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Garrett Reisman is Interviewed about the Artemis Launch; NASA Scrubs Launch; Baseball Card Sells for Record $12.6 Million; Air France Suspends Pilots. Aired 8:30-9a ET

Aired August 29, 2022 - 08:30   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

[08:33:13]

BRIANNA KEILAR, CNN ANCHOR: Right now it is looking like the Artemis 1 launch may be pushed back after several technical issues this morning. A hydrogen leak, also a potential engine problem threatening lift-off for the window that is just opening weather wise right now for the next two hours.

Joining us now is former NASA astronaut Garrett Reisman. He spent more than 100 days in space and performed three spacewalks. He took this space selfie in 2010. You can actually see part of the space station and earth in his visor. Very cool there.

All right, Garrett, so, we wanted to have you on as we were, you know, watching this thing get ready to go here, but it's looking like this may be in jeopardy. What are you thinking as you hear about some of these issues that they're having today?

GARRETT REISMAN, FORMER NASA ASTRONAUT: Well, I'll tell you, Brianna, I'm having some pretty major FOMO sitting in this hotel room and not being down there at The Cape to be able to see this with my own eyes.

But as far as the problems go, it's not surprising. This is a very complicated, very large rocket. Getting everything to work perfectly the very first time we go - try to launch it is not something that usually happens on something this complicated. So, if it's not today, it will be some day in the near future. And, hey, this is a test flight. That's why they do these things is to get this all smooth and get all the bugs worked out.

JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: One of the thing we're hearing, and we were just listening in a little bit to engineers and flight directors talk about what the situation was, but it's a bleed in engine three. And you're looking at a close-up right there, images of the engines of this rocket down there.

What does that mean to you, necessarily?

REISMAN: Well, what that means is, you want to flow a little bit of this super cold propellants into the engines before you light them up so that they don't get this big shock of very cold propellant going through for the first time. It's called thermal conditioning. You want to get it to the right temperature. And so that's a -- if you can't get that to work, that's a problem. And I know that's what they're trouble shooting right now.

[08:35:02]

I'm not ready to give up hope. I think they've got it - you know, we've got a lot of smart people down there at NASA trying to figure this out. And it is - we've still got time. But that is an issue that needs to be resolved for launch.

KEILAR: And that -- being able to see a line of frost on the rocket, what does that mean or what could that mean?

REISMAN: Well, they were worried initially that that was some kind of a crack in the structure, in the inter tanks area, which would be a very bad thing. You don't want your rocket -- trust me, from somebody that's climbed into one of these things, you don't want cracks in your rocket, OK. That's bad.

So -- but - but the thing is that we were very experienced with this type of insulation and this type of tank because it's very similar to the space shuttle main - main - the extended -- sorry, external tank on the - on the shuttle. And so, from that experience, we were able to know that, hey, yes, sometimes air freezes and makes these lines that look like cracks but it's really just frozen air and they were able to resolve that issue.

BERMAN: So, what's supposed to happen or was supposed to happen in a launch window that opened exactly two minutes at this point, was this is supposed to lift off to launch and send a capsule around the moon and then back again in a very long mission. You know, six weeks long, back here, and land off the coast of San Diego.

What is it you're most excited to learn or see here, Garrett?

REISMAN: Well, I think the most exciting thing was make - to see this big, big rocket, again, the biggest thing we've launched, it is 8.8 million pounds of thrust when it launches. And that is more than a million pounds greater than the Saturn V. So, it's a beast. And I'm excited to see that.

I'm excited to also see Orion perform and be put through its paces, especially coming back -- it comes back at 24,500 miles an hour, which is a lot faster than the 17,500 miles an hour that the shuttle re- entered at. So, making sure that heat shield can take the heat with that kind of speed of re-entry, that's another thing I'm looking forward to seeing proven.

KEILAR: Garrett, what is the benefit of going to the moon, of getting that time and that experience as NASA is looking, ultimately, towards a Mars mission?

REISMAN: Right. So, if you're looking towards a Mars mission, there's still a lot of things that we don't understand about putting humans that far away from the earth. And the big thing is, when I was on the Space Station and on the space shuttle, we're above the atmosphere but we're still below the earth's magnetic field. So, we're still protected from a lot of the really nasty radiation that's out there. Now, we know exactly what kind of radiation is beyond the earth's

magnetic field, where the moon is, and where Mars is, and we've measured it very carefully. We don't know exactly what that does to people.

So, the nice thing about going back to the moon with people is, we can - we can learn about what happened and we can learn in a safe manner. We can go for a month. We can go for two months. We can come back quickly if we have to.

If you go to say, hey, let's just go to Mars today, you're going for about two and a half years and there's no quick return. And so you're just going to take that risk.

Going back to the moon with people allows us to figure out what's going on before we take such a big step.

KEILAR: Garrett, we certainly appreciate your insights here as someone who spent so much time in space.

If you could just stick around, maybe stand by for us as we wait to maybe get some final word here on what is happening at the Kennedy Space Center.

BERMAN: All right, and we did just get final word on what is happening. I think we can call this breaking news. Just seconds ago, we learned that the launch for today has been scrubbed. There will be no launch today. The Artemis 1 mission on pause, at least for a few more days.

Back with me now, Miles O'Brien and Professor Michio Kaku.

Miles, what do you make of the decision?

MILES O'BRIEN, CNN AVIATION ANALYST: Well, not surprising. As we've been talking, this is a complex machine. It's never flown like this before. And there's a lot of things that can go wrong in space. And in particular the plumbing is always a problem. And that's what we're seeing here now is when you have a lot of pipes and the coldest substance on earth goes through them, you end up with difficulties.

BERMAN: Just tell us as much as you know about the specific problem that it did experience. Again, these are live pictures of the overall rocket, but it was on engine three, some kind of a bleed on engine three.

O'BRIEN: Yes. Liquid hydrogen flows into the engine, it gets lit and that's how - that's what makes you get off a launch pad very quickly. But that engine needs to be precooled before you do all of that. The plumbing that allows that to happen is not working. They've been trying to force open essentially a door to make that happen and they haven't been able to do it, so.

BERMAN: Professor, human endeavor is not without setbacks. And this, so far, is a relatively mild one. MICHIO KAKU, PROFESSOR OF THEORETICAL PHYSICS, CITY UNIVERSITY OF NEW

YORK: Right. And I think it's actually good news. It's good news that they caught it in time. You don't want the rocket to blow up because you overlooked some small thing and you thought you could patch it up. You're sitting on a million gallons of high-octane rocket fuel that could go up like a roman candle just like that.

So, I think it's good news. Good news they caught it in time so that we don't have hundreds of moving parts giving us a gigantic fireball on Cape Canaveral.

[08:40:03]

BERMAN: And, look, this is why you - this why you run the tests.

KAKU: They caught it in time. So I think it's good news.

BERMAN: This is why you do the unmanned missions, like they're doing today.

Brianna.

KEILAR: Yes, it's a 42-day mission, this is supposed to be. They have to get it right from the beginning here.

So, let's get right now to CNN's Kristin Fisher, who is live for us at Kennedy Space Center with this news that this launch has just been scrubbed.

Kristin.

KRISTIN FISHER, CNN SPACE AND DEFENSE CORRESPONDENT: Hey, Brianna, well, definitely some disappointment here at the Kennedy Space Center, but, you know, we knew this was going to be a very likely outcome of this very first attempt to get this incredibly complicated rocket off the launch pad. NASA was able to successfully trouble shoot through three problems this morning. The lightning, the hydrogen leak, they also thought they saw a crack in the inter tank, in the main core stage. They were able to successfully fix all three of those issues.

But, in the end, it was the fourth problem, an engine with engine number three, as you guys have been talking about, that they have simply not been able to reconcile.

And, yes, there are still about two more hours left in this launch window, but they simply just don't think that they're going to have enough time to fix it. And so, right now, they are still kind of keeping the rocket in its current configuration because they want to trouble shoot this problem and figure out what exactly is going on.

We still don't know exactly how severe the problem is. Is this something that they can fix on the launch pad? Do they have to roll it back to the vertical assembly building? That would be a very long delay. Or if it's a quick fix, you know, you could see a second launch attempt on Friday, or the third attempt would be on Monday. But it's just too soon to say at this point when NASA officials are going to give this another go.

We do expect a briefing at some point this afternoon where NASA officials are going to explain what they think went wrong and when they think they can try again.

But this is exactly what happens on a first test flight. They have never gotten this far in the countdown. During the tests, the wet dress rehearsals, as they called them, they ran into similar issues with a hydrogen leak and they were able to successfully push past that point. So, in a way, today is a bit of a success in that they got even farther than they had before. They were also able to stop this before there was a serious problem on the launch pad. And, you know, perhaps a loss of the entire multibillion dollar rocket. That would be a worse-case scenario.

But, certainly, a bit disappointing for everybody that came here to see it today. You know, you've got tons of people, between 100,000 and 200,000 folks who came out here to see the launch of the most powerful rocket ever built. The vice president, Kamala Harris, wanted to be here to see it as well.

So, you know, these things happen. But we wait to see when we're going to get another attempt off the launch pad. But, for now, the launch is scrubbed.

Brianna. John.

KEILAR: Yes, the launch is scrubbed.

All right, Kristin Fisher, thank you so much.

Launch is scrubbed. And it's so interesting to hear, Kristin, ticking through the different problems they have but it really came down to this engine situation.

Michelle, tell us a little bit about these engines that are stuck to this rocket and why this can be troubling.

MICHELE THALLER, NASA ASTROPHYSICIST: They're really fascinating engines because these engines have actually been in space before. You know, these are engines that were flown on the space shuttle. So this particular type of engine has lots and lots of experience in space. NASA knows every little square inch and exactly how they work. So I trust their judgment that something wasn't quite right today. These engines have worked in the past. They've all flown in space before. So, you know, the best thing to do right now is caution. As they said, this is a test flight. The very first time they've configured this entire rocket, gotten it this close to launch. So, to some degree, it's a success, but, obviously, a disappointment that we didn't see lift-off.

KEILAR: It's an incremental success, as we heard Kristin saying. They've sort of been moving towards getting closer to launch. And here they've gotten the closest, but no dice.

HAKEEM OLUSEYI, ASTROPHYSICIST: Yes, no dice. But this is the dice, right? This is how it goes. And you do it step by step. You work out the kinks. And that's what they're doing, they're working out the kinks. And I think that Dr. Kaku is absolutely correct, this is a win because you didn't attempt a launch under circumstances where it should never happen.

So, this is par for the course. This is the way it goes.

So, you know, we have events like this, everybody gets their expectations up, right? But, you know, if you're in the game, you know that, look, it's 50-50 every time.

KEILAR: Because -- I think we've also been conditioned by some of the smaller launches in private industry as well.

OLUSEYI: Yes.

KEILAR: This is a different beast. OK, this is 42-day mission. A practice mission of something they want to do with actual astronauts.

THALLER: Well, that's right. And, in fact, there are three mannequins up there, what we call phantoms, because -- the reason we call them phantoms, these are used in medical research to actually study how much radiation a human body is going to absorb. And it's amazing the international collaboration.

[08:45:01]

So, one of the phantoms is managed by the Israeli space agency, one by the German space agency, and then the one that NASA has testing our new survival suit is actually named Moonikin Campos. And that's in honor of Arturo Campos, who was one of the lead engineers that actually solved the Apollo 13 problem.

So, right now there's no people up there waiting but there are these amazingly complex mannequins. And everything about this was a test. How much radiation will they get? What will the heat shield be like? But we're going to be hotter and faster into earth than we ever have before during reentry. So, everything about this mission is pushing the limits. And so, of course, we've got to sort of now stand down and make sure everything's working before we go.

KEILAR: All right, Moonikin will wait for another day, but hopefully not to far from now.

If you guys can stand by for me as we are awaiting -- certainly what we know now certainly that this has been scrubbed, but our special coverage is continuing, Berman.

BERMAN: That's right. Again, our special live coverage of the scrubbing of today's moon rocket launch continues.

Plus, marijuana legalization is on the ballot in a number of states as new data shows it's more popular than ever.

Plus, a Mickey Mantle card goes for $12.6 million. Where does it rank among other cards? Harry Enten here with the numbers. (COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[08:50:20]

BERMAN: That is a 1952 mint condition Mickey Mantle card. It just sold for a record $12.6 million. The sale makes the card the most expensive sports memorabilia in the world.

Here now, CNN senior data reporter, switch-hitting hall of famer himself -

HARRY ENTEN, CNN SENIOR DATA REPORTER: That's right.

BERMAN: Harry Enten.

This card, pretty expensive. Much more expensive than the previous recordholder.

ENTEN: Oh, my goodness gracious, man alive, I wish I saved those cards that I bought when I was a kid. Maybe. I don't think I'd get up to this level. But maybe I wouldn't have to always be working every single day.

Take a look here, top selling sports card, Mickey Mantle, Topps 1952, $12.6 million. The next closest was Honus Wagner, T206 at $7.3 million. And you'll notice, the years that these are sold, look at that, they're all basically within the last year.

BERMAN: What's going on? Why is the now such a big deal?

ENTEN: This is just such a hot market for cards. In fact, I was talking with you beforehand. My first cousin once removed, who's only - who's less than 18 years old is already dealing in this stuff. It's just such a hot market.

BERMAN: And whoever sold this just made a ton of money off this card, yes?

ENTEN: Oh, I would think so. What an investment. So, I -- this is accounting for inflation. Accounting for inflation. It was bought for in 1991 for $109,000. Sold in 2022 for $12.6 million. If I had a time machine, folks, and could go back and buy something for $109,000 with inflation taken into account, I would have gathered all the money I possibly could and done it.

BERMAN: That's a good investment. Now, just for the kids out there who may not know this, Mickey Mantle's a pretty big deal, right?

ENTEN: Mickey Mantle, if you go back to the mid-1960s, was one of the biggest deals. You know, John and I, baseball aficionados, we, of course, know Mickey Mantle. But, take a look here. How many people knew who these celebrities were and knew what they did back in 1963- 1964? Mickey Mantle, 86 percent of folks in America, of all Americans, knew who he was and what he did. That was more than former Vice President Richard Nixon, more than the French President Charles de Gaulle. It was basically only Elizabeth Taylor and, of course, talking about going into space, John Glenn at 89 percent.

BERMAN: So, he's a big deal. You're saying I'm not going to be able to get as much for my 1978 Rick Monday or my 1977 Randy Jones.

ENTEN: Expect -- you definitely won't, especially Rick Monday in Montreal, you will not get the amount.

BERMAN: All right, You've got some other numbers that are fascinating, Harry, on a totally different subject, which is the rising use of marijuana.

ENTEN: Yes. So, look, do you smoke or have you ever tried marijuana? Currently, look at this, 16 percent say they currently use it. That's an all-time high. The ever use is also interesting because, in October of 1969, it was just 4 percent. Look at where it is now, nearly half the country at 48 percent.

BERMAN: And what's really fascinating about this, is if you compare marijuana use to tobacco cigarette use.

ENTEN: Yes, the exact opposite trend. Look at this, all-time low, just 11 percent now. Back in '69, it was nearly half the population at 40 percent. So, cigarette smoking, way down. Marijuana smoking, way up.

BERMAN: Harry Enten, thank you very much. I will leave you with a Rick Monday card for your efforts here.

ENTEN: I'm going to, you know, save this and maybe take a nice photograph of it and send it to my friends back home.

BERMAN: All right, fantastic.

Two pilots suspended after a fight inside the cockpit mid-flight.

KEILAR: And it is official, the Artemis 1 rocket launch has been scrubbed. We are expecting NASA to speak very soon on the engine issue.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[08:58:10]

KEILAR: Air France suspending two pilots who had a physical altercation in the cockpit during a flight.

CNN's Scott McLean is live for us in London.

Scott, what happened here?

SCOTT MCLEAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Brianna, look, this happened back in June. This was a flight from Geneva, Switzerland, to Paris. Flight time, a little bit over an hour. And we know that there was some kind of a disagreement between the pilots in the cockpit, which actually escalated into a physical altercation. Now, it's not clear what kind of physical altercation, but the way that the airline described it in a written statement to us made it seem rather benign, saying that the pilots exchanged inappropriate gestures. But they also clarified that this was not pilots giving each other the finger or something like that. This actually was something that turned physical. Now, they say that the disagreement was resolved, the flight continued on as normal and there was no risk to safety or anything like that. Both of the pilots, though, have been suspended while they investigate.

And this is not the first time that Air France is dealing with a safety mishap in the headlines. Just last week the agency in France, which investigates air safety incidents, released a report about a flight back in December 2020 where there was a fuel leak in one of the engines. And that report said that the protocols dictated that that engine should have been shut down but the pilots didn't actually do that. And that, the report says, created a pretty substantial fire hazard.

And there are other incidents that have been detailed in this report, which suggests that pilots have been pretty laissez-faire in the past when it comes to safety issues. And this is the quote, and they say that that suggest that there is a concern culture among some Air France crews which encourages a propensity to underestimates the extent to which strict compliance with procedures contributes to safety and that Air France should put compliance with procedures back in the center of the company's safety culture.

[09:00:02]

Of course, it also gives us a little bit of context. And that is that this airline flies literally thousands of routes every single day. And so the number of crews, the number of flights that are actually investigated for any kind of safety concerns is very small.

John. Brianna.

KEILAR: Scott, thank you for that.

BERMAN: All right, CNN's coverage of the scrubbed Artemis 1 moon rocket launch continues right now.