clash between an embattled president, in this case richard nixon, who confronts a social movement on the streets, in this case, the antiwar movement, just as he is fighting to get out of -- get reelected. what constitutional lines to the administration cross in an effort to stay in power? announcer: lawrence roberts tonight at 8 p.m. eastern on c-span's q&a. announcer: c-span shop.org is c-span's online store with a collection of c-span products. every purchase help support our nonprofit operations. further to order a copy of the road -- directory. in leading up to mother's day, get our newest apparel. you will get a special discount on your purpose. go to cspanshop.org, announcer: the workers securing

the spacex dragons capsule after return to earth lives morning with an ocean/down off the florida coast. the first nighttime splashdown of a nasa crew since the apollo eight mission. after the cruise return to earth, nasa held a briefing. >> welcome to this morning's post splashdown briefing for nasa's spacex crew. nasa astronauts mike hopkins, victor glover, shannon walker, splashdown off the coast of panama city florida this morning at 150 6:00 a.m. central time they will make their way back to houston a little later this morning. the crew launched in november of last year spent 168 days in space. members of the resilience crew were involved in five spacewalks , saw the arrival and departure of several visiting crew and

cargo space crafts and contributed to hundreds of scientific investigations and technology demonstrations aboard the international states -- space station. we have a few folks here to talk about the mission. the associated minister for nasa's human operations mission directorate. nasa's commercial crew program manager. nasa's international space station program manager. the chief flight director at johnson space center. the spacex senior advisor for flight viability. and the vice president and director general for human spaceflight technology directorate. let's start with some overview remarks and removed questions. for those asking questions, please press star one. we will also take questions from those on social media using the #asknasa.

we'll start with you, kathy. kathy: thanks for being here so early in the morning. what an exciting landing. first of all, beautiful evening. you can see how nice the weather was once again. we have been extremely lucky that we got to landing days. these are really nice days to be able to rescue the crew. we always -- reentry is hard. the spacecraft was in beautiful condition, but you just worry as you go through the six minutes of calm blackout and it was so great to hear mike's voice and see the main vehicle come softly down to earth and see the votes -- boats going out to pick up the cruise and bring them home.

it is amazing. we have pictures of the crew out there. you can see -- mike and shannon and victor and soichi, they look like the day they did when they launched. it is hard to think that that is a picture of them inside the crew capsule on the recovery vote. they are doing great. we are very happy that we will bring them home to their families. i got to talk to soichi and victor's families and they are very happy to see them again. i will be planning on having a late birthday party for victor soon coming up. this was our first full crew rotation mission. on the nasa side and on the spacex side we have learned a lot. on the nasa side we will take this learning into our future crew missions. with boeing.

and also with the artemis missions. space x folks will also do these missions. i do not know how you could have done this much better. we are hoping that there will be continuing to do the great job they do. i want to thank the spacex team, the nasa team, and we have had several other federal agencies jumping in and helping us along the way. i really want to thank everybody for all the hard work they have done and doing such an amazing job for our nation. 90. -- thank you. >> next week will hear from steve. >> good morning, everybody. it was an incredible day today recovering mike hopkins, victor glover, after their 168 days in space. it has been an incredible 27 days for the nasa and space x

teams. this has been our busiest month. we started on april 5 to set up for the landing we did today. on april 23 we launched the crew to mission and they docked one day later. today on may 2, we orbited and landed the crew. one vehicle. today was almost flawless. dragon did great. the crew -- when they woke up, the first thing mike hopkins said was, what is the weather going to be like? >> we told him, two nights of wind, one foot waves. we plan the separation sequence to get about 10 kilometers below the station. that is where we executed maneuvers. that orbit is a safe orbit.

right around 1:03 a.m., that is when the burn happened. it took 17 minutes to execute that burn. around 150 6:00 a.m., -- 150 6:00 a.m., as we dock from station during the sequence it went great. just as we expected. the entry went phenomenally well. i had to talk to the spacex team for building such a great vehicle. it was phenomenal for some. we have a lot of confidence in this night recovery based on the cargo mission. that we landed in january when spacex recovered that vehicle, as well. we had a couple lessons learned from the demo to mission.

we had some slightly high readings. today we had some of that. it performed flawlessly. you might remember we have some boats in the area. today the coast guard had several assets on scene and patrolled the area. we had no leisure boats within the landing zone. that was much better than last time. overall, a great flight. we recovered the two parachutes in the four main parachutes. we are interested in looking at them for different missions to make sure they are performing well. those were covered, as well. my hats off to the entire nasa and spacex teams. not only for tonight's operation but for all the work they did to get this mission ready to go and to bring back. we will move on after this flight. we will do if postflight review of the data for this flight.

we also have post flight reviews coming up for the crew 2 mission for the launch phase and orbit phase with dragon. we have been talking with iss. it is an incredible time for the commercial crew. after this we will move onto to the boeing mission. that will be in the august- september timeframe. we have another rotation coming up. in the october timeframe. we will launch crew three and bring crew two home. my hat is off to the entire team. >> thank you, steve. next up is joel. joel: thank you. and welcome again to the briefing. truly, an outstanding mission. an international effort with participating countries across the globe working to make this mission successful.

as you heard, 160 plus days in orbit. 160 days during utilization and research. as well as commercialization activities. now with the crew one team safely at home, crew two in the soyuz crew will continue. again, an outstanding mission. we look forward to seeing the smiling faces of the crew one team back on earth, talking about lessons learned and using them to advance our mission, to advance and make these missions even better and stronger in the future. with that huge thanks to everyone involved, i will hand it back to you. >> thank you, joel. we will go over to holly writing. holly: good morning everyone.

thanks for being at the post splashdown conference. it is an exciting time to be here talking to you. it has been a great day for the operations that work conducted first with the dock then with the entry dissent and then a very successful landing. i should back up and say it has been an amazing six months. the resilience docked at the -- space station. the international crew, soichi, the first time with an international crew on the dragon, which we were excited about. and shannon walker had the opportunity to be the commander for a. of time so that was exciting as well. earlier today when they left, they took over as commander. he is a crew two crew member. he was able to ring the bell after resilience was departing and say all those happy words as

they were able to send them home. they have been doing a direct hand over with all of the crews on board. crew 2, the soyuz crew, crew one. 11 members on the space station for a little more than a week was an exciting time. lots of work that was done. of course, the landing required everyone on board to do a sleep shift. we changed their sleep and wait times aboard the space station. that affects the teams on the ground here. to make this a really good orbit end landing opportunity work out for the operations, all of the teams -- there is a tremendous amount of effort by nasa and spacex working together and many other pieces as well. to ensure we can safely land our crew during the night landing. also, crew members are doing really well. we got the capsule on board,

resilience on board. spacex's recovery ship had no trouble. i was walking over here and the helicopters were there ferrying them onto land. the reports are that all four crewmembers are in great shape and spirits. just an incredible six months. of this resilience vehicle and the crew on board the iss. just a great day. it is not very often you get to wake up on a space station and go to sleep in houston. we have been talking about that in the control center. it's pretty remarkable. back to you, rachel. rachel: thanks holly. >> from all of us here at spacex, i want to think nasa for

trusting us to fly their astronauts. i was watching the mission from the departure space station and i must say, it was an amazing mission. the entire spacex team is so proud. the missions went smooth. the launch in november last year, the long-term docking, and now the departure and splashdown. it is great to have mike, victor, shannon, and soichi back home again. i know the team here is looking forward to meeting them in person. we will look at data and inspect the spacecraft. then we will get the capsule ready for the next flight. nasa and spacex worked hard to certify the dragon for multiple flights. this is critical for reliability. this was the first nighttime landing since 2008.

-- since apollo eight. the lighting was good. no additional traffic. the weather was super. conditions were perfect. the spacex and nasa teams are a remarkable achievement. the opportunity of a lifetime for many of us. it is something to be proud of. thank you, nasa. we're looking forward to many more flights to the space station and beyond the moon and mars. >> thank you, hans. hiroshi: good morning. first of all, we are relieved to hear all crewmembers came home safely. congratulations and welcome back. i would like to express

appreciation to nasa, spacex, and all members who have devoted themselves to this mission during the covid-19 situation. the japanese astronaut completed this important mission. together with the u.s. as partners and with spacex. this mission harbors a new era for human spaceflight. they are pioneers. he was the first japanese astronaut launched on russian soyuz and he also wanted this mission. he was the first international crew of the dragon.

i believe his experience had to do with this mission's success. there is a long -- during his long stay at the space station, he benefited our lives for those on earth and to future human spaceflight. we will take over his job. the international space station is an important facility for humankind. i think this mission served the

dragon to provide a more robustness and capability to the international space station. it also proved that international and commercial partnerships can accomplish goals. the partnership is also true for our endeavor in space expiration. we would love to continue the international partnership and commercial engagement, not only with the iss but also as a gateway and -- to mars. we must go together towards these challenges. of course, jaxa will be joining this endeavor. again, congratulations. thank you. rachel: thanks for everyone's remarks. we will start taking questions

from media dialed in. as a reminder, you can press star one to get in the queue to ask your question. we will also take questions via the #asknasa on social media. we will start with marshall dunn of the associated press. >> good morning. another spacex crew mission is in the books just in time for the 60th anniversary of alan shepard's mercury flight. in the next -- the next flight fork spacex is privately purchased. could you comment on spacex leading the way for space tourism? >> i will make a short remark and then i will let hans jump in, but i think this was our goal when we set up a commercial crew. we are very excited to see it taking off. one of the reasons why we did

the contract the way we did was that so the commercial companies have the opportunity to be able to, you know, sell the capabilities they developed to give services to other folks. so that the capabilities we work so hard together on our then there and available for u.s. citizens or international citizens out there to be able to experience and be a space person, too. our goal is to one day -- that everyone can be a space person. this is just an exciting first step for that. we are very excited to see it started to take off. go ahead, hans. hans: thank you for that question. obviously, this is a big step

going forward. we showed in the last missions that we can sit -- safely transport astronauts up and down with dragon. we had a chance to learn lessons and improve reliability and make the operations very smooth. today was a testament to the design team and operations team and also the recovery team. the execution was just perfect, and my eyes. i think going forward we are ready for this. we are ready for the private astronaut mission. i think the first mission in particular is a very special mission. they are trained accordingly. the mission is very important. i think all these things come

together and i am looking forward to that. >> the next question comes from eric berger. >> congratulations all around. you made something quite hard look easy. a question for kathy. now you have kind of got transportation enhanced. -- in hand. it seems to me you can think more about operations. what is it like planning not just for this station but for the moon? you could potentially send hundreds of tons of cargo to the moon. her. i am wondering, kathy, as you look beyond it transportation to operations, is that exciting to you? what do you think about that,

the fact that it is not so much transportation anymore you have to worry about, but actually capabilities and operations? thanks. kathy: we are still at the beginning steps of making this look easy, but joel and steve have been doing a great job of that along with spacex. this is only our first full operational mission. we need to keep having the missions look like this but you are right, eric. it is exciting. hopefully with artemis one and the unaccrued mission demonstration getting behind us. you know, we are laying in the key foundational aspects with gateway and beginning to land the demonstration -- lay in the demonstration to lay down the

foundation for going back to the moon. sustainably. operating sustainably on the moon. this is not a dream anymore. we have very concrete steps to go do that. . this is an international endeavor. we have a very solid plan. and agreements and contracts out there. it is a great time to be here. a lot of exciting things going on. obviously, you know, landing today was one of them. >> our next question comes on chris davenport from the washington post. >> -- chris, are you able to ask

a question? >> can you hear me? >> yes. >> sorry, i was thinking gratulation's. i was mentioning how you guys got this spacecraft on the recovery both -- boat in less than 30 minutes and the crew out in an hour. i was hoping maybe hans could talk about the training going into that and what your goals were going into the mission in terms of speeding up the timeline? >> i can start and then we will let hans follow-up. congratulations to the spacex recovery team. they did a phenomenal job getting the crew out of the water very quickly. in the capsule onto the ship.

i think one of the things that has enabled that is they have done many practices of this operation. in fact, just before the launch, the last couple fridays ago, they went out and did a practice. they were really ready to go. today, one of the considerations when we evaluated this night landing was, was the weather, the sea state, the fact it would be very benign. benign conditions for recovering the crew. that help the crew -- helped the team. i know the goal is to get the vehicle out of the water as fast as they can and get the crew out and start. one of the things we do and we get the crew back is the end of medical valuation -- is the medical evaluation to see how the crew read adapt to earth's gravity. that is important to us, as well. i will turn it over to you, hans.

hans: like you said, it is basically practice, practice, practice. this was an awesome officer -- operation. i was commenting on this earlier in mission control. i noticed the professionalism and how smooth everything was. it looked more like a race car pitstop than anything else. everyone was at the right spot doing the right things. obviously, the better -- the weather was great. we picked a great night for this operation. everything came together and resulted in these record-breaking times forgetting the dragon out of the water and the crew out of the dragon. great operations. congratulations. >> the next question is from camden hall with next horizon spaceflight. >> thanks for taking my question.

my question is for kathy or anyone who feels they can take it. i know the dragon has a lifespan for human spaceflight. do see that lifespan increasing f dragon can show it is safe and reusable over the next few flights? safe -- angst. >> steve, do you want to take that one? >> yeah, i can talk about the dragon. hans talked earlier. we have embarked upon reuse of these vehicles. crew two is our first reused dragon capsule. it flew on the demo mission with bob and doug. it can be reused up to five times based on our assessments right now. our assessment is for the one time, but we can extended to five. what that means is five flights for up to 210 days on orbit. we will continue to look at the vehicles when they come back.

one of the things we will do when we get resilience packed -- back is we will go through -- hans and the spacex team will go through and start a refurbishment. kudos to spacex for allowing nasa to have a presence at dragon land. we have an office there. we go hand in hand with them as they refurbish the spacecraft. what we do is we take the components off and look at reuse and learn from that. there is a potential overtime to extend that life. we do it methodically, step-by-step. >> will take a few questions from social media. dominic on twitter asks, are there differences or modifications between the crew one and crew two capsules? >> i can take that. there are a few modifications between crew one and crew two

capsules. mostly it is the same vehicle. there are some upgrades to the propulsion systems on crew to -- two. for example, some of those upgrades actually allowed us to utilize some more propellants and fly a little bit higher on absent. -- absent -- ascent. some of the software on the crew two vehicle has been upgraded to improve capability and escape downrange for bad weather. there is a battery upgrade on it, with a little bit improve lifetime on the battery and improved energy storage. of course, we have a fly around capability on the crew two vehicles so at the end of the mission, -- we talked from the zeno port and did three

maneuvers to go up around station and below. that vehicle can go through under 60 degrees around the space station and get good photography of all parts of the space station. those are just some of the new things to the vehicle. >> another twitter question here. maybe for holly or steve. brandon on twitter asks if the crew will get to sleep at home or have to sleep at a nasa facility tonight. >> i can certainly answer that. they will sleep at our quarantine facility here at the johnson space center. it is really important when they have been up on the space station for six months ended not exposed to the same things down here on earth that they quarantine a little bit longer while they are monitored by our flight doctors after their return. they go straight into an exercise protocol that helps

them recover quickly. there will be out in not too long. but they do stay the quarantine -- in the quarantine facility for a little bit after their return. >> thanks. one more, also from twitter. will dragon and resilience be crew threes ride to the space station? >> i can take that question. resilience will not fly the crew three mission. spacex is in the process of building a new dragon for crew three. it is well underway. the propulsion system is very far along. there are two parts to the vehicle already made together and the trunk that has the solar arrays and radiator panels, it's built up. it will be a new vehicle for the crew to fly in october. >> ok, thanks.

we will go ahead and wrap up here and let our participants get some much deserved rest. thanks to everyone for joining today. stay tuned to nasa.gov for more information about the first opportunity to talk to the crew later this week. thank you. announcer: c-span's "washington journal." were taking her calls live on the air. coming up monday morning, a look at the week ahead at the white house with the associated press white house reporter. we will talk about childcare proposals in the biden american families plan with the heritage foundation's rachel bressler and hannah matthews. then the discussion to share u.s. vaccine supply with the rest of the the world. watch c-span's "washington

journal." be sure to join the discussion with their phone calls, facebook >> c-span's or unfiltered view of government. we are funded by these television companies and more, including spark like. >> it's our home to, and right now we're all facing our greatest challenge. we're doing our part so it's easier to do yours. >> spark like supports c-span. >> next on q and a, investigative journalist lawrence roberts talks about the spring offensive by 1971 when tens of thousands of the vietnam war testers, including veterans

came to washington dc. after that, prime minister's questions from the british house of commons. then, national intelligence leaders tell the senate armed services committee facing threats. >> the 1971 offensive began in a few weeks. it began with no great expectations of success or impact, but it moved, sometimes in a