Meet the 24-Year-Old Who Drives NASA Rockets to the Launch Pad in a 6.5 Million Pound Crawler – Futurism

Rockets dont just spawn on the launch pad. You know this, even if sometimes it seems like the behemoths that launch explorations to space spontaneously line up, ready to blast off. After all, what machine on Earth is even capable of hauling skyscraper-sized structures over solid ground?

Ask Breanne Rohloff shes an engineer for NASA contractor Jacobs, who moves rockets around at NASAs Kennedy Space Center. Her machine is a 6.5 million pound beast called a crawler transporter. It rides a bit like an army tank, has the width of a baseball infield, and trundles at a glacial pace of less than a mile per hour.

The crawlers date back to the Apollo era, when they were constructed to haul the rockets that brought the first humans to the Moon. Over 50 years later, theyll transport NASAs Space Launch System (SLS) rocket and the Orion spacecraft to the launch pad, which if all goes according to plan will kick off NASAs Artemis mission and eventually launch a crew that will mark humanitys return to the lunar surface.

But before that happens, crawler drivers like Rohloff will spend countless hours maintaining and preparing the storied machines for their big day. And the SLS wont be the first nor the last giant load to ride what Rohloff calls the Space Centers Uber for rockets.

This interview has been condensed and edited for clarity.

Could you tell me a little bit about your background and how you came into this job?

I got really interested in space when I was young, just watching shuttle launches on the TV it felt like astronauts were superheroes. And then that interest just kind of grew as I went through school. I went to the University of Central Florida for engineering, had an internship at the Kennedy Space Center while I was in school and I fell in love with it. Then I came out here to work on the crawler about two and a half years ago when I graduated.

So is this the first job that youve had out of college?

It is, yeah. Its the first full-time position Ive had.

Did you anticipate that you would be doing something with the crawlers, specifically? Or were you just kind of open to anything?

I was open to a lot, you know, with the nerves of being out of school and thinking, I have to get a job, what am I going to do? But I was really hoping to come back to the Space Center. Id worked with the crawler in my internship, and I was really interested and hoping to work with them, and got really fortunate when it worked out.

Is there such thing as a typical day at this job? Could you walk me through what you normally do during a shift?

What we do normally on a day-to-day basis is a lot of maintenance. So were doing preventative maintenance to make sure all of our systems are up and running. If we notice anything, well have some corrective maintenance that we complete to be sure that were ready to support any operations.

Could you take me back to what it was like when you first started? What do you remember from driving the crawler the first time?

I had been on crawler moves before I started out here. So when I first drove I was a little bit nervous to be the one with the hands on the steering wheel, but I just felt really excited. I was trying to look at everything that I needed to, and I had someone in there training with me. But yeah, it was really exciting. And a little bit awe-inspiring to be like, this thing weighs 6 million pounds, and now Im at the steering wheel.

I think I went home and I told my mom, I got to touch the steering wheel today. Its a little dorky, but Ill admit to it.

I mean, it sounds exciting. Its not something that most people ever get the chance to do. Im kind of wondering what its like to drive a crawler, compared to driving a regular car or truck?

The first thing that hit me is we drive standing. And theres a lot of different visual points that youre checking. So in a car, youre looking at the road in front of you, but on the crawlerway there are not a lot of reference points ahead of us. So were looking to the sides for different fixed points on the crawler in reference to the sides of the crawlerway. And so were keeping those in our viewpoint a lot.

The front right corner is where the cab is; its not in the middle. And so weve got one of our four sets of tracks directly below us, and one behind us. So a lot of times were checking where our front tracks are looking in reference to the front of the crawlerway ahead of us. And were also looking behind us to see how our rear tracks are tracking. Because the crawler steers from the middle, but were driving from the front right.

Why do you have to keep such a close eye on those tracks?

Youre going really slow 0.8 miles per hour. Youd think a turn wouldnt sneak up on you, but it will sneak up on you.

We steer in degrees. We can only steer up to six degrees in one direction. So youre keeping a close eye to make sure that when you want to be going straight, youre actually going straight and not at an angle. And youre making tiny little corrections, but youre also keeping a really close eye on the tracks when youre going into a curve. You have to be anticipating your next moves so that the crawler has time to correct and time to react to where you want it to go.

So when youre moving rockets to the launch pad, how far of a distance are you typically going? And how long does that take?

From the Vehicle Assembly Building where everythings stacked and put together to the launch pad, its about a four mile journey, give or take.

Theres a lot of front end work and a lot of back end work that we are involved with: going in picking up the stack, putting it down at the launch pad and then backing up, because we dont stay parked there. We leave the launch pad when we finish moving everything.

Just the move itself will take about a whole 8-hour shift.

And for you specifically, youre mostly just doing that middle part where youre moving, things, youre not assembling?

Well be involved picking up the stack and putting it down well be there on both sides of the operation. But our group is not the one that does the assembling of a vehicle.

Okay, so youre just kind of taking things from point A to point B.

Were like the Space Centers Uber for rockets.

So another thing I find interesting is that Kennedy Space Center is on a wildlife preserve and Ive read that there are times where animals can get in the way of your vehicles. Im kind of curious what thats like have you had any run-ins with wildlife?

So yeah, were on a wildlife preserve. And thats part of why we have so many people observing as well. Theres hogs, coyotes, gators, tortoises, mice there was a mouse in one of the crawler shoes once.

We do walk downs, and we look around before we start moving to see if theres anything we need to usher away though wildlife protection services. And if we see animals on the crawlerway, where its more common, we create a lot of vibration when were moving. So they can feel that in the ground and it kind of disturbs them. Usually they kind of get spooked a little and theyll walk away from where were headed. If we need to, we would stop and have them safely moved out of the way.

That makes sense. I can imagine its a little freaky to be on the track at the time when the crawlers are coming down anyway, just because of the vibrations, like you said.

Yeah. The crawler is big from my perspective; I kind of would be scared to see it as a turtle.

So switching gears, I know that NASA is planning to launch a massive Space Launch System rocket as part of the Artemis mission in March. With those larger loads, can you feel the difference when youre driving compared to a smaller load?

The crawler itself will react a little bit slower, and theres a lot more friction when youre steering in particular. And youre also paying a lot of attention and watching carefully how the JEL system which is our jacking, equalizing, and leveling system thats keeping the top surface flat. We have to go up a slope to get onto the launch pad.

Weve got hydraulic cylinders on each corner, and when you go up onto the slope, the front cylinders will start lowering and the rear cylinders will be extending to keep our load level while the crawler is experiencing different angles.

I see. So the back kind of comes up so that everything feels even.

Weve got limits on how high up we can go. So youre keeping an eye on that to make sure that nothings out of whack.

Yeah, you wouldnt want to accidentally tip a rocket forward or something. I feel like that would be a bad day.

Yeah, that would be a bad day.

Is there anything thats surprised you about driving a crawler since you started doing it?

It was hard to go straight at first. It was difficult. Same with learning the different viewpoints as I drive.

It was difficult because youre standing and everybodys different heights. So everybodys viewpoints are slightly different based on their perspective. For me, Im kind of short and I work with some very tall men. So theyre trying to tell me, you look at this hose and it should be right on top of this grass line and Im looking at it like, this is two feet in the grass line, what are you doing? It took me a second to translate that, for him, right on top of the grass line is six inches for me inside the grass line. Im just too short to see it.

How tall are you?

52. Maybe 53 in steel toes; they have a little bit of a cushion.

More on NASA: The James Webb Space Telescope Just Detected Its First Signal

Care about supporting clean energy adoption? Find out how much money (and planet!) you could save by switching to solar power at UnderstandSolar.com. By signing up through this link, Futurism.com may receive a small commission.

The rest is here:
Meet the 24-Year-Old Who Drives NASA Rockets to the Launch Pad in a 6.5 Million Pound Crawler - Futurism