>> Maria Varmazis: Having the busiest spaceport in the world close to one of the busiest amusement parks in the world, and subsequently, one of the busiest airports in the world is to put it mildly, kind of a complicated situation when it comes to air traffic and space launch traffic. So with the example of Cape Canaveral and Orlando in Florida in mind, people who are building out spaceports throughout the world are trying to put them far, far away from populated areas and busy airports, but even some of the most remote places in the world can still be busy in their own way. Things get tricky when we're talking about airspace disruption, and that's something that SaxaVord Spaceport in the remote reaches of northern Scotland may have to deal with sooner rather than later.
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Today is June sixth, 2023. I'm Maria Varmazis, and this is T-Minus.
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Iceland asks SaxaVord to maybe tap the brakes. Excitement guaranteed for the space economy in Washington state. ISRO sets a launch date for Chandrayaan 3, and former NASA executive Tom Whitmeyer is joining Booz Allen as an executive advisor. We've got the story and an exclusive interview with Tom in today's show. He speaks with T-Minus speaker Alice Carruth on his career at NASA and how he'll be using that experience at Booz Allen. You don't want to miss it.
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And now, let's take a look at today's intel briefing. Increasing numbers of launches to space presents exciting opportunities, but it also causes some logistical problems on the ground. One of them is simply having enough places for launches to happen. Do we have enough spaceports in enough places to support the increasing pace of launches? Well, as the world rushes to build out spaceport capacity, there are growing concerns about how space launches could impact commercial airline traffic and increase pollution, and that issue is front and center in northern Scotland with SaxaVord Spaceport, which is currently under construction. The primary concern about airspace disruption due to space traffic at SaxaVord comes from both the Icelandic Transport Authority and from an unnamed aviation stakeholder at Isavia, which is Iceland's air traffic control company. Now, both parties are concerned about environmental and financial hardships. Now, to set the scene, here, there are 30 to 50 space flights a year planned at SaxaVord, which is situated at the most northerly point in the UK in Shetland, Scotland. Now, that northerly vantage point puts it very close to Iceland, and Isavia has said that with over a quarter of all north Atlantic air traffic crossing through Icelandic airspace at some point, once SaxaVord is up and running, up to 76 transatlantic flights a day would have to be rerouted when a space launch is scheduled. So I should say, that number has been disputed. Now, regardless, the reroutes will mean significantly less money for Isavia, which the company says it can't afford to lose, and the company also notes that both it and the Icelandic Transport Authority are concerned about an increase in flight time for aircraft operators, which would mean more fuel burned and more carbon emissions in the atmosphere. Isavia said quote, "This matter is of great concern to us and viewed with the utmost severity" and hopes to work with SaxaVord to mitigate impacts. One of its proposals it has is to actually limit launches to nighttime, and for its part, SaxaVord says it can't comment on this particular issue, but the build out continues a pace and pending a license from the UK Civil Aviation Authority in August, SaxaVord's first satellite launch to space might happen as early as next year. We'll keep an eye on this story for you. Now, let's switch gears to some more positive news on the space development front, shall we? Yesterday, NASA administrator Bill Nelson paid a visit to the US state of Washington for the Washington State Space Summit, which was held at Blue Origin Headquarters. And Blue Origin just won a recent NASA contract, as you might remember, to build the Blue Moon, which will be a lunar landing vehicle for the Artemis 5 mission, and that's just one of the many, many reasons the spotlight is on commercial space development in Washington state and why VIPs - including space CEOs, NASA's Nelson, and US Senator Maria Cantwell - were all in attendance at the summit. Now, this comes to no surprise, I'm sure, to any of our listeners who live or work in that area, but if you didn't know, Washington state is one of the central hubs of the commercial space industry. The Puget Sound Regional Council said that commercial space in Washington state has doubled since 2018 and generated 4.6 billion US dollars and employed 13,100 people in the state in 2021 alone. The talent pool and manufacturing base for aerospace in Washington is also why Senator Cantwell says she's working to establish a Manufacturing USA Institute there, which would specifically help develop research into composites and thermoplastics, which would absolutely be beneficial to the space economy. And speaking of the space economy, Tom Whitmeyer, a former NASA senior executive, has joined consulting firm Booz Allen Hamilton as an executive advisor to support its space business. In his new role, Whitmeyer will guide Booz Allen's strategic plans for supporting NASA, NOAH, and the Space Force. Whitmeyer's decades of experience managing large scale space flight programs include years leading the Artemis 1 mission. And tune in for more about that in our interview today, when he speaks with T-Minus producer Alice Carruth who got to sit down with Tom to discuss his lessons learned from a distinguished career as an executive at NASA, and what he looks forward to most about joining Booz Allen as executive advisor. Tune into that interview later in our program today. And now, some news from India and ISRO, now. The organization announced that its latest lunar lander - say that three times fast, latest lunar lander - Chandrayaan 3 is now integrated with its launch vehicle Mark 3, the LVM 3. The goal for Chandrayaan 3, India's third lunar mission, is to safely soft land on the moon and explore. That is not an easy task. Now, ISRO announced today that the launch date for this mission is July fourteenth, 2023, at 2:35 PM IST from SDSC Sriharikota. So until that day, may we recommend some light reading to pass the time. Now, there's a great article on Ars Technica we'll link for you in our show notes about India as a growing space power and its relationship with NASA, especially now that India has signed onto the Artemis accords. So we've got a link for you in our show notes at space.n2k.com. Space launch firm Astra is spinning off its spacecraft engine business into a wholly owned subsidiary, Astra Spacecraft Engines Incorporated, according to its corporate records. The restructuring is intended to ease hiring and financing. Now, US launch firms operate under very strict export control rules known as International Traffic and Arms Regulations, or ITAR, making hiring non-US talent a significant challenge. Subsidiary businesses fall under less stringent export administration regulations called EAR, simplifying international hiring. So in addition to making hiring a bit easier, this move also allows Astra to use this subsidiary as collateral for loans to bolster its launch business. And given Astra's depleting cash reserves, this flexibility could prove crucial to sustain operations. Astra's reserves are currently about half of their reserves from the first quarter of 2023. UK and EU negotiators have drafted a deal for UK's reentry into the 95.5-billion-euro Horizon Europe research program and the Copernicus Earth Observation Program. Talks restarted in March after a two-year hiatus. Payment of backdated participation fees were dismissed, and UK's final contribution was negotiated on Tuesday, and UK's Prime Minister Rishi Sunak will decide on the deal ahead of meeting with European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen. If approved, the UK's reentry is expected in January 2024. The Polish Space Agency has completed the acceptance phase for three observatories in Australia, Chile, and South Africa to monitor satellites and space debris. At a total ticket price of 7.6 million euros and co-financed by the European Commission and Poland, the observatories house high-speed telescopes capable of spotting small objects in various orbital zones. Two additional observatories in Utah and Hawaii are also planned to enable global coverage. The ITU, or the International Telecommunication Union has approved Rivada's plan to launch 600 satellites by 2028, supporting the creation of its Outer Net, a private global network for secure communications. With contracts for manufacturing and launch in place, the next steps are the deployment of 144 satellites and spares by June 2026, and another batch by September 2026. And some more news out of Australia's space sector, today. There's a new space consortium there called iLauNCH, or Innovative Launch Automation Novel Materials Communications and Hypersonics trailblazer. The goal of this new $180 million program is to train new generations of space professionals and propel Australian space research forward and translate it into practical advancements in the space economy. The new consortium is based at the University of Southern Queensland in partnership with the Australian National University, the University of South Australia and over 20 space industry partners. Vice Chancellor Professor Geraldine McKenzie of the University of Southern Queensland said this new program to speed up development in Australia's space industry with the university's help, just makes a lot of sense. Here, we have critical infrastructure in space research, including the long duration hypersonic tunnel, Mount Kent Astronomical Observatory, Advanced Automated Composites Manufacturing facilities, and Rocket Solid Fuel Manufacturing lab. This is an exciting opportunity to be at the forefront of space research that has a critical role in creating new products, companies, technologies, and jobs to be a world leader in the space industry, she said. The National Geospatial Intelligence Agency issues an RFI for a data science platform, specifically seeking vendors capable of providing access to both commercial and unclassified government geospatial intelligence data. The agency's economic and security division aims to access specific datasets from a common repository. This request includes optical, radar, IR, and hyperspectral imagery, and is specifically looking for a software as a service solution with Python-based infrastructure. For those interested, if that sounds like you, we've included a link to the solicitation in the show notes at space.n2k.com. Global mapping provider Impact Observatory today announced a partnership with Planet Labs to deliver near real-time land use monitoring. The Impact Observatory's IO monitor service offers government and industry leaders access to timely, up-to-date, and categorized land use maps. This offers insights into global changes, helps identify threats, and supports decision-making across infrastructure, food systems, and resource management. And speaking of Earth observation, Hawkeye 360, a provider of space-based radio frequency monitoring, received a contract from Australia to support the work of the Pacific Islands Forum Fisheries Agency against illegal fishing in the region. They will provide data, analytics, and training to detect illicit maritime activity, including activities undetectable by automatic identification systems, or AIS. Now, this commitment aligns with the Indo-Pacific Partnership for Maritime Domain Awareness, a quad-nations initiative between the US, Australia, India, and Japan. Hawkeye 360 plans to expand its 21-satellite constellation with 2 more clusters launching in 2023 to meet the growing Indo-Pacific demand. And then happy, happy news, Jenny is back after a 2-month communications blackout due to Mars' rugged terrain, NASA has reestablished contact with the ingenuity Mars helicopter. The small drone has successfully completed 52 flights and is preparing for her fifty-third. Welcome back, Jenny. And as always, we have a bunch of stories we think you'll enjoy reading linked for you in our selected reading section of our show notes. We've mentioned a few of them throughout the show today, so be sure to check all the stories out at space.n2k.com.
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Speaking of the briefing, that is it for our intel briefing for today's show. And hey, T-minus crew, if your business is looking to grow your voice in the industry, expand the reach of your thought leadership, or recruit talent, T-Minus can help. We'd like to hear from you. Just send us an email at space.n2k.com or send us a note through our website so we can connect about building a program to meet your goals.
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Today, we have an interview with Tom Whitmeyer, executive advisor at the Booz Allen Hamilton group. He's speaking with our show producer, Alice Carruth, all about his previous extensive experience at NASA and how his experiences there shaped his views on space exploration and his career moving forward. First, though, Tom tells Alex about what got him interested in a career in space to begin with.
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>> Tom Whitmeyer: I was just young enough to actually remember watching the Apollo landings, but that's not really what inspired me to go into space, and I'm convinced it's my dad was a plumber. Two sisters and a brother, and we were always getting these oddball jobs. And interesting enough, space launch vehicles and spacecraft are really about a plumbing situation. There's a lot of propulsion, there's a lot of bells, and timing, and so I actually think it was more kind of the background I got growing up that was more into doing things like that, working with your hands, and doing things like plumbing that got me more interested in space. A lot of the folks I meet are more like me, which is they came from some small town somewhere and they just kind of got involved, and then they really decided they liked it a lot and then they kept doing it. And there's opportunities in space to do that. You don't have to be from some special background or know somebody that does this type of stuff. You just really want to - need to want to do it.
>> Alice Carruth: Can you talk me through your roles and what you did at NASA before you went and joined Booz Allen Hamilton.
>> Tom Whitmeyer: Yeah, I had 17 years as a support contractor and I did a lot of robotic missions, and it was really the last 22 years that I started working for NASA directly. And that's the thing, it's very hard to actually go work for NASA right out of school. So you usually have to go off and kind of get your feet wet, learn about the industry. In my case, I did a lot of spacecraft - some space shuttle stuff, and then I also did some Earth observing spacecraft. And when I was at NASA, I had a lot of really super cool jobs. I worked in the space shuttle program; I helped lead that program, and then I did - I was actually the deputy chief safety officer for the agency for a little while. And then over the last 8 years, I've been doing the program that I basically retired after we got through our mission, which was Artemis. The first 4 years, I was the deputy leading the entire program, and the last 4 years, I ran the entire program. And that was just fantastic. That was a great opportunity. It was a super cool mission, and I enjoyed it. It was really a lot of fun.
>> Alice Carruth: What were some of the greatest challenges that you faced executing NASA's Moon to Mars program?
>> Tom Whitmeyer: The first thing is I was working for NASA during Columbia. So anybody who was there at the time was really touched by that. I mean, if you were at NASA, you worked human space flight, you were involved in this type of activity at Columbia, you'll remember it. Right? And so for me, Columbia was really a great learning experience. I actually started helping lead the shuttle program after the accident, and the accident - there was a lot of contributing causes to the accident, a lot of them technical in nature, but one of the things we really learned was how important it was to listen to people. And so we actually instituted a whole bunch of specific things to make sure that we had different voices talking to us and that everybody had a seat at the table, and they were really able to help, you know, advise us in terms of operations. I think nowadays, most people would look at that and call that diversity and inclusion. We really called it safety culture at the time, and I can tell you that it really did a lot for the agency. Not only - I think it made our programs a lot stronger, but we became last 10 years of my tenure at NASA was the number 1 agency in the government to work for, and I honestly believe it's the things we learned as a result of making these changes an becoming a much more inclusive organization and a diverse organization that really made it not only a better place to launch vehicles and spacecraft, but made it a better place to go work. I like where I'm working at now with Booz Allen because they have many of the same thoughts and philosophies about a work culture. Second one was really the Artemis program. You know, we worked in it for 8 years from design development to building production sites, to doing the manufacturing, testing the hardware, all these different things you have to be able to fly. When COVID came through, we had to shut operations down, we had to send people home, you know, we were really worried about people's safety. And then not only for the work that we were doing with the vehicle, but the suppliers that were supplying us parts, they were in parts of the country which were really impacted by COVID. And you wanted to keep moving forward, but you didn't want to put people in a position that wasn't safe. And so - and that was one of my responsibilities working with the agency to make sure we were doing the right things. The other thing is we had a lot of bad weather. We had 7 major storms, and last year when we got ready to launch, we had 2 come through Florida back-to-back. The first one was Ian, that was a cat-5 storm that came into Florida. We actually - I had to direct that they put the vehicle into the VAB to protect it, and then a little bit later on in the beginning of November, we were getting ready to launch again and I got a call from our program manager who says, "You're not going to believe this". And I said, "Well, what?". "Well, there's another hurricane coming to the Cape". And that's just really almost impossible to believe. I'm like you've got to be kidding me. Right? And so this one, fortunately, Nicole, which came through in early November, was only a cat-1. We have really smart people that do the weather for us, and so they're very good at predicting this. We knew what the vehicle was capable of. We had a [inaudible] ground team that knew how we should respond to this. For the second one, we were able to leave the vehicle at the pad. And so we actually had the storm come through in early November and we launched the vehicle November sixteenth.
>> Alice Carruth: So you've now transitioned. You've retired from NASA and gone to Booz Allen. What has drawn you to this role and tell me a little bit about what this executive advisor role will entail.
>> Tom Whitmeyer: It's a great role. Highly recommend it. First of all, Booz Allen is like a Easter egg hunt. I go out and I meet people, and they do everything. Right? Booz Allen is involved in all these different activities not only in space, but with the veteran's affair, basically the park service. I mean, I don't think there's a government agency that Booz Allen doesn't have people involved doing independent technical integration. So that's really a lot of fun to be part of that. It's not just a single mission focus, but it's the ability to see across all these different organizations and all these different activities. Booz Allen people, they're very interesting, capable, credible people, and it works mostly with data. And so data is very interesting by itself. You know, we talked a little bit about what was going on in space, well, that's going on with data right now in the country, as well. And Booz Allen's in a great position because it actually does both the space stuff and the data stuff. If you told me 5 or 10 years ago, for example, artificial intelligence would be something that could be used on a routine basis, it just wasn't going to happen. Right? It would be a special, you know, high-cost task to look at just a little piece of data. And in the space world, we collect data all the time. Spacecraft I worked on are still flying 20 years later collecting data, and up to now, we've only taken snapshots of the data and just seen - and it's been very valuable, but it's not really been a full motion picture of the data. Nowadays, with the data capabilities that are out there to deal with large quantities of data, fuse the data, take it from different sources, and get it into a common language, do machine learning on the data, artificial intelligence, and then share it with people is really just amazing. And so you have these situations where now people are using this data for these really incredible purposes, almost near real time information what we can share with people and help predict when a flood is going to happen or how to react to a disaster when it occurs.
>> Alice Carruth: So as the executive advisor at Booz Allen, how do you plan to leverage your extensive experience at NASA, for example?
>> Tom Whitmeyer: One of the things that's useful is understanding how the government works. And so again, being in a headquarters position for 22 years, you really have a feel for, you know, the policy aspects of it, how things are appropriated, why it's important to communicate with folks, and so that's useful. And of course, technically having a background in space is helpful because you can understand what the opportunities are. So there's that kind of technical aspect, and there's a policy aspect to doing things, and it's really taking those type of experiences on what's technically going on and really how policy and government works and combining those. Five, ten years ago, every government agency kind of did their own thing. Right? And when I was at NASA, we did our NASA stuff, and the Air Force did its Air Force stuff. And now, all that stuff is kind of coming together. Everybody is worried about a congested space. It wasn't that congested 10 years ago. Everybody is worried about the strategic value of space, both nationally and internationally. Everybody understands the economic potential for space, and everybody wants to do things in space, transport things around space, kind of making space to communicate back. And so to be an executive advisor at this point in time, where data is just going crazy and space is going crazy, that's like - that's just the greatest thing ever. I guess it's almost like the first golden era when we went from not flying in space to getting to land on the lunar surface in 10 years. I think we're at that moment, now. Ten years from now, you and I can't even imagine what some of these benefits are going to look like. And the third thing I didn't talk about, it's not only so much what's going on in space and what's going on with data, but what's going on with the Earth. Right? I mean, we're seeing extreme weather events, we're seeing fires, we're seeing floods. I was in DC two weeks ago and there were forest fires in Canada. We had the smoke alarms go off in our building. I mean literally, in the building, the smoke alarm is going off. And so people begin to realize that these extreme weather events affect everyone. And so now, you have this opportunity to use assets in space to help people on the ground in a meaningful way. I mean, really save lives, be ahead of, you know, extreme weather events, help the world kind of deal with what's going on and help people to kind of avoid it, or at least react to it.
>> Alice Carruth: So I'm very conscious of time, and I could chat to you all day, I really could, but I really wanted to kind of talk about your incredible experience and what kind of advice you'd give others who are now starting off in the industry. What do you say to people that when they come up to you and say, "How do I become like you?"
>> Tom Whitmeyer: I think it's almost having that kind of modest background always work in your favor because you don't really take things for granted. Right? You're really enthusiastic, and you care about things, and there are so many opportunities right now. There's just opportunities and everything I just talked about, opportunities with data, opportunities with the environment, opportunities with space. It's really picking what's important to you. Don't think you're going to get work for NASA directly. I never got to work - I got people saying how can I work for NASA? It's like impossible. Right? I mean, they don't hire too many people right off the street, but if you work and you find something that you really care about, and you get involved in that, and you feel like you're making a change, you'll really be enthusiastic. And if you're enthusiastic about something, then you - there's a good chance you're going to get a chance to do it. And I really think there's just a tremendous amount of opportunities right now, and those opportunities are really great opportunities because you have real opportunities to change the world. Right? All of the sudden, all the stuff is coming back and it's all happening at the same time, and you can change the world. I talked to people after our launch and I said it doesn't really matter what you did for the launch, or where you were at, or what your role was. We had a lot of contractors, just like I was a contractor, you made this happen. Right? You weren't the one sitting in the launch control center when it lifted off, but you're the one that built this part and this part needed to work for this mission to be successful. Everybody has a chance to be that person, to be the person that builds the part and makes a difference. And whether it's in data, whether it's the environment, whether it's with what we do in space, you have a chance to do that, and it does make a difference.
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>> Maria Varmazis: We'll be right back.
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And welcome back. And for today's little fun fact of the day, I'm serving up a bit of media metacommentary because if you're at all space nerdy, and I'm betting you probably are, you've likely seen headlines like this one on July fourth, US independence day, asteroid the size of 3,500 Big Mac hamburgers to pass Earth, or this one last month, colossal asteroid the size of 99 narwhals to pass Earth on Thursday, or asteroid 2023 HF7 is roughly the size of 6 Darth Vaders and is part of a trilogy of asteroids to pass the Earth on Star Wars Day, May fourth. This is the way, or, this is the last one, I promise. My absolute favorite from this past April, Asteroid the size of 787 Matzas to pass over Earth on Passover. These hilarious headlines are all courtesy of the same person at The Jerusalem Post, Aaron Reich, the paper's assistant managing editor. And they're clever, too, because us space nerds know that asteroids are passing by Earth - harmlessly, we should add - all the time. So if he can think up a creative unit of measurement, he's got pretty much an infinite cavalcade of near-Earth objects. But why Big Macs and Matzas? So Aaron answered that question in an interview with the Jewish Standard, and he said this, "The real issue is that numbers can just be confusing for some readers. A measure of comparison can often illustrate things a lot better than simply saying a standard measurement. I've done a lot of different ones in the past, but more people have a general idea of how big a flamingo is than how big 14 meters is". Especially if they're American. No, he didn't say that part. I said that part. Anyway, nerd bonus points to anyone listening who can figure out the unit conversion for Darth Vader to Narwhal. Space@n2k.com. I'm serious, my inbox is open.
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And that's it for T-Minus for July sixth, 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 Peltsman and Trey Hester, with original music and sound design by Elliott Peltsman. Our executive producer is Brandon Karpf. Our chief intelligence officer is Eric Tillman, and I'm Maria Varmazis. Thanks for listening and we'll see you tomorrow.
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