween!
International Space Station astronauts Scott Kelly and Kjell Lindgren will don spacesuits and traverse the outside of the orbiting laboratory’s structure on Wednesday during a spacewalk that will take six-and-a-half hours and cover a number of important tasks. The two, each making the first spacewalks of their careers, will connect power system cables on the station so spacecraft from NASA partners Boeing and SpaceX can dock with the station during flights for the Commercial Crew Program.
The future missions are slated to carry up to four new crew members to the station in the near future in order to allow more research to be performed in orbit and to return American launch capabilities for its astronauts. The spacewalk will begin at 8:10 a.m. EDT. You can watch it live on NASA TV and streaming on www.nasa.gov/ntv beginning at 6:45 a.m. The astronauts will return to the station’s interior at about 2:40 p.m.
The last of seven tiers was recently added to a nearly 200-foot-tall steel structure that has changed the landscape along Florida’s Space Coast. The tower at Space Launch Complex-41 at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida will provide commercial crew astronauts and ground support teams easy access to Boeing’s CST-100 Starliner spacecraft stacked on top of a United Launch Alliance Atlas V rocket at the pad.
Boeing is one of two companies that will launch astronauts to the International Space Station from the United States in the next two years. These systems will carry four astronauts, increasing the station’s crew size to seven. The additional crew member will be able double to amount of time currently dedicated to scientific research.
Workers will begin outfitting the tower for launch, including installing the elevator, roof, white room, crew access arm and infrastructure lines in the coming weeks. SLC-41 remains an operational facility while the tower is built, so work on the tower is taking place between Atlas V launches of satellites and science payloads. For more photos, go to the Commercial Crew Program album on Flickr here. Photos by NASA/Jim Grossmann
The steel lattice column that will become the Crew Access Tower for Boeing’s CST-100 Starliner spacecraft continues its methodical rise at Space Launch Complex-41 where four of seven sections of the tower have been stacked.
Built four miles south, each section or tier, is being trucked to United Launch Alliance’s Atlas V launch pad where a crane lifts it into position. The tower will reach about 200 feet high when it’s finished.
Even after stacking is complete, the team will have plenty to do to outfit it for launch, including installing the elevator, white room, crew access arm and infrastructure lines. Since SLC-41 remains an operational facility while the tower is built, work on the tower is taking place between Atlas V launch operations.
The new face of the Commercial Crew and Cargo Processing Facility (C3PF) is complete. Workers placed the finishing touches of the building-sized mural on the rounded edges of the former Orbiter Processing Facility-3 at Kennedy Space Center in Florida earlier this week.
The image of Boeing’s CST-100 Starliner orbiting above Florida highlights the C3PF’s role as the assembly and processing home for the company’s next-generation human-rated spacecraft. The Starliner is being built in partnership with NASA’s Commercial Crew Program to re-establish America’s ability to launch astronauts to the International Space Station from Florida’s Space Coast.
Spacecraft built in the C3PF will be launched into space from nearby Space Launch Complex-41 aboard United Launch Alliance Atlas V rockets. NASA also is working with SpaceX on the Crew Dragon to take astronauts to the station.
The first new Crew Access Tower at Cape 
Canaveral Air Force Station in Florida since the Apollo 
era will take shape at Space Launch Complex-41 in the coming days as workers moved the first two tiers from a nearby construction yard to the pad surface. The tiers will be lifted into place atop each other at the foot of the launch pad starting next week.
Boeing and United Launch Alliance are building the tower which is a critical element for the launch pad as it is converted from a pad that serves only uncrewed missions to a complex that can safely accommodate the needs of flight crews along with their ground support teams for CST-100 Starliner missions. The Starliner is under development in partnership with NASA’s Commercial Crew Program, along with the SpaceX Crew Dragon, to take astronauts to the International Space Station from Florida’s Space Coast.
Designed with modern data systems, communications and power networks integrated and protected from blast and vibration, plus an elevator, the Crew Access Tower has been built with several features only a fully suited astronaut could appreciate, such as wider walkways, snag-free railings and corners that are easy to navigate without running into someone. The tower will also be equipped with slide wire baskets for emergency evacuation to a staged blast-resistant vehicle.
The segments were assembled about four miles away from the launch pad so workers wouldn’t be idled by launch preps for United Launch Alliance Atlas V rockets. The tower will be stacked just to the side of the hard stand at SLC-41 where the boosters lift off. It will take seven tiers to complete the more than 200-foot-tall tower. A swing-out walkway bridge will be added later to connect the tower to the hatch of the Starliner so astronauts can climb aboard the ship as it stands at the pad before launch.
The tower construction marks the latest in a quick succession of events for Boeing’s Starliner program. The company opened the Commercial Crew and Cargo Processing Facility last week for use as the Starliner production and processing base and just completed the mural on the front of the building showing the spacecraft orbiting above Florida. The upper and lower dome assemblies arrived earlier this year for the Starliner’s Structural Test Article which is being built and processed as a pathfinder for the program and will be put together just as an operational spacecraft would before it goes into exhaustive testing to the prove the design.
The wait is over! Boeing’s next-generation spacecraft has a new name! A fleet of CST-100 Starliners will give the United States crew access to the International Space Station, launching from Florida’s Space Coast atop United Launch Alliance Atlas V rockets on NASA Commercial Crew Program flights. Read details about the spacecraft and today’s grand opening of the C3PF, where the Starliners will be assembled and processed for flight.
Boeing is unveiling a new name for its CST-100 spacecraft along with the factory floor space where the structural test article is already coming together during a ceremony at the Commercial Crew and Cargo Processing Facility here at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida. The event begins at 10 a.m. ET and will air on NASA TV, which you can watch here on the blog or in a separate window. The high bay of the C3PF, which used to be called Orbiter Processing Facility-3, is still under construction but a new mural over the front of the building showcases the facility’s role in building and processing a new spacecraft for the next generation of human-rated spaceflight.
Orbiter Processing Facility-3 at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center has a new spacecraft to assemble and prep for orbit: Boeing’s CST-100, which the company is developing in partnership with NASA’s Commercial Crew Program. The needs of the CST-100, short for Commercial Space Transportation-100, are quite different from those of the space shuttle fleet. The modern spacecraft calls for a modern facility, so about 78,000 square feet of processing areas inside the former OPF has been revamped.
More than 1,040 tons of steel and aluminum platforms, work stands and other hardware were removed from the building’s high bay to make room for the specialized equipment to allow an assembly line for CST-100 crew and service modules. Massive overhead cranes in the building capable of lifting up to 30 tons remain in place and are critical in moving spacecraft and heavy equipment into different areas as the CST-100 is built up from pressure vessel to operational spacecraft.
Look for more details tomorrow about the transformation of the OPF, now called the Commercial Crew and Cargo Processing Facility, or simply the C3PF. Boeing is holding its grand opening for the C3PF during a ceremony at Kennedy starting at 10 a.m. EDT. Watch it live on NASA TV. In the meantime, check out these small but important details about the new facility and what it means for helping NASA re-establish its ability to launch astronauts to the International Space Station from Florida!
