01x05 - Episode 5

[bunniefuu]

Four civilians are going
to space

and they will kick the doors open
for the rest of us.

Every person who's going
to join this mission

has to be able to deliver a very powerful
and inspiring story.

Went upstairs after the phone call,
though, and told my wife,

"I think I'm going to ride a rocket."

And she just, "What?"

I don't think I'll think about
the worldly impact

this mission is going to have
until Chris is back on the ground.

I'm, like, "Why would they choose me?"

Look at that!

Look, my dad instilled this idea in me
that I could do anything.

At age ten I was having pain in my knee.

Hayley was diagnosed
with bone cancer.

Having cancer made me who I am.

I'm getting to show them what their life
can look like after cancer.

If I can do it, you can definitely do it.

I'm commander of Inspiration4.

No matter what I'm a father first and that
comes with a great deal of responsibility.

What is the speed?

Seventeen and a half
thousand miles an hour.

Oh, wow!

It's getting real.

They put us through the ringer
pretty quick.

We've worked so hard.

Yes!

Wow!

The two times where you're the most
worried is at launch and reentry.

The risk is not zero.

We're basically going
through a controlled expl*si*n.

We all feel really ready.

Let's do this.

There's no doubt in my mind that we're
going to have a successful mission.

We left Hawthorne yesterday.

And then we all reconvened
with the jets in Pensacola,

and then this morning
we had a beautiful sunrise flight out.

So we just arrived
to Kennedy Space Center,

and this is the place where
we're gonna launch in just a few days.

Good way to get
to Kennedy Space Center, right?

No better way.

I know that we're gonna be really busy
in the next six days leading up to launch.

We've got some medical checkouts.
We're doing some research.

We're doing some media and studying.

I thought launch week I'd be nervous,
but I'm really not at all.

I think we're just ready.

I'm still into today,

and today's a great day.

I know looking ahead in six days,
I'm going to feel very differently,

but right now I'm not thinking about
anything else but how exciting it is.

Some of the biggest milestones
that we're gonna have coming up is, like,

there's dry dress,
which is basically the dress rehearsal.

Everybody's involved.

Mission control, launch directors,
the crew, the families.

Like everybody is going through
a simulation of exactly what it will be,

including us getting strapped in Dragon.

And then you get your L minus 1,
the last day before launch.

We'll brief the public as to a little bit
more specifics on our mission.

Last moment to spend with family.

And then we wake up the next day,
and we go to space.

For right now, let's talk through
what the week will look like.

We did decide a 8:00 p.m. start
of a 12-hour launch window on the 15th

is kind of what we're targeting right now.

Here's your launch time, right there.

And so, we're gonna do the sleep shifts
so that you guys are fully optimized.

Going to sleep at 5:00 a.m.
and waking up at 1:00.

All your hormone levels,
plus the circadian, will line up

so that you guys are
in perfect state for that launch.

So today we're just going to walk
through all these choreography steps

so there's nothing
that pops up and surprises us.

My name is Maddie Kothe. I'm 26 years old,

and I am a Dragon integration engineer
at SpaceX.

Hayley and Sian, you guys are
going to go into the elevator first.

For the I4 crew,
I'm also the closeout lead.

What the closeout lead means is I'm
in charge of the day-of-launch operations.

Basically, having everything scheduled
minute by minute

to make sure we're gonna hit our T-0 time.

So if you guys wanna go
to each of your stations,

we're gonna go through crew warren,

which is like what is in your tablet
and what you're wearing.

And then we ultimately
close the hatch on them,

so we're the last people to say
good luck on this amazing adventure.

- You're gonna get...
- Everything's awesome.

- Thank you.
- Thank you. Thanks so much.

Everything's incredible. Thank you.

- Everything's good.
- Oh, yeah.

- Oh, yeah.
- You're welcome.

We are at the
weather decision point

for the upcoming Inspiration4 mission.

So today we'll be stepping in
to look at the weather forecast

across ascent and return.

So, yeah. The thing
that we've been tracking

is that tropical development
off to the east.

Overall, pretty good for that.

Really, not much difference
in the window as you can see.

Thanks, everyone.

Currently right now, the weather's
trending great for not only the launch,

but also for the splashdown and recovery.

We have to not only look
at launch weather,

but also ensure that we'll
have good weather for landing

basically three days from now.

Our launch window is
on the 15th, Wednesday,

between eight o'clock at night
and 1:00 in the morning.

And all the weather models and everything
looks like we're trending

towards the front side of that model
as being the best.

Right now, here, we're getting ready
for what we call dry dress.

Essentially, it's a rehearsal for
what's gonna happen on launch date.

It's a great kind of end-to-end
for not only the crew

but also for the team
that's supporting the crew...

We're a few minutes late.

...and all of mission control.

All stations, CORE, and Dragon,
for awareness, we are a few minutes behind

on side hatch leak checks.

Copy. Mosquito is in the capsule.
Understood.

We went through all those
different things that you need to do

to make sure you're going
to be safe and ready for flight.

What are you physically doing
in that moment?

This is your last chance to visualize it
before you actually go and do this thing.

Dry dress was absolutely necessary,
to have walked through all those steps.

And it gave us a really good indication
of the timing of everything.

We got to put on our space suits
and sit in our spacecraft,

and it just made us even more hyped
for launch day.

Everyone's phones are on silent.

Except mine.

Yeah, don't miss that call.

As I'm about to go
and inspire others, you know,

there's a lot of people who have been
a big influence in my life,

even though they don't know it.

And Michelle Obama is one of them.

And so I just causally said,
"I wish I could talk to her."

And Kidd was like,
"We can make that happen."

You want us all to keep staring at you?

Okay, here we go.

Hello?

Good afternoon,
this is Michelle Obama

calling for Dr. Proctor
and the Inspiration4 crew.

- Am I on the right line?
- You are on the right line.

Hi, Mrs. Obama.

This is Sian Proctor.

Oh, my goodness.
It's so good to hear your voice.

My goodness.

I can't tell you how much
it means to be able

to join you guys on this call the day
before this exciting mission.

I can't imagine what's going
through your minds.

Well, I have my entire crew here
right now with me,

but I'm just saying I'm thinking about
how I'm talking to you right now.

And how amazing that is.

You are making history,
and I just want to thank all of you

for your courage
and your curiosity and your bravery.

You have everything you need.
You have each other.

You guys are representing
what it means to be America.

It is all of us.

Showing courage,
taking risks on behalf of everyone else.

And you all are doing just that.

Right now I want to thank the crew
of Inspiration4 for joining us.

In just a little over 24 hours,
they'll be blasting off

on the first all-civilian mission
to space.

We had a very special call today.

I was very fortunate that
I could help me and my crew

speak with Michelle Obama today.

And so we had a very nice conversation

that will stay with me
the rest of my life.

I'm grateful to you all,
I'm proud of you all,

I wish you all the very best.

I want you to be safe

and know that we'll be here
praying for you all.

So, thank you. Thank you for allowing me
to spend this time with you.

I know. Isn't that amazing?

This is unreal.

It really is.

Look at that, under the moon.

- Amazing.
- I know!

Tomorrow.

My best friend's an astronaut! Oh, my God!

It only took a decade
for that to come true.

Yeah, well...

I'll be fine, too.

- So don't worry.
- I might worry a little.

- I'll be back.
- When?

In, like, three days.

Daddy?

Is that how you get into the entrance?

That's right.
That's how you get into the spacecraft.

You're so smart.

You want to look?

It's the most beautiful thing
I've ever seen.

Like, it is absolutely gorgeous.

Is it scary, Daddy?

No, it seems like a lot of fun to me.

Snap that one.

- They told me, they said...
- You're going to space in that, Hayley.

Yeah, in 24 hours.

I think more of my emotions hit
that night before actual launch day,

just because you are seeing
this giant rocket and the Dragon on top,

and it was just different
to witness it so close.

- Are you getting emotional?
- Yeah.

It's gonna be good.

- Mommy.
- I know, I'm just scared.

- Shall we?
- Yeah, let's do it.

Come on. We're walking.

You want me
to come jump on your bed?

You got to get up early
in the morning to go to space.

I love you guys. Have a good night.

- Bye.
- Sleep well.

Text us when you're awake.

Okay, I will. I'll call you around 11:00.

It is finally September 15th.



I'm about to go to sleep.

And when I wake up,
I'm going to go to space.

I wrote letters to my family

that as soon as I get to orbit

Evelyn's gonna give them to my family.

They don't know that yet, though.

And I also wrote letters
if things didn't go well.

I started with the easy
"yay, I made it to space" letters.

But then, other astronauts gave us the
advice to write letters to your family

because what we're doing,
it doesn't come with a zero risk.

I feel like people ask us,
"Do you understand the risk?"

Of course we do.

In the letters that if things
don't go well, I told my family...

to not blame themselves
because I would've done this anyway.

And have no regret

because I have no regrets.

And... and then I just told them
how much they mean to me.

And to keep... you know, keep me around.

I've been through a lot
in the last 20 years.

You know,
from when I was going through treatment,

I...

I never would've imagined that
something like this would come about.

I just wanted to get through
the next couple years.

I just wanted to be able to go
to high school and learn how to drive

and go to prom and go to college.

I had this really special moment
tonight with Leif,

and he said, "Look up. Tomorrow
you're gonna be looking down."

All right, game plan.
Chair fly run-through.

This is the last time you're gonna get
an opportunity to imagine yourself

going through these motions before you're
actually gonna do them. All right, ready?

Dragon, SpaceX. Ready for comm checks.

Rook, loud and clear.

Leo, loud and clear.

- Nova, loud and clear.
- Hanks, loud and clear.

Retrieve location 8 bags.


Cognition test, go.

- One.
- Two.

- Three.
- Four.

Crew check for suit leak checks, go.

- One.
- Two.

- Three.
- Four.

Final crew check for launch, go.

- One.
- Two.

- Three.
- Four.

SpaceX. Dragon.
Inspiration4 is go for launch.

- Just black.
- Yeah, I'm excited for that.

One hour.

One hour to walkout!

Daddy, look at this one.

Thank you.

Give me a hug.

Group hug!

I know how lucky I am.

We're all going into this
eyes wide open, right?

As Elon said, the risk is not zero.

I couldn't help but think about that
when I was saying goodbye to my kids.

Have a good... Enjoy the show.

- Be safe.
- He thinks I'm lying.

Absolutely.

You, get over here.

That's great.

- I love you.
- I love you too.

- Have a good time.
- I will.

I'll be...

- Love you.
- Yep. See you out there.

- Good.
- Thank you.

- Love you.
- You are brave.

Really.

- Okay, guys. We can start walking.
- Cool.

And right now we are currently
awaiting walkout of the Inspiration4 crew.

There they are, pulling off from Hangar X.

There is a lot of procedures that
will happen over the next couple of hours.

At T minus three hours
and twenty minutes,

the crew will begin suiting up
for the mission to space.

Craziness.

The astronaut that you see
who is standing there on your screen,

that is Commander Jared Isaacman.

It gets me.

Hi.

Once they are suited up

the crew will make that short drive
to the launchpad,

and once they arrive the crew will ascend
the fixed service structure

in an elevator up to the 255-foot level.

The crew will then head
through the crew access arm

where they will
make a final phone call

before climbing into the spacecraft,
a process known as crew ingress.

I just still am like,

"Is that my husband?"

"Is that, like, Chris
in an astronaut suit?"

Just for awareness,
we're about ten minutes ahead of schedule,

and the advance team is ready for us.

...as well as the first ever
Saturn V rocket launched from there.

This is the launch pad where
the last Apollo launched from, Apollo 17.

And they are now passing the gates at
pad 39A. This is the safety perimeter.

And once again, we are four
minutes ahead of schedule.

All right.

- This is awesome.
- Here we go. All right.

So they're gonna take
this elevator up to the 255-foot level.

Hello?

- Hey.
- Hey!

I'm calling you
from the launch pad.

We're feeling great, so excited.

I'm so excited for you. I just...

- Thank you.
- And so proud of you.

I'll talk to you tomorrow.

All right. Love you.

- Love you too.
- Bye.

Bye.

Sweet girl.

I'm so happy.

Happiest I've ever been in my life,

and a lot of it because you all have
helped me and supported me all the way.

Thanks for everything.
Mom and Dad are coming with me.

Mom and Dad are with you.

They're with you, Sian. We're all here.

Okay, you all. Have fun.
See you in three days.

Love you all. Bye.

Come on.

- How are you?
- I'm okay.

How are you doing?

- Doing good.
- Feel good? Good.

Here are the girls. I love you.

All right, here they are.
Say, "Love you, Daddy" real loud.

Love you, Daddy!

Yes, love you, little people.
See you.

Love you, Daddy.

- See you soon.
- Okay, love you.

- Safe travels. Love you.
- Okay, goodbye.

Okay, bye.

I'm a little bit nervous.

Nervous?

- Why are you nervous?
- 'Cause I'll miss Daddy.

So what a sight to see
with them

- hugging as they're walking.
- Yeah.

SpaceX. Dragon. Comm check.

Good morning, Dragon.
I have you loud and clear. How me?

Hear you loud and clear, Sarah.

Hey, crew, can you hear us?

Yep. We'll see you in a few days.

Enjoy the ride.

Okay.

Okay, guys. I think we're ready
to close this hatch.

Dragon, SpaceX.
Seats are in the launch position.

Four decimal 1-0-0.
We are go for launch.

And copy that, Dragon.
Crew are go for launch.

Crew access arm retraction
has started.

Crew access arm retraction complete.

Dragon, SpaceX. You are go
for section 7 of 4 decimal 100.

Close visors and arm
the Launch Escape System.

Closing visors and arming LES.

Propellant load has started.

Yeah.

You know what?

It's gonna light up the sky,

the sound is gonna come across,

but it's gonna be amazingly beautiful.

Four minutes.

Thank you.

SpaceX, Dragon. Our displays
are configured for launch.

Copy that, Dragon.

Two minutes, brother.

And it has been an absolute honor
to prepare you for this historic flight.

Today, you are truly inspiring the world.

We wish you a great mission.

Good luck, Godspeed, and enjoy the ride.

Dragon, SpaceX. Go for launch.

Inspiration4 is go for launch.

Punch it, SpaceX.

T minus 15 seconds.

Ten, nine,

eight, seven, six,

five, four, three, two, one.
Zero.

T plus 30 seconds.
Callouts indicate nominal.

The start mission flame,
the Inspiration4 crew.

Looks like a smooth ride for the crew.

Major event coming up
will be main engine cutoff

followed by stage separation
and then ignition of the second stage.

And MECO.

Stage separation confirmed.

First stage booster is making
its way back down to Earth.

It will be making a landing attempt on our
drone ship in the Atlantic ocean.

- See it light up again?
- Yeah.

That's the second stage lighting
up. So they separated stages,

And now second stage
is taking them into orbit.

You can start to see
some upper atmospherics.

SECO. SECO. Come on, guys.

We are expecting an event
called second engine cutoff.

And then we'll wait
for the confirmation of good orbit.

Separation.

Following SpaceX.
Nominal orbit insertion.

All right, good news there.
Nominal orbit insertion.

That's amazing news for Inspiration4 crew.

We're orbital.

On behalf of the crew of Inspiration4,

we just want to thank everyone at home
for making this mission possible.

We were just carried right to the doorstep
of an exciting and unexplored frontier.

Where few have come before
and many are about to follow.

The door is open now.
And it's pretty incredible.

Come here, man.

She is up there, look at that.

She is up there giving the thumbs up!

Giving the thumbs up!

Yeah!

Yeah!

Yes!

This is good.

- Thanks for taking care of my buddy.
- Absolutely.

- All right.
- Thank you so much.

It is a happy, happy day.

Oh, I'm so happy to get my hands on you.

- Do you need anything?
- Yeah, a stiff f*cking drink.

Now we can see the zero G
indicator floating around.

Dragon, our environments
are looking good in the cabin.

At this time, I can give you
a go for seat doffing.

Copy that SpaceX.
We are go for 4.300.

And the views are incredible.

Cabin configuration procedure is complete

and seats 1 and 3
are transitioning out of suits.

Copy, cabin configuration
is complete,

and seats 1 and 3
are transitioning out of suits.



I'm pretty sure that they
all got out of their seats

and started floating around in space
and taking pictures,

if I had to guess what happened.

Si, what did you think of launch?

Oh, my God. It was the best ever.
I love it.

Launch was amazing.

Wow. I'm gonna have to reflect
on that one for a bit.

I am loving every minute of it.

- How's your meal?
- Oh, it's great.

I'm just having some veggie sticks
and hummus right now.

- They're all coming in.
- Is that cool with you?

The crew members all had
very special things

they wanted to accomplish on orbit.

You know, Sian, doing her art and poetry.

Look at how it shimmers.

Chris had his ukulele out.

But to me, it was everything.

It was the mission. Like,
we started this, let's see it through.

Hey, everyone. We're doing some research.

Taking swabs to see
how microgravity affects the microbiome.

I won't tell you
where this one was.

- Hey, Hanks.
- Hey, just ringing the dinner bell here.

- Ringing the dinner bell.
- Yeah.

They gave us an hour for meals

because they know how much
we're gonna be playing with the food.

Oh. Oh.
And they're flying everywhere.

Oh, sh*t!

Oh, no.

Oh, sh*t.

Don't tell SpaceX.

Dragon,
Space X for end of day briefing.

Currently the distance that you guys
have traveled today is 218,016 km

or just approximately under five and a
half circumnavigations of the globe.

So excellent work by you all.

You are go for 4.050
for those crew sleep preparations.

Get that to connect.

- Oh, let's turn the TV on.
- Oh, that's... here.

- So quiet.
- Yeah.

Whenever we'd get results
of Haley's scans or anything

the doctor knew the first thing she needed
to say was the results,

like, "Clear scans", and so we'd look for
that, and then we would listen

to anything she had to say, so if you can
start off with, "Everything's great."

Everything's great.
Your family members are so happy.

Everything's great.
Your family members are so happy.

They've been floating in space,
enjoying life, healthy and happy,

and in really good spirits.

My name is Anna Menon,
and I'm the technical advisor

for the families here for Inspiration4.

And so my job here is to basically
translate what's happening in the mission

for the families, answer any technical
questions they have...

At the time they went to bed they had
completed five and a half orbits already.

So now they're getting that constant,
amazing view of that spherical Earth.

- That I'll show you in a minute.
- Oh, yeah.

Just taking you back over
what has transpired in your life

over the past 12 or so hours.

There are tremendous emotions
when going through this.

- Hey...
- Oh, my God!

We are trying to make sure that every
person is cared for.

Oh, Hayley was trying to eat.

Is that like cheese?

- She's looking outside.
- Looking out the window...

We do have access to some
of the internal video,

and we got to watch a little last night.

We'll make sure you guys
get the access to that as we can.

Right now when they're sleeping,
we don't get that as much.

But it is only for you.
You know, we're really...

We're not showing this publicly
as a matter of crew privacy.

Especially if they're not feeling great.

But I think it's important that you get
to see your loved ones floating around.

So the cupola has not been opened yet.

So they elected to not open it last night.

So we would highly expect that they
open it when they wake up.

Dragon, SpaceX. Good morning.

Comm check.

Dragon, we have you loud
and clear.

Good morning, everybody.

- Hi.
- Hi.

Hello.

Just hanging around.

Nothing new here.

How's your coffee, Hanks?

It's the best.

It's making my day get started so well.

Dragon, SpaceX. We're a go
to open the forward hatch

for cupola use, per 4.030.

And please enjoy
the best view of the planet.

And copy that, SpaceX.
We are in procedure 4.030.

And we have a go
for opening the forward hatch.

All right, guys, we are going
to open forward hatch.

All right, opening the hatch.

The cupola is a giant glass dome

that is mounted on the top
of the spacecraft.

It's concealed under the nose cone.

And it's just amazing ingenuity.

Checking the indicator. It says it's open.

Like, why don't we
just put the biggest window

that's ever been designed in space in it

because the views are probably
going to be pretty incredible.

Oh, wow.

The moment I saw the Earth
from the cupola,

it was indescribable.

It is the most beautiful thing
I have ever seen in my life.

You know, I wasn't expecting
to get up there

and then see
the entire sphere of the Earth.

It's so big, it takes up
the entire cupola's view.

And then you can see just the blackness
of space around you.

And it's just mesmerizing.

There's very few that
have seen the Earth from the altitude

that we've been at before.

I mean, it's much higher
than the space station.

So, we can see, like, it felt
like the entirety of it.

You can see someone's head.

They're waving now.

It was so impactful,
I couldn't believe it.

It was overwhelming.

Here is our view.

From the cupola you can see the entire
perimeter of the planet.

There's our nose cone.

And we're back where we started.
You can see it all from here.

Get that hair down here.

I wanted to have the zero G hair.

Like, I didn't want to hide it.

I wanted it to be as big as possible.

Just showing off my space hair.

I've kept my hair pretty long
ever since I had cancer.

And it felt like such a celebration.

I wish it was like this all the time.

While I was in the cupola,
I had my hair all big and crazy,

and I took a picture of me holding
a bald photo from when I was in treatment.

It felt very indicative
of this almost 20-year journey.

Full circle.

Through the years,
since I was ten years old,

I've lost friends to cancer.

And I wanted to make sure
they were never forgotten.

And so I reached out to
all their families before launch,

and said,
"I want to take a picture to space."

It just brought back such good memories
of those friendships

and just feeling like
I had those friends with me.

I feel so fortunate to be able
to represent all the kids with cancer.

Arthur, from your perspective,
how are we looking on the floater cam?

Inverted.

You're looking pretty good.

Dragon, you are now live
with St. Jude Children's Hospital.

Hello, Miss Hayley.

Hi, guys!

Dad, come here.

Look at Hayley's hair.

I actually had my patients on the call

who I've gotten to treat
and gotten to know really well.

Hello, everyone, and welcome
to our Dragon capsule here in space.

Some of y'all on the call
may know me as your PA.

I work at St. Jude.
I have the best job ever.

And I was a St. Jude patient as a kid.

I was treated for bone cancer.
I spent a year at St. Jude.

I had some chemo and surgery, which
might sound familiar to some of y'all.

Getting to hear their voices from space
was just the best feeling.

So I'm not gonna delay it any longer.

We're gonna get right to some questions
from our patients.

So, Eva, take it away.

Go ahead, Eva.

What kind of sleeping bag do you have?

Hey, Miss Eva!
Thank you for that question.

So if you've ever been camping,

we pretty much have
those same kind of sleeping bags.

And we had a seatbelt
around our sleeping bags

so we didn't fly away
when we were sleeping.

Hello, Inspiration4.

What were you feeling
right before you launched?

That's a really good question.

So, when we first got strapped
into the rocket,

it felt like time was moving
really slowly.

And then when you got down to
the last five minutes, it was racing.

And before you knew it,
you heard, "Liftoff!"

Hi, I'm Luna

and my first question is

what do you do for fun in space?

We're doing a lot of fun things, like now.

And we're eating, doing chores,

and looking out the window at the world.

All the kids asked such sweet questions,
and they were so engaged.

Speak up real loud so she can hear you.

Are there cows on the "mooooon"?

"Are there cows on the moon?"

Is there such a thing as aliens in space?

I did not think there were until we opened
up our big, beautiful cupola window.

And next thing you know,
who comes flying by?

But don't worry.
He's a friendly alien, as we discovered.

He just likes to take our dog for walks.

That's so cool.

I was thinking about the kids on the call

but also all the kids that weren't asking
question but were there and watching.

I just really wanted to emphasize to them
that they can do this too.

So what we're looking at is
the Earth from our perspective.

So we are flying this huge window,

the biggest window
that's ever been flown in space,

and looking through the window, we can see
the entire perimeter of the Earth.

Which is so beautiful.

And I hope that you're getting to see
what we see,

which is passing over
some really beautiful water,

beautiful land and lots of clouds.

So cool.

Hayley, she told me repeatedly

that she was looking forward to
the phone call with the St. Jude patients.

At one point, it looked like
that might be kind of hard to accomplish.

And she insisted that that take place.

Because floating is awesome.

I have admired her
her whole life.

All the way fast-forward to how
she has really dedicated herself

to this mission for the kids of St. Jude.

And I just want you all to know
that we're doing this for you.

And if I can do this, you can do this,

and I'm so proud
of each and every one of you.

So for the launch, we sat on
mission control at Kennedy Space Center.

As soon as they were on orbit,
we jumped in the jet,

flew out here to Hawthorne
to SpaceX's mission control,

went straight to console

to fulfill our roles and responsibilities
supporting this team.

To make sure we execute
a safe return here in a couple days.

Good news was, last time I checked,
everything was still trending

right around that five, six knot regime.

Which is amazing, because to have seven
locations in Florida in September align

is just another testament to
the stars aligning in our house of cards.

There's seven potential landing sites
from the Gulf side of Florida

to the Atlantic side of Florida.

What is going to govern reentry
is gonna be the weather we're predicting

at one of
the seven potential landing sites.

Twenty-four hours prior to splashdown,
we pick a location,

and then you start
what we call "phasing the orbit."

You actually orbit the Earth a little bit
quicker or a little bit slower

based on the altitude you are.

And so you can kind of pick an altitude,
so that on that final orbit,

the part of the Earth that has that
landing site in it is gonna be aligned.

You know what would be really cool?

Because they have not done this yet,

would be to land right off
of the cape. Cape North.

It'd be another nice first
for the mission.

Pretty ballsy to park in Elon's spot.

Is this Elon's?

Perfect! He's not gonna be here.

What we're looking at is basically

a mix of three different things that
are kind of impacting

the splashdown time.

You basically have the remnants from
Tropical Storm Nicholas

over the Gulf areas.

So you can see a lot of lightning in the
Southern Gulf or Central Gulf at that time

just south of most of the sites

You know, this to me looks like
it's a pretty good setup

for the Atlantic sites
if all the winds are low.

In summary, we're recommending
the Cape North site.

I believe this team has come to that
consensus. That is the decision.

We've chosen Cape North
for the landing site,

which is off of Cape Canaveral,
where they launched from.

It'll be the first time SpaceX has landed
Dragon in the Atlantic Ocean.

All the previous ones have been
in the Gulf of Mexico.

So, everybody there in Florida will
potentially have the opportunity

to see Dragon fly by

before she deploys her parachutes
and comes on down safely.

- Hey, fam.
- Hey.

So, it looks like
we might have a video pass,

so what we're gonna do is try
to pull up some video.

- Oh, my God.
- I can't promise anything,

- but we're gonna try to pull it up.
- Absolutely.

Hi, this is Erin.

Hi, Erin, good evening.
This is mission control.

- How are you doing?
- I'm doing well. How are you?

Very well. And we are ready
to connect you with Chris now.

I will hand you over to Sarah
who will then connect you to Sian.

Dragon, SpaceX. Comm check with Monica.

- Hi!
- Hey, guys. How's it going?

- Oh, my God, Hayley!
- Hey, good! How are you?

- How are you?
- I'm awesome. Having the time of my life.

Hi, honey. It's nice to see your face.

Well, hi there. I can't see yours,
but that's cool.

Glad you still like my face.

Y'all, Earth looks
so incredible from space.

From the cupola window,
you can see the entire perimeter of Earth.

- Oh, wow.
- And it's incredible.

We have the cupola open right now.
I mean, the view is spectacular.

You can see the stars all out.
It's fantastic.

Daddy, have you seen the Milky Way
or a black hole?

Did you see any stars?

We had a few Milky Ways up here,
but then we ate them all.

- Here you go, Hanks...
- Okay, let's do it.

You're so good at this.
You've never missed.

Hayley, how were you feeling before launch

when y'all were just sitting there
for all that time?

I was so calm.
I thought I was going to be like terrified

but I was just like, let's do this.

I gotta say, Hayley, I'm really digging
the zero G hair you've got going on.

Yeah, I don't know if
my crew members are as much

because there's been little pieces
of Hayley hair.

Just give me some of that hair
so I can have it.

- It looks good on you.
- Yeah.

Yeah. There you go.

- But your hair's the best.
- Look at us.

I love seeing your smiling face.
I miss you.

I'm super excited to see you tomorrow.

Love you, babe.
I hope you're having a good time.

Here, say, "Love you, Daddy."

- Love you, Daddy.
- Love you, Daddy.

Love you, little people.

- All right, it was great talking to you.
- This has been wonderful.

Love you.

- We love you, Hayley.
- We love you.

Love you too.

- Bye.
- Bye.

It was the best ride ever.

It was smoother
than I thought it was going to be.

It just was so much fun.

To have the Neil Armstrong autograph
and the medal,

knowing how proud they would be,

especially my dad, about this moment,

you know, there is nothing
I would wish more

than my parents
to have been able to see that.

Hey, family, it's me

in the cupola.

Just traveling around the Earth,
getting ready to come home tomorrow.

It's a big, beautiful Earth

Oh, just having some morning coffee.

Show us.

Here it is. So, this started off,
like our first day in orbit,

pretty much frozen solid,

and it was like a coffee slushie.

And now it's nice and lukewarm,

so it's getting a little bit
closer to home,

and we're getting closer
to home today.

So, this is our last time in the cupola,

Yup, and I don't want to cry
because the Earth is so beautiful.

Oh, I'm already there.

It's been a real pleasure
to go to space with you.

- You too.
- Yeah.

Just, like, getting to see something
that so few people get to see,

- we're so lucky.
- You can't make me cry.

Oh, my God. It is stunning.

It's just so beautiful.

Good morning.

- How are you?
- Good morning.

Welcome back.

Your family is doing really,
really, really well,

and we're gonna bring them home today.

Yay!

The crew have gone approximately


of the globe as of the time
they went to bed,

which was around 5:30 a.m. our time.

They did a lot yesterday.

Today will be basically wake up
and get really into focused ops to return.

We will experience a short period
of comm blackout.

It could be around seven minutes.
This is really normal.

This happens due to the heating
experienced by the spacecraft

during reentry.

During reentry,
there is risk involved.

You have a lot of energy, right?

So you lose
some thermal protection on reentry.

When you're ready to reenter,

you start firing your rockets
to slow down.

Your altitude starts decaying.

Now the drag of the atmosphere
starts slowing the vehicle down.

They're gonna be seeing
out the side windows

some flame or some heat
as it's coming down.

At that point, you lose voice transmission
for about seven minutes.

It's possible to lose a vehicle that way,
kind of like we lost Columbia.

You can't put a giant bubble
around everything and call it safe.

You know, you have to step out
and say, "Hey, there is this risk here."

"I'm willing to accept it
for the goal I'm about to achieve."

Hayley said she's looking forward
to my hug when she comes back,

but she said, "But don't crush me, Mom."

"Like, don't crush me."

I made no promise.

They're up there.

I remember Ed Viesturs
who climbed with you guys saying,

"You haven't climbed the mountain
until you get back down."

I think we're at that part

where soon they'll be able to say
that they've climbed the mountain,

and we're all gonna be able
to take a deep breath and celebrate.

I can't wait.

- Are we actually certified for this?
- I'm giddy.

This is...

surreal.

All right, Jared.

Everything's looking really good
for your return to Earth.

Continuing on to vehicle status,

we are healthy
and looking good for de-orbit entry.

Landing will be approximately


right before sunset.

Regarding the recovery team,

they are in position and ready to support,

currently launching fast boats.

And we copy all. We're gonna have
a good sunset over flight of Florida.

We're looking forward
to seeing all you guys soon.

I always think about, like,
what is the worst thing

that could happen in every phase,

and what I am gonna do about it,

and what can I do about it.

The big one kind of on the way downhill

is going to be that we have a much,
much higher risk

of micrometeorite orbital debris hits

at the altitude we flew
at than the space station.

It would be the highest risk
of the mission

So it's like you won't know
if you took a hit

until you're entering
the Earth's atmosphere,

and that's where you could have
a situation like we saw in the past.

That's one of those where there's nothing
we can do about this right now.

You just got to hope.

Dragon, SpaceX is go
for de-orbit, entry, and landing.

And copy that, SpaceX.
Go for de-orbit, entry, and landing.

And, Jared, great read-back.

We're looking forward
to bringing you home.



That whole process
is gonna take about 45 minutes.

The waters are looking crystal clear,

glassy flat. Looking really good.

Crew have already all passed
their suit-leak checks.

And they're getting ready
to start this whole sequence very soon.

Splashdown's scary.
I know everyone's excited,

and I think we all are.

But there's still the possibility
that something could still go wrong,

and that's scary too.

In the back of my mind,
I mean, I'm not going there,

but I know what the risks were.

There's splashdown, and there's
getting the capsule onto the boat,

and then getting in a helicopter.

And, so, it will be a great relief

that she's back.

Good afternoon, and welcome
to SpaceX's splashdown coverage

of the world's first all-civilian
astronaut mission to orbit.

At 3:17 p.m. Pacific time,

we'll have the beginning
of the de-orbit burn.

And that is what will line up Dragon
for reentry into Earth's atmosphere.

During reentry, we will have
an expected loss of communications

with Dragon for about seven minutes

as Dragon passes back
into the Earth's atmosphere.

A few minutes
after we get communications back,

we're gonna start to deploy our parachutes
to bring vehicle velocity down

to just fifteen miles an hour,
at which point we have splashdown.

Dragon, de-orbit sequence start
in five minutes. You are now live.

And copy that, SpaceX.
We show the same.

Go, SpaceX.

Jared, you're looking good.

No deltas to timeline.
Vehicle's nominal. Tracking no issues.

The de-orbit burn
is right down the middle,

with nominal
landing site targeting.

No deltas on weather or recovery.

And we're looking forward
to having you home shortly.

So, at this point, we are entering
a communications blackout period,

which lasts approximately seven minutes,

due to plasma formation
around the spacecraft.

We're currently in progress
of the blackout period.

The Dragon spacecraft,

it'll see external temperatures
of about 3,500 degrees,

preventing communication
with the Dragon spacecraft.

So, we should, in a couple minutes here,
start hearing some comms from the CORE

checking in to regain
that communication with Dragon.

Dragon, SpaceX. Comm check.

Dragon, SpaceX. Comm check.

Dragon hears you loud and clear.
How me?

What you are seeing
is a view from our thermal camera

seeing Dragon coming back
down to Earth right there.

- Was that the...?
- That was the sonic boom right there.

Dragon, loud and clear.

We have your visual on the aircraft.
You're looking great.

Dragon, expect automated chute deployment.

Copy that, SpaceX. We're bracing.

Dragon, visual on two
good drogues.

We are expecting
for these to cut off

and the main chutes
to come shortly after this.

And we do have confirmation
that the main chutes have deployed.

Dragon, descend rate nominal.

You have visual from recovery forces.

Copy that, SpaceX. Good news.

One thousand.

Copy 1,000.

Six hundred.

Copy 600.

Two hundred. We're bracing.

Copy 200.

Dragon, SpaceX sees splashdown
and mains release!

SpaceX, we have splashdown.

You're okay.

- You're okay.
- I never want to do this again.

And Inspiration4
is mission complete.

Inspiration4, on behalf of SpaceX,
welcome home to planet Earth.

Thank you for sharing your leadership,
hope, generosity, and prosperity,

and congratulations
on your incredible journey.

Dragon, stand by
for side hatch opening and egress.

This will be our last call from you.
Congratulations, Inspiration4 crew.

Signing off.

Copy that...

I know!

Hey!

- Welcome home, earthlings.
- Hey, man.

We're glad to have you back.

- Good to see you.
- Glad to have you back.

- Hey, guys.
- What's up?

Rock stars.

You still feel like
a zero-G monster?

Zero-G monster?

Yes!

All right.

Just wait one sec.

We went to space for three days

and successfully came back.

We're bonded for life.

Hayley's my sister,
and Jared and Chris are my brothers.

We're a family.

It made me realize that
there's so much to see

here on the Earth, that I really
want to go out and explore it.

Seeing it from above just gives you
kind of that introduction

to the beginning
of what life probably should be.

And that's where I am right now.

It's like it's just the beginning
of a longer book.

Hey, guys. Thanks for everything.

Inspiration4 just set the bar very high.

I mean, the best moment for me
was when we got back down to Earth,

and we knew we exceeded
the $200 million goal for St. Jude.

We completed all of our
on-orbit objectives.

It felt like a good mission complete.

And it also felt like it's game on.

There's gonna be starships
going around Mars in our lifetime.

There's gonna be starships
landing on Mars in our lifetime.

Humanity is just getting started.

I feel so fortunate every day
just to be alive.

And whenever I get to do big things,

and this is the biggest thing
I've ever done,

I just feel especially fortunate.

It's been a great adventure,

and I'm gonna miss these guys.