Launch ops for Hermes II were iterated several times throughout the year, mostly after launch rehearsals. The document was designed to have key procedures take up as few pages as possible, and for two-party verification on several procedures throughout. Assembly procedures and their corresponding integration checklists were kept in an appendix. One integration checklist was used for each subsystem, which was checked by two people and contained key points for checkout photos.
Attached is the pre-flight version of launch ops.
Hermes II Flight Launch Ops.pdf
Keep from Hermes II:
- Chronological structure
- Contingency checklists
- "Breakout" procedures when possible – single sheets for tasks like Pad cameras, pad setup, away team. Allows distribution of tasks
Intended changes for Hermes III:
- Better packing lists.
- Clearer organization by subteam - which exact tools are which? make sure tools aren't doubled
- Easy way to add/remove things to packing list
- Serialize boxes for prelaunch / flight - log which tools are in which box
- Clearer enforcement of packing for transit so we don't lose items and/or become disorganized during transit
- Add specific sets of flight spares for small parts
- Go-nogo poll
- Faster/clearer who to ask for each go/nogo
- Multiple boxes for each item – several opportunities
- Easy way to log attempts (misfires are likely)
- Altimeter state at launch
- Temp/wind speed/direction at launch
- Tie roles in more distinctly throughout Launch Ops
- Make quality/consistency integration checklists better across subteams
- Pad cameras were very difficult on launch day:
- Lack of training
- Lack of knowledge of which cameras were available and exact placement of each type of camera
- No documentation of aluminum foil shades/sunshields for cameras
- Roles not enforced strongly from the beginning
- We did a verbal walkthrough of the rocket prior to launch – might be nice to have
- Data recovery was not well-enforced. We took a lot of checkout photos but it's not clear how many of them made it back
Added 9/24:
- Pre-transit driver checklists
- One car ran out of gas on the way to the launch site, risking safety and delaying launch
- Prevent with list of things.
- Gas, food, water, list of riders (or # of riders), list of rocket components
- PRE-PRINT and give to drivers
- Maybe have matrix of rocket component / tool boxes (serialized earlier) to car number.
- Structural change idea:
- Minimize "launch ops" parts to the pad preparations in parallel with final integration onsite and the "pad setup" portion
- Pad setup == pad camera setup, rocket vertical
- Prelaunch == arm avionics, turn on cameras, arm propulsion
- Launch == go/nogo & contingencies