Watch Video: NASA “Flying Saucer” LDSD Vehicle to Make Test Flight

This week NASA hopes to finally conduct a test flight of thier Low-Density Supersonic Decelerator (LDSD), or as the media refers to it, their “Flying Saucer” test spacecraft.

NASA TV will provide live coverage allowing viewers to watch the LDSD “flying saucer” online via a live video stream. We are providing the NASA TV video stream below for our readers to watch the test flight and related activities.

Watch the NASA “Flying Saucer” LDSD test flight live streaming online video below:



The LDSD is part of the space agency’s ambitious new robotic missions to Mars which will ultimate pave the way for complex human science expeditions to come to the red planet.

Recent missions, and their spacecraft landers which used parachutes and airbags, have not been nearly as heavy as those which will ultimately carry humans on a mission to Mars.

In order to land these future expeditions safely, with all of their cargo, a new technology for decelerating from the high speed of atmospheric entry to the final stages of landing on Mars needs to be developed, which is where the Low-Density Supersonic Decelerator comes in.

With the LDSD NASA hopes to use atmospheric drag as a solution, saving rocket engines and fuel for final maneuvers and landing procedures. Led by NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, the agency will conduct full-scale, stratospheric tests of these breakthrough technologies high above Earth.

So far the test flights have been postponed due to weather conditions. The next attempt will take place on Wednesday June 11, and then again on the 14th if necessary.

According to NASA, “wind conditions have been the prevailing factor in the launch delays ­ they have to be just the right speed and direction in order to launch the balloon that carries the LDSD test vehicle.”

To get the latest update on the progress of the launch and test flight of the LDSD flying saucer, NASA has an update page online at: http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/tdm/ldsd/index.html, as well as a Twitter feed available via @NASAJPL and #LDSD.