Season 5 is a modded single-player game in Science mode, and one goal of the season is that no kerbal dies. This video opens on Year 2, Day 84 with 469.5 science, and a new craft heads for the science module BSSScience1 with the pilot Philford Kerman aboard. The aim is to dock with it, then hook up to the hub later. The docking finally works, but nobody can climb through, so Philford ends up crossing over on a spacewalk. The video ends with Philford aboard BSSScience1 and the empty craft left drifting nearby.
Not an adapter, an extension
The video opens on a Mission Summary for BSSAdapter1: one crewmember recovered, Philford Kerman, "Ready for next assignment." In the VAB the ship gets a new name, BSSExtension1. The commentary explains it: an adapter would change one connector to another, and this ship keeps the same connections, "so it's an extension not an adapter."
The launch goes up cleanly with Philford's portrait in the corner. The plan this time is to dock "backwards," engines toward the target, which "might prove to add new challenges." No food was packed for Philford, and the commentary counts 14 days: "we need to make sure we dock by then."
Dropping the outer engines
A couple of maneuver nodes bring the closest approach down to "point 9 kilometers. Perfect." After that burn the outer engine stacks are meant to come off, and staging doesn't do what was expected. "What did I just do?" They get decoupled by hand instead and drift slowly away. "Please don't bump my ship. Goodbye."
The rest is the routine from the last few videos: point at the target, burn a little, flip retrograde to kill the speed, repeat. The thrusters get cut to 50 percent for finer control. BSSScience1 has no RCS, so it has to turn itself with plain SAS. "It might go infinitely slow."
Two ports that won't connect
The lineup looks nearly perfect, and still the ships keep "bouncing off each other." "It says different sizes cannot connect, which makes sense, but I don't think they're different sizes." The working guess is that the flexible port and a regular Clamp-O-Tron can't join. A look at the part window, the Flex-O-Clamp-O-Tron Docking Port, shows a deploy option on the top port and none on the bottom one. While testing, the bottom port gets thrown away: "It's gone. Okay, we just got rid of it."
With the top port deployed, the next approach holds. "Yes! Okay, perfect."
A hatch that stays shut
The joined ship is one craft now, but Transfer Crew won't move anyone through. "Hatch status closed," the commentary reads, and the hatch won't open. A line read out on the recording says a forum "suggests it may be incompatible with a mod." The commentary's verdict: "I'm gonna do regular docking ports," and a viewer suggests testing things on the ground first.
BSSExtension1 undocks to head home, and then the heat shield comes up. It doesn't have one. "I don't want to test that." The plan changes: get close to BSSScience1 again and have Philford spacewalk across.
Philford crosses over
![A command pod at the end of the dark BSSScience1 station glowing green, with on-screen prompts reading [Space]: Let go and [B]: Board, solar panels at the left edge](https://www.basketmc.com/images/6850/conversions/a-command-pod-at-the-end-of-the-dark-bssscience1-station-glo-c11b8c88-content-image.webp)
Philford climbs out and floats across with RCS on. The first try at boarding gets "Cannot board a full module." After some shuffling with Transfer Crew, Philford ends up inside, and the commentary is pleased. "Look at this, we can EVA, fly around, spacewalk or whatever it is, and we can dock if the ports are compatible."
Where it ends
The empty BSSExtension1 has no remote control, so BSSScience1 burns prograde to open some distance between them. The Life Support Status window lists seven kerbals on BSSScience1: Jebediah, Bill, Philford, Leatrey, Bob, Ludlie and Valentina Kerman. Ludwell and Lodlorf Kerman are together on "BSSHub1 Ship." The commentary sums it up: flexible docking "is not really all that good, unless you're doing rovers." The video stops with BSSScience1 in orbit, BSSExtension1 drifting nearby, and the hub still not connected.