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SpaceReadiness reviews: the approval to start the countdown
Weeks before launch, the mission starts passing its readiness reviews, and the last one, no later than one day before launch, gives the approval to proceed into the launch countdown. You run them in order, close every open action, collect the signatures on the Certificate of Flight Readiness and check readiness the way the federal launch rule asks.
Free to startScenarios
- A NASA payload on a commercial launch service managed by NASA's Launch Services Program.
- A licensed launch whose operator holds a readiness meeting close in time to flight.
- An action left open at the Flight Readiness Review that must be closed at the Launch Readiness Review.
The steps
- About 30 to 60 days before launch, the Launch Vehicle Readiness Review, chaired by the Launch Services Program Manager, certifies readiness to proceed with spacecraft and launch vehicle integration and reviews any launch vehicle anomaly or issue.
- Between 3 and 12 days before launch, at the launch site, the Flight Readiness Review, chaired by the NASA Launch Manager, updates the mission status, closes the actions of the earlier reviews and certifies readiness to start the final launch preparations.
- Before the Launch Readiness Review, the NASA Launch Manager prepares the pre-mishap plan: the immediate launch-site reaction to a launch vehicle anomaly and how the data is impounded.
- No later than 1 day before launch, at the launch site, the Launch Readiness Review updates the status, closes the actions of the Flight Readiness Review and authorizes approval to proceed into the launch countdown.
- At the end of the Launch Readiness Review, sign the Certificate of Flight Readiness: the Launch Services Program Manager, the NASA Spacecraft Mission Director, the NASA Launch Manager, the launch services contractor, the independent technical authorities and a range official.
- Check readiness item by item: vehicle and launch site, including any contingency abort location; safety-critical personnel, systems, software, procedures, equipment, property and services; and readiness to carry out the mishap plan.
- Keep the record of every review, how each action item was closed and the original Certificate of Flight Readiness.
Safety rules that stop the station
- The approval to proceed into the launch countdown comes from the Launch Readiness Review, held no later than one day before launch.
To pass
- Each review held in its time window, with the actions of the previous one closed.
- The Certificate of Flight Readiness signed by every required signatory at the end of the Launch Readiness Review.
- Readiness checked for the vehicle, the site, the people, the systems and the mishap plan before the countdown.
Official source
NASA · NPD 8610.24C · 14 CFR 450.155
NPD 8610.24C, Launch Services Program Pre-Launch Readiness Reviews
NASA publishes NPD 8610.24C free in its NODIS library: the four prelaunch reviews, who chairs each one and who signs the Certificate of Flight Readiness.
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