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>> Maria Varmazis: Gather around, little ones. Let me tell you a bit about the first American in space. Alan Shepherd was born in Derry, New Hampshire, a little bit just up the road from where I am in Massachusetts. He was the second human to go into space and was the fifth and oldest man to walk the moon during the Apollo 14 mission. He was famously quoted as saying, "It's a very sobering feeling to be up in space and realize that one's safety factor was determined by the lowest bidder on a government contract." Classic, and he is the namesake for Blue Origins suborbital vehicle, which returned to space today.
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Today is December 19, 2023. I'm Maria Varmazis, and this is T-Minus.
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Blue Origins New Shepherd returns to flight. Axiom to launch a commercial orbital data center. UNOOSA announces a space bridge for global dialog, and our guest today is Kirsten Hibbard from the Challenger Learning Center in Maine. Stay with us to hear more about their incredible STEM Outreach Program.
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And now, onto today's intelligence briefing. Blue Origins New Shepherd has resumed flight missions after a 15-month hiatus. The company's suborbital vehicle lifted off from Van Horn in west Texas this morning, taking scientific payloads and 38,000 postcards for the educational group Club for The Future to the Karman line and back to the high desert. New Shepherd experienced an anomaly in September 2022, which saw the booster explode at max q. We all watched the livestream in anticipation today as the rocket hit max q and then MECO (main engine cut off) followed by separation, sending the capsule into low-Earth orbit before it returned to terra firma under parachutes. The real star of the show was the booster that had its ninth flight and successfully landed itself for reuse in the future. It honestly looked a bit like an AI-simulated video as the engine booster ignited its reverse thrust and landed effortlessly. The livestream finished with a plea for people to apply to their hundreds of job postings and a message that they will resume their human spaceflight program soon. Congrats to Team Blue. Axiom Space has announced A partnership with Kepler Communications U.S. and Skyloom Global to integrate and demonstrate high data rate optical intersatellite links, known as OISLs, on the first module of Axiom Space's commercial space station. Also included in the latest announcement from Axiom is the news that the team is building the world's first scalable cloud technology-enabled commercial orbital data center to be hosted on Axiom's station. Axiom says the first tranche of orbital data center capability will support the transformation of low-Earth orbit into a global space marketplace by maturing the necessary technologies and infrastructure for large-scale and secure space-based data processing. One of the key features of the orbital data center is what they're calling Earth independence, the ability to provide in-space cloud services without the need to connect back to terrestrial cloud infrastructure. The center will help operationalize data processing and management applications for Axiom Space's customers while setting the stage for Lunar and Mars-use cases where on-premises data processing will be required to support exploration and economic development beyond Earth's orbit. The effort with Kepler and Skyloom will enable the demonstration of OISLs to allow for data to be transmitted to and from the orbital data center via the Kepler and Skyroom relay constellations. The OISLs will allow for up to 10 gigabits per second data throughput and meet the Space Development Agency interoperability standards. In preparation for the data center deployment, Axiom Space plans to install a smaller data processing prototype aboard the International Space Station to conduct testing and demonstrate initial capabilities. The prototype is planned for launch in 2024 and will test applications in artificial intelligence and machine learning, data fusion, and space cybersecurity. Astrobotic says their Peregrine lunar lander has successfully completed all integration milestones and was mated with United Launch Alliance's Vulcan rocket payload adapter on November 16, 2023. After a three-week campaign to fuel and complete final checkouts, Astrobotic says the Peregrine spacecraft is ready to launch on its mission to the moon, which is scheduled for January 8, 2024 -- not long now. Ball Aerospace has been selected to conduct a phase-A study for NASA's proposed extreme ultraviolet Coronal Mass Ejection and Coronal Connectivity Observatory, also known as ECCO, a mission that would provide astronomers with a better understanding of the sun's coronal structure and its relationship with solar wind and eruptive events. The proposed mission would use a wide-field extreme ultraviolet imager called ECCO-I and a pair of imaging EUV spectrographs called ECCO-S to provide the first continuous high-contrast observations of the middle corona, which is the outermost layer of the sun's atmosphere. While there is instrumentation in place to observe the inner and outer corona, the middle corona, and how eruptive phenomena shape within it, remain largely a mystery for researchers. In addition to ECCO, Ball Aerospace was also selected to conduct a concept study for NASA's Chromospheric Magnetism Explorer mission called CMEX, which seeks to determine the influence of the sun's magnetic field on eruption events. Both the ECCO and CMEX studies are part of NASA's Small Explorers Program, and if NASA chooses to pursue either project after the studies, they would join the administration's Heliophysics Mission Fleet. Firefly Aerospace has announced its Alpha FLTA004, a.k.a. Fly the Lightning mission, is prepared to launch no earlier than December 20th, with backup dates through December 22nd depending on local weather. The daily 20-minute launch window will open at 9:18 PST. The mission will deploy an electronically steered antenna payload developed by Lockheed Martin to develop rapid delivery of on-orbit capabilities for U.S. war fighters. As a secondary objective, the mission team will further demonstrate responsive space capabilities by tracking and improving the total working hours required from payload receival to launch readiness compared to Alpha FLTA003, the record-breaking VICTUS NOX mission. The United Nations Office for Outer Space Affairs has launched the UNOOSA space bridge. And no, we're not talking about the Bifrost Bridge in the movie Thor or anything like a space elevator. No, the UNOOSA space bridge aims to promote global dialogue to enable local action. UNOOSA says this will be achieved through targeted exchanges that enhance international expertise and break down silos. The bridge, again, metaphorical bridge, will aim to bring relevant stakeholders together to ask the right questions and identify solutions that empower policymakers to advance space sustainability and leverage space for the sustainable development goals. UNSOOSA will launch a consultation over the coming months to identify specific topics for discussion in 2024. Last week, we reported on the doom and gloom of the European Space Agency's launch program, with issues plaguing both the Vega rocket and Ariane 6. But as always with setbacks in space, the only way is up. Teams from Ariane Group, the French Space Agency, and the European Space Agency successfully carried out another launch sequence of Ariane 6 on its launchpad at Europe's spaceport, French Guiana, for the combined test campaign. The combined test loading tested a launch countdown aimed to qualify the launch system in degraded conditions to ensure its robustness and prepare for operations. According to ESA, the rehearsal was very well-executed, and the countdown ran exactly as planned. It's always nice to report on success. The US Office of Space Commerce and India's Department of Space held the first meeting of the Commercial Space Working Group under the US India Civil Space Joint Working Group, sharing updates on commercial space governance and scoping joint priorities for cooperation in 2024. This effort was called for in early 2023 and reiterated by President Biden and Prime Minister Modi during their meetings in June and September. And you know, it's been just a few days since China launched its mysterious space plane back into Orbit, and already, it has amateur spacecraft trackers around the world watching its every move and spotting some strange happenings. According to one tracker, the space plane has released six objects into Earth orbit, some appearing to be emitting signals reminiscent of those emitted by objects that China's space plane released on previous missions. We will probably never know what the mission profile is, but it's certainly keeping sky watchers entertained as they speculate what the robotic spacecraft will do next.
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And that concludes our briefing for today. You'll always find links to further reading on all the stories that we've mentioned, and we'd like to add a few pieces in there for you to enjoy in addition. And today, we've included an announcement from Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Lab in recognition for the Parker Solar probe team and the other is a Bloomberg piece on Amazon's project, Kuiper. They can be found in the show notes and. at space.n2k.com. Hey, T-Minus crew, if you're just joining us, be sure to follow T-Minus Space daily in your favorite podcast app. And also, if you could do us a favor, share this intel with your friends and coworkers. Now here's a little challenge for you as we all start wrapping up before the end of 2023. By Friday, please show three friends or coworkers this podcast. A growing audience is the most important thing for us, and we would love your help as part of the T-Minus crew. And as a side note, we're not going to be publishing our usual daily shows over the holiday week. So look out for our radio programs that feature interviews from throughout the year, and let us know if you want to hear more.
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Our guest today is Kirsten Hibbard from the Challenger Learning Center in Maine, and I started by asking Kirsten to tell us more about the Challenger Learning Center and their mission.
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>> Kristen Hibbard: Yeah, so Challenger Center Headquarters is in DC, but you know, we always call them kind of HQ or "the mothership." They really help. Really, help centers, there are 35 centers all over the U.S. in lots and lots of different states there. There are a couple with two in one state, but ours, for example, we're kind of located centrally in Maine. And so, we serve all of Maine, literally all 16 counties of Maine, because the goal of Challenger Center, really, is to create STEM-inspiring opportunities. So we're located in different types of situations. So some centers are part of college campuses. Some are part of science museums. We're a standalone center. You know, but it really is unique to different communities across the U.S.
>> Maria Varmazis: What is their day like? How do you sort of get that sparkle to happen of like connection?
>> Kristen Hibbard: Yeah. A really wonderful connection is we work really closely with the educators before the students even get here. Sometimes students will fill out a job application. So like middle schoolers have not filled out a job application. But it gets them thinking about, okay, this is the skillset I have or things I would need. And then, they actually rank. These are jobs I think I want to try. And that educator, he or she, is the key, because they will push a student and say you should try it. You should try robotics. You should try it. Or did you know there's a job about space weather? You know? Or, man, let's do navigation, engineering, a medical team. And so, a student then, once they come in, they've been assigned to a job team in Mission Control or as an astronaut and they -- we welcome them. They have a crew manifest, and then, they even get a job badge, like a real job badge you'd scan to enter your job. And from that point on, they're that STEM professional. In fact, we call them by their job title, not by their name. So they are truly that job title. We go over their mission objectives, and say, you know, as a navigator today, these are your responsibilities. Or as a med team or as the aero-engineering team, and they really, it's like --
>> Maria Varmazis: Kind of sweaty.
>> Kristen Hibbard: I'm a little nervous. Well, a middle schooler --
>> Maria Varmazis: Oh, my God.
>> Kristen Hibbard: -- will be like you trust me? And we're like, it's basically handing the keys to the car and saying you're going to drive today, but I have the confidence that you can do this. You're going to do it well, and we're going to have a great mission today.
>> Maria Varmazis: I believe you when you say that. I totally -- I am like, yes, I am. So I'm very glad that you do this for a living. So I'm like, I'm with you. I'm ready to do this to do this now.
>> Kristen Hibbard: It's an intense mission. It's for two, two-and-a-half hours. So in that mission, they're really from top to bottom going through their mission objectives, and it really is about, you know, those science objectives of while we're on the mission, we want to gain this knowledge, do these experiments, so we can learn and gain knowledge about living off Earth and how we can go deeper into space. But you know, Maria, halfway through we -- the software, we always make it so something goes not as planned, as in true life. So they have to do that classic risk assessment. You know we want to get the science, these science projects done, but want to keep the crew safe, and they have to decide as a team. We don't let their educators, our staff. They get to decide, how are we going to move forward with this mission? And so, man, it's great; it's intense. It's an intense two/two-and-a-half hours, but at the end, wow. How powerful when they have had control and have had a great mission. Like man, they own that success. And there are jobs like communication. You know, we also say that, you know, you don't have to be an astronaut. There's actually very few astronauts. There's all these jobs, 40,000 jobs just at NASA, you know, that are supporting these missions. We need communication specialists. We need reporters to tell these stories. So it's for those students that don't think STEM is their space, it's even saying, but did you like this? There is a place for you here. You know, and to if this brought you joy, you can share that and be a part of it. So yeah, oh, breaking down all those barriers.
>> Maria Varmazis: That is so important, and I love hearing you say that because that is, as I've said many times, I didn't need much convincing. I was not the kid who needed to be told, hey, space is for you. I was like, I want to go. Just send me. But it's, for many other people who are, you know, for kids who are going I don't even know if science is for me. I don't even know if like -- what does this mean for me? Like I don't see a path. I don't see -- I don't have any interest and getting., aha. This is actually something cool that maybe is attainable, like not knowing that there's a way in is life changing. It's really life changing, and I know that for your center, especially in Maine, like you guys have a specific mission for sort of raising people up, specifically in Maine, and sort of encouraging people to go more into higher education. Can you talk a little bit about that?
>> Kristen Hibbard: Yeah. So while we, you know, we focus on the mission and mission objectives, actually, during mid mission and the post mission, you know, it's really talking about STEM careers. And this is where we really highlight even local companies. You know, it's part of the STEM pipeline of saying you can live and work in Maine, and there are these colleges and universities right here in Maine, some right down the road, where you can actually get this degree. You know, but you really want to start thinking about a two, four-year degree, extended degrees, and they can be all different pathways. And, you know, and we highlight some of those. An easy one for us is we have a wonderful Maine astronaut, you know, and a retired Maine astronaut that had very different professional journeys, and it was not always a yes. You know, multiple applications, even to become an astronaut. So saying that if the attitude is there, if the work is there, and if you want to be a part of this, you can. You know, and then, just here are the ways to connect those dots. But saying that with middle schoolers, not starting in high school; really saying all right, middle schoolers, let's talk about this now and think about this now for you. And kind of a newer term that, you know, we have is that STEM self-efficacy. It's an individual belief, right, of positive experience, you know, so that that person, you know, has control over their success in STEM, that they can do it. That I could do this in STEM. Maybe I don't want to, but I had a great experience. So I could, you know? And a neat thing, too, about our state is we've been growing leaps and bounds about reaching rural students. I mean, we have schools that their whole sixth grade is 15 students. It's 15. In fact, when we connected with a one-room schoolhouse and Whiting, Maine, there's --
>> Maria Varmazis: Oh, bless it.
>> Kristen Hibbard: So there are two classrooms in their whole school. One of them is for middle school, sixth through eighth grade, very small, 10 students or less. But the neat thing is, if they can't come to us for geographic barriers, we actually are reaching them with virtual missions. So same concept from their own classroom, their one-to-one devices. Their mission controllers were at the front of the room in those smart boards and blue suits helping control the software but same idea. They have a positive experience about a Mars mission or moon mission talking about STEM careers, even in a rural setting. Because to us, whether you're a school of 15 students or 300, we want to connect with students and really kind of create equity with STEM experiences.
>> Maria Varmazis: You've got to have so many stories of, like, kids who walked in there going, oh, I don't want to be an astronaut. So why am I here? And then walked out going I didn't even know I could do X, or you know? You must have so many. Like any you want to share, because I'm so curious?
>> Kristen Hibbard: Well, and it -- it's neat, too. So traditionally, it's math or science teachers that com. But sometimes, you know, any teacher really is helping create this experience, and it's small connections to large connections. So I always like to peek in and pop in at missions. And so, there was a navigation station, right? Classic, you know, trying to find the exact coordinates for this comet, and the student -- and we tell the teachers, you know, just you're an observer, right? Let the students do this. This student, and the teacher was kind of keeping an eye to make sure he's behaved, but he looks up and goes. "I'm using XY coordinates. We just did this in class. I'm using this here. This is real life." And the teacher's like, yes.
>> Maria Varmazis: Yes.
>> Kristen Hibbard: Yeah, but, and so, of course, all those great things, you know? Oh yes, this is applicable to life. You know? But he was like, I learned this, and I can do this here. Oh yeah, and then, once I do this, then I'm in charge of throttle and touchdown. You know? So then, it's like oh, this is even more fun, right? And I knew that small part to do this job. Maybe I could do this job in the future. I mean, powerful, powerful.
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>> Maria Varmazis: Be sure to join us this Saturday, December 23rd, for our Deep Space episode featuring my full chat with Kirsten about the Challenger Learning Center in Maine and how we, as space professionals, can do more to engage with students and get them interested in STEM careers.
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We'll be right back.
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Welcome back. All right, hands up. Who's guilty of watching back-to-back videos of animals in silly and cute situations. Everybody, right, everybody. Okay. Well, if your preference tends to be more towards the feline variety, then this story is especially for you. We talked about the laser communication beaming experiment that NASA completed recently from the Psyche vehicle nearly 19,000,000 miles away. But we didn't know at the time that the communication was actually a cat video. Meow? Yep. Okay, NASA's Deep Space Optical Communications experiment beamed an ultra-high-definition streaming video on December 11th of an orange cat named Taters. The demo transmitted the 15-second test video via a cutting-edge instrument called a flight laser transceiver of a playful orange cat chasing, of all things, the elusive red dot from a laser pointer as it moves across the couch. The video signal took 101 seconds to reach Earth and was sent at the system's maximum bit rate of 267 megabits per second. The instrument beamed an encoded near-infrared laser to the Hale telescope at Caltech's Palomar Observatory in San Diego County, California, where it was downloaded. Each frame from the looping video was then sent live to NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California, where the video was played in real time. Yep, engineers at NASA were caught watching cat videos on the job, and this time, they were being paid for it. Living the dream guys, living the dream.
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That's it for T-Minus for December 19, 2023. For additional resources from today's report, check out our show notes at space.n2k.com. We're privileged that N2K and podcasts like T-Minus are part of the daily routine of many of the most influential leaders and operators in the public and private sector, from the Fortune 500 to many of the world's preeminent intelligence and law enforcement agencies. This episode was produced by Alice Carruth. Mixing by Elliott Peltzman and Trey Hester, with original music and sound design by Elliott Peltzman. Our executive producer is Jen Iben. Our VP is Brandon Karpf, and I'm Maria Varmazis. Thanks for listening. We'll see you tomorrow.
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