Are We There Yet?

The Humans to Mars Summit wrapped up this week in Washington, D.C. It’s a yearly meeting of the minds to chat all things Mars and what it’s going to take to get people there.

It included panels of folks talking all things space from mission architecture to social media. NASA’s new administrator Jim Bridenstine spoke about his vision of human space exploration.

Laura Forczyk is the founder of Astralytical a space consulting firm. She kept a watchful eye on the summit and joins the program to let us know just how we’re going to get to Mars.

Follow Laura on Twitter for great space industry insight! 

The Humans to Mars Summit wrapped up this week in Washington, D.C. It’s a yearly meeting of the minds to chat all things Mars and what it’s going to take to get people there.

NASA is poised to launch a robotic geologist to Mars. Before it blasts off, what goes into planning that trip?

Caley Burke is a Trajectory Analyst for NASA’s Launch Services Program. Her job is to map out InSight’s trip to Mars. She joins us va Skype from the Kennedy Space Center to tell us just what goes into planning a Mars trajectory.

NASA is poised to launch a robotic geologist to Mars. Before it blasts off, what goes into planning that trip?

Where were you when you first saw Pluto? The New Horizons flyby back in the summer of 2015 had all eyes on the deep spacecraft exploring the outermost parts of our solar system.

New Horizons launched in 2006 but it was years in the making, and it wasn’t easy getting managers and administrators on board with the idea of exploring Pluto.

“Chasing New Horizons: Inside the Epic First Mission to Pluto” is a new book out this week that chronicles the triumphs and challenges of the mission that’s now past Pluto and on it’s way to it’s next flyby: Ultima Thule, an object 43 AU or 4 billion miles away.

Dr. Alan Stern is the Principle Investigator on New Horizons..and the co-author of the book. He joins the podcast to talk about the mission and the decades long path to reach Pluto.

Where were you when you first saw Pluto? The New Horizons flyby back in the summer of 2015 had all eyes on the deep spacecraft exploring the outermost parts of our solar system.

A new space telescope will help scientists identify alien worlds.

NASA’s Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite, or TESS, launches on a Falcon 9 rocket from Florida’s Space Coast. Once in space, it will look for planets outside our solar system by observing nearby stars.

Sara Seager is an astrophysicist at MIT and the Deputy Science Director of the TESS mission. She hopes the discoveries of these planets, called exoplanets, can help us find other Earth-like planets and eventually the evidence of life outside our world.

A new space telescope will help scientists identify alien worlds.

Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos, Richard Branson, Paul Allen. Our guest calls them the space barons. Washington Post reporter Christian Davenport interviewed the four space entrepreneurs for his book “The Space Barons: Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos, and the Quest to Colonize the Cosmos.”

He joins the podcast to talk about what he learned from these four space entrepreneurs.

Washington Post space reporter Christian Davenport spent years interviewing the space barons: Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos, Richard Branson and Paul Allen. What is it about space that makes them chase nearly impossible dreams?