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Canadarm2 to capture a spacecraft - CSA simulator

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Uploaded on February 7, 2019

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Canadarm2 to capture a spacecraft - CSA simulator

2019-02-07 - Canadian Space Agency astronaut Jeremy Hansen explains how astronauts use Canadarm2 to capture a cargo spacecraft when it arrives at the International Space Station. (Credit: Canadian Space Agency)

Transcript

Jeremy Hansen: Let me show you how we capture a cargo vehicle that arrives at the Space Station. So, here's an example. This is the Japanese HTV cargo vehicle. It's arriving near the Space Station. It's not connected to anything; it just flies up close, and then astronauts reach out with Canadarm and grab hold of that supply vehicle, and we use these controllers to do it. And you can see; Canadarm is roughly about -- a little over a metre away from the cargo vehicle right now.

But we also use -- you see this black object, here; this is actually an alignment -- a visual alignment device for us. So, you can see, here - if I point it straight at you - the white dot is in the white circle. But if I get out of alignment the white dot moves, in reference to the circle. And this is how the astronauts can see if we are lined up properly.

And we also have references on the screen. So, I'm going to start moving Canadarm towards the object. And I notice my green crosshairs are not centered on that white dot either, so I'm going to start moving the arm up towards them. So, I'm moving up in the screen. I want to centre my crosshairs on the white dot, and that's up to -- I'm actually a little bit high. I will go back down a little bit.

And one thing about controlling Canadarm is it actually oscillates around a little bit. So, you just have to make really slow corrections. I also know that -- you know, if this were an airplane my wings aren’t levelled, so I'm going to make a correction, here, with my right hand, to start levelling the wings. Small correction so I don't put too many oscillations into the Canadarm. Still a little bit high, so I'm going to keep correcting down slowly. That's looking pretty good. I'll keep moving towards the target.

And right now everything is lined up well enough to capture it, and now I'm looking at this white line, in reference to these red lines, and that will tell me when I'm actually over the pin and can grab a hold of the vehicle. A small correction I'm going to put in. I'm a little bit to the right; a little correction to the left, real small, at this point. I'm actually over top of the pin, now, and I can pull the trigger and capture the vehicle.

And now, the inside -- the Canadarm is grabbing a hold of it, and we can dock it to the Space Station.

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