Latest / Made of Stars / Recapping Space News of 2024 Part 2

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Recapping Space News of 2024 Part 2 · Made of Stars

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Speaker 1: Warning. The following podcast contains an entertaining look at astronomy, physics,
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Speaker 1: and space news throughout the known universe. Listeners have been
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Speaker 1: known to learn about astronomical phenomenon, the scientific method, and
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Speaker 1: expanded vocabulary to include terms like quasar asterism and uranus. Listen,
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Speaker 1: that's your own risk. Go ahead.
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Speaker 2: When made of stars, made them stars, madies. When made
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Speaker 2: of stars, you could be from high they would New Mexicomus,
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Speaker 2: where all stars.
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Speaker 3: When we are made of stars. I'm Wes Carol, joined
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Speaker 3: by my good friend, doctor Seawan Cruisin from Columbus State
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Speaker 3: University's Coca Cola Space Sign Center.
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Speaker 4: Good morning Sean, Good morning Wes. It's good to be here.
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Speaker 4: I hope everybody had a great Christmas and we're moving
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Speaker 4: on toward New Year's.
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Speaker 3: Now, getting ready to roll on into twenty twenty five.
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Speaker 3: We are recapping the biggest space news stories of the year.
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Speaker 3: This is our part two. If you didn't catch last week,
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Speaker 3: you missed five. Pretty impressive. Really, it was almost like
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Speaker 3: six or seven, because we had a few that had
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Speaker 3: some multi parts to them, but they were all sort
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Speaker 3: of collectively part of one particular story, which was amazing
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Speaker 3: things that we were able to see in the sky
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Speaker 3: this year, and now as we're knocking on the door
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Speaker 3: of twenty twenty five, we're knocking on the door of
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Speaker 3: someone new taking over at NASA. I suspect that will
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Speaker 3: be a pretty significant story. Well, I suspect I looked ahead,
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Speaker 3: you know, I know he's in there. I know he's
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Speaker 3: in there.
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Speaker 4: Where will he rank?
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Speaker 3: That's the question as we work our way through the
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Speaker 3: biggest space news stories of twenty twenty four. We started
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Speaker 3: last week's show with kind of a sad story because
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Speaker 3: it was the end of the Ingenuity Rover, which again
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Speaker 3: us assigning human qualities to an actual machine. In this case,
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Speaker 3: it's a sad story, and then it's an actual human being,
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Speaker 3: you know, and a legend.
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Speaker 4: We like to have a lot of fun on this show,
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Speaker 4: but sometimes it's important just to stop and note monumental events,
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Speaker 4: and the loss of another Apollo astronaut is definitely a
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Speaker 4: monumental event. Bill Anders William Anders, Apollo eight astronaut, the
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Speaker 4: person who captured the very famous Earth rise photograph. We
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Speaker 4: lost Bill Anders in twenty and twenty four. He passed
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Speaker 4: away at the age of ninety, which is a good
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Speaker 4: long life. He died in an airplane crash on June seven.
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Speaker 4: I don't know that this is true, but perhaps if
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Speaker 4: you spoke with these legendary Apollo astronauts who are also aviators,
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Speaker 4: not just spaceflyers, maybe they would rather go in a
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Speaker 4: plane crash than some other way. I don't know, it
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Speaker 4: seems like maybe not the worst way.
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Speaker 3: It's the old, you know, died doing what they loved
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Speaker 3: kind of thing. And you know, you hear that often sadly,
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Speaker 3: you know, when someone does pass doing something that they love,
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Speaker 3: we're not able to go back and go. So are
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Speaker 3: you're glad? But yeah, I mean it's a nice thought
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Speaker 3: to think that this is someone who was as an aviator,
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Speaker 3: was doing exactly that something that he loved, and especially
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Speaker 3: to be doing it at ninety.
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Speaker 4: Just moments before his death, he was just flying a
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Speaker 4: vintage plane. He was in a beach Craft T thirty
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Speaker 4: four Mentor. And you know, I'm guessing he went and
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Speaker 4: jumped in that plane because he was going to have
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Speaker 4: a good time that day.
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Speaker 3: I like to think, yeah, that he was excited to
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Speaker 3: be in that plane. I would think that he would be.
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Speaker 3: I would be, and you know, I'm not an aviator
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Speaker 3: and a NASA legend.
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Speaker 4: Well, in nineteen sixty eight, Bill Anders served as the
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Speaker 4: Lunar module pilot for the Apollo eight mission. He was
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Speaker 4: alongside Commander Jim Lovell. Yeah, that Jim Level. He played
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Speaker 4: Tom Hanks in that movie. Oh wait, it's the other
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Speaker 4: way around. And then also another legend of NASA, Frank Borman.
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Speaker 4: So that trio was on the Apollo eight mission. And
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Speaker 4: there are a lot of very famous things about the
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Speaker 4: Apollo eight mission. If you've never heard the stories of
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Speaker 4: Apollo eight, go back and read those stories. They were
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Speaker 4: the first ones to fly around the backside of the Moon,
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Speaker 4: the first astronauts to reach the backside of the moon,
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Speaker 4: to orbit the Moon and come back home. So a
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Speaker 4: lot of cool stuff from Apollo eight. Go check that out.
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Speaker 4: But Bill Anders, we lost him this year. Coates from
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Speaker 4: the family, his son, who is a retired Air Force lieutenant.
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Speaker 4: As Colonel Greg Anders said this, the family is devastated.
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Speaker 4: He was a great pilot and we will miss him terribly.
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Speaker 4: But then NASA Administrator Bill Nelson added, as Bill put
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Speaker 4: it so well, after the conclusion of the Apollo eight mission, quote,
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Speaker 4: we came all this way to explore the Moon and
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Speaker 4: The most important thing is that we discovered the Earth,
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Speaker 4: and again that's referring back to the iconic earth rise
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Speaker 4: photograph and just a new perspective that going to another
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Speaker 4: world gave human beings for the very first time on
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Speaker 4: Apollo eight, that we could look back at such a
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Speaker 4: distance and see that blue marble in the sky and
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Speaker 4: understand as a species, really what that world means to us,
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Speaker 4: and how much we should treasure it, how much we
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Speaker 4: should treasure each other, and how we really need to
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Speaker 4: take care of the shining blue planet Earth.
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Speaker 3: We have a couple of stories coming up that relate
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Speaker 3: to commercials, but this is also that's not all we cover.
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Speaker 3: We also cover actual science, and this is the most
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Speaker 3: science y of our top five, certainly here at number four,
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Speaker 3: and it's some black hole stories. We learned some new
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Speaker 3: things and discovered some new things about black holes, one
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Speaker 3: of those things that you know definitely fascinates and I
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Speaker 3: guess you get some fixation on them, at least I
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Speaker 3: did when I was even in elementary school as a
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Speaker 3: kid learning about space.
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Speaker 4: Coming in at number four, So wes excuse me of
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Speaker 4: a kind of you know, squeezing some stories into one
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Speaker 4: story and I'll admit it, I did do that. So
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Speaker 4: it's a top ten that you know. I'm not complaining
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Speaker 4: sixteen seventeen stories in it. I don't know something like that.
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Speaker 4: I try to squeeze them in there because you can't
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Speaker 4: just get it down to ten, right, So this is
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Speaker 4: one of those combo stories that I cheated on. It's
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Speaker 4: a couple of black hole stories. So coming in at
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Speaker 4: number four, we have black holes doing some crazy stuff.
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Speaker 4: And in September of twenty twenty four, astronomers, I can't
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Speaker 4: even say it, let's go on roastrong with me. Astronomers
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Speaker 4: figured out that there was these gigantic jets emerging from
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Speaker 4: a host of a galaxy that had a super massive
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Speaker 4: black hole on the inside. And these jets were blasting
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Speaker 4: out of this host galaxy from this supermassive black hole
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Speaker 4: out to a distance of twenty three million light years
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Speaker 4: twenty three million light years friends, and stretching as long
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Speaker 4: as one hundred and forty Milky Way galaxies lined up
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Speaker 4: end to end, just to give you some perspective on that.
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Speaker 4: So these are the largest and fastest black hole jets
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Speaker 4: that had ever been discovered. So what's a black hole?
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Speaker 4: Jet well as the black hole in the center of
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Speaker 4: this galaxy swallows material. In other words, it's eating up
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Speaker 4: all the gases and other particles around it as it
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Speaker 4: sucks it into its massive gravitational well, some of those
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Speaker 4: particles are stripped away by the magnetic field of the
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Speaker 4: gal of that black hole, and they're ejected out of
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Speaker 4: these jets like a particle accelerator, off into space at
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Speaker 4: ninety degree angles from the plane of the material that's
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Speaker 4: going down into the black hole. So you get these
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Speaker 4: one and eighty degree jets blasting out from this black
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Speaker 4: hole two different directions, one hundred and eighty degrees apart,
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Speaker 4: and in this case, they're blasting out from the host
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Speaker 4: galaxy to a distance of one hundred and forty milky
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Speaker 4: ways lined up end to end. Take our parent galaxy
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Speaker 4: line it up one hundred and forty times. So this
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Speaker 4: is a titanic structure out there, and it's all being
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Speaker 4: caused by a very powerful, very hungry, super massive black hole.
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Speaker 4: And that becomes one of this two part story for
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Speaker 4: black holes doing crazy things. The other one is this
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Speaker 4: here comes story number two. This was announced in November
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Speaker 4: of twenty twenty four. It's the fastest eating black hole.
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Speaker 4: In other words, this black hole is consuming material at
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Speaker 4: a faster rate than any black hole ever discovered before.
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Speaker 4: And in fact, it's even more than that. It's eating
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Speaker 4: material at forty times faster than we thought the theoretical
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Speaker 4: limit for how much material could fall onto a black hole. So,
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Speaker 4: in other words, forty times faster than what we thought
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Speaker 4: the speed limit for how fast a black hole could eat. So,
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Speaker 4: you know that Joey guy that eats hot dogs, you know,
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Speaker 4: imagine that guy, except now this is a super massive
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Speaker 4: black hole and it's even forty times faster than we
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Speaker 4: thought hot dogs could be eaten. That's you know that
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Speaker 4: Hopefully that puts it in some per expective for you.
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Speaker 4: So anyway, really interesting story about how fast black holes
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Speaker 4: can swallow hot dogs.
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Speaker 3: I mean, it kind of makes me want a hot dog.
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Speaker 3: And it's a little early for a hot dog here
10:11
Speaker 3: on this Boxing day, you know, right after Christmas. I
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Speaker 3: feel like, you know, a lot of Christmas cakes and
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Speaker 3: all sorts of sweets are still going on, and now
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Speaker 3: I'm wanting a hot dog. So thanks a lot, Sehn,
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Speaker 3: thanks for doing that to me.
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Speaker 4: You're so welcome.
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Speaker 3: We're made of stars. Right after this, let's jump to
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Speaker 3: the next story, because this is one of those things
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Speaker 3: that it was a news story. I think just because
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Speaker 3: people like to embrace the headlines, maybe it was a
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Speaker 3: little bit of clickbait. It's obviously a real news story.
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Speaker 3: We're not going to dismiss the fact that the events
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Speaker 3: did transpire. But what became sort of the clickbait or
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Speaker 3: the news headlines or the fodder for the twenty four
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Speaker 3: hour news cycle channels is were they stuck or weren't
11:19
Speaker 3: they stuck? And are they still stuck. I don't know
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Speaker 3: where they are in their coverage of the story, but
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Speaker 3: there was a lot going on with Starliner this year,
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Speaker 3: and it led to some astronauts spending extra time. They're
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Speaker 3: still there by the way in space, and basically a
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Speaker 3: couple of astronauts that were supposed to go to space
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Speaker 3: not getting to go.
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Speaker 4: So the good news on June fifth, twenty twenty four,
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Speaker 4: Bowling finally launched their star Liner vehicle. They've been working
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Speaker 4: on this for years and friends, we don't have enough
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Speaker 4: time to cover all of the ins and outs and
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Speaker 4: twists and turns of the story, but let's just say
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Speaker 4: they had really hard time getting Starliner pasted all of
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Speaker 4: its technical challenges to even launch human beings to space.
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Speaker 4: So that's a story in and of itself. This could
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Speaker 4: have been in the top ten if nothing else had happened,
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Speaker 4: If it had all gone smooth, this would have still
12:17
Speaker 4: been in the top ten. Starliner finally launched his human
12:20
Speaker 4: beings into space after all these years. They got paid
12:24
Speaker 4: almost twice as much money from a NASA contract as
12:28
Speaker 4: SpaceX with the Dragon capsule to take astronauts back and
12:31
Speaker 4: forth to space. So again this would have been a
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Speaker 4: big story. But what happened was what happened was they
12:37
Speaker 4: got up there to the International Space Station and they
12:40
Speaker 4: had a hard time docking their vehicle because they had
12:44
Speaker 4: some serious challenges with the maneuvering system. That's a problem.
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Speaker 4: In other words, imagine like you're trying to pull your
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Speaker 4: car into the garage and suddenly your steering wheel isn't
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Speaker 4: working the way it's supposed to and your brakes go out.
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Speaker 4: It's not maybe quite that severe, but it was space,
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Speaker 4: so it's really dangerous. So yeah, it's pretty severe. So
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Speaker 4: they did manage to get it docked. But when they
13:09
Speaker 4: got it docked, they realized that the helium leaks, which
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Speaker 4: they had been struggling with for months, were actually worse
13:15
Speaker 4: than what they thought. And the helium actually pressurizes the
13:21
Speaker 4: fuel for the maneuvering thrusters. So all of these things
13:25
Speaker 4: are a problem. And so Butch Wilmore and Sunny Williams,
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Speaker 4: the two astronauts, arrived safely at the International Space Station.
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Speaker 4: That's an important part of the story. They're up there,
13:35
Speaker 4: they're having a good time. But the vehicle that they
13:38
Speaker 4: got parked out in the garage, it's not doing so well.
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Speaker 4: And in fact, NASA ultimately decides, you know what, I
13:45
Speaker 4: don't think we want to bring these people back home
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Speaker 4: in this maybe somewhat sketch vehicle. So they decided to
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Speaker 4: have an unpiloted return, which happened on September sixth, And
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Speaker 4: then the headlines really got ramped up, as you remember,
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Speaker 4: these astronauts are stranded, lost in space, astronauts stranded aboard
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Speaker 4: the International Space Station. Do they have enough food? Do
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Speaker 4: they have health problems? What are they gonna wear? How
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Speaker 4: are they going to talk to their family? As if
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Speaker 4: NASA had thought of none of these things, you know,
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Speaker 4: before sending them to space in the first place.
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Speaker 3: And and we covered the fact that when you go
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Speaker 3: to the International Space Station you're prepped for the possibility
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Speaker 3: that you may have to stay longer than you expected.
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Speaker 3: That is something that has happened before. I assume that
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Speaker 3: it will at some point happen again. It's not unheard of.
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Speaker 3: And and yes, they they have supplies there. It's not
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Speaker 3: like you're showing up and you know, you only bring
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Speaker 3: with you exactly how much food you're going to eat
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Speaker 3: for the mission, and then you know, once that's out,
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Speaker 3: you're just having to you know, grow potatoes in your
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Speaker 3: feces on Mars. That's not exactly the way things go.
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Speaker 3: That's just for you know, Matt Damon and movie. So, yes,
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Speaker 3: they were stuck. I mean in the sense that they
15:04
Speaker 3: weren't comfortable bringing them home in a vehicle that, by
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Speaker 3: the way, came home and had no problems when it
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Speaker 3: came home, and they could have come home in that vehicle.
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Speaker 3: So technically, I guess they weren't stuck. But NASA being NASA,
15:17
Speaker 3: they were taking care of their people, which is what
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Speaker 3: they're supposed to do.
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Speaker 4: Yeah, they were making all the right decisions. And as
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Speaker 4: Wes said, the vehicle did come back with parameters that
15:26
Speaker 4: would have allowed the astronauts to come back safely. NASA's
15:29
Speaker 4: made that clear. However, there were some well there were
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Speaker 4: some other issues with the heat shield as it came
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Speaker 4: back in.
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Speaker 2: But yeah, all right, so.
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Speaker 4: There's some things Starliner needs to work out, some glitches,
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Speaker 4: let's just say that. But here's the thing, NASA always
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Speaker 4: has a plan, right, So the next plan involved the
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Speaker 4: next Crew Dragon mission, which is Crew nine, a SpaceX mission,
15:53
Speaker 4: and that mission was actually altered to leave a couple
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Speaker 4: of astronauts at home, which is sad for them. Xena
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Speaker 4: Carbon and Stephanie Wilson did not get to fly in
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Speaker 4: September on SpaceX's Crew nine mission. In other words, they
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Speaker 4: left two seats open so that Butch and Sunny could
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Speaker 4: ride back from the International Space Station aboard the Crew
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Speaker 4: nine mission. So the Butch and Sunny just transitioned into
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Speaker 4: Crew nine astronauts. But it is a little bit sad
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Speaker 4: that the two astronauts Xena Carbon Stephanie Wilson got left behind.
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Speaker 4: They're eligible for future flights up to the International Space Station,
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Speaker 4: so hopefully they'll get them up there soon. This did
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Speaker 4: leave the two empty seats for Williams and Wilmore to
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Speaker 4: fly back with the Crew nine astronauts in February of
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Speaker 4: twenty twenty five. Now, all of that's true. That mission's
16:45
Speaker 4: already gone up there, That SpaceX Crew Dragon is already
16:48
Speaker 4: docked to the International Space Station. They're already part of
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Speaker 4: the Crew nine. Right, They're no longer star Liner restaurants.
16:56
Speaker 4: They're now Crew nine astronauts officially. And I still saw
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Speaker 4: a headline a few days ago that said the stranded
17:03
Speaker 4: astronauts aboard the International Space They're not stranded anymore. They're
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Speaker 4: ride sitting right outside. In fact, they kind of went
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Speaker 4: from a Ugo to a Ferrari.
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Speaker 3: Yeah, you know, they upgraded on that vehicle for that
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Speaker 3: ride home. It's like, sure, you know, they were gonna
17:19
Speaker 3: send a car. They were gonna send, you know, like
17:21
Speaker 3: a small little compact car. And then they said, we're
17:24
Speaker 3: gonna we're gona upgrade you to the town car. You're
17:26
Speaker 3: gonna get a nice You're getting a limo home. It's
17:29
Speaker 3: gonna be just fine, expected to come back. Yeah. Now
17:34
Speaker 3: in a couple of months, coming up after a quick break,
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Speaker 3: we're going to talk about the two biggest space news
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Speaker 3: stories of the year. Will it be SpaceX, Will it
17:46
Speaker 3: be Isaacman find out next? Almost feels like we should
18:07
Speaker 3: do it the way they do it pageants. We get
18:09
Speaker 3: down to the final two stories, and we should announce
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Speaker 3: the winner rather than the runner up, you know, because
18:13
Speaker 3: they used to do that. They'd go the runner up
18:15
Speaker 3: is that means the winner is and then it was
18:18
Speaker 3: you know kind of you know, they have to get
18:20
Speaker 3: excited because they were I don't know that Jared Isaacman
18:22
Speaker 3: is sitting by waiting to find out that he is,
18:25
Speaker 3: in fact the top story space news story of the year.
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Speaker 3: But before we talk about Jared Isaacman, because really he's
18:34
Speaker 3: got a pretty big twenty twenty five ahead of him,
18:36
Speaker 3: but we'll get to that first, let's talk about SpaceX
18:40
Speaker 3: because honestly, if not for the Jared Isaacman story, this
18:43
Speaker 3: would have easily been the SpaceX year to be the
18:48
Speaker 3: biggest news story of the year because they did some
18:51
Speaker 3: pretty remarkable things, which also included, you know, providing the
18:56
Speaker 3: town car to bring the astronauts home, will be bringing
19:01
Speaker 3: them home in February, so from you know Mechzilla, Chopsticks,
19:07
Speaker 3: and they just had a really good year.
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Speaker 4: There are so many things that could make SpaceX the
19:13
Speaker 4: top story of twenty twenty four. And I know it's
19:16
Speaker 4: just big combining stories to say it's a single story.
19:20
Speaker 4: But when we look back at twenty twenty four, we're
19:24
Speaker 4: gonna think about SpaceX and Polaris, Don and Elon Musk
19:31
Speaker 4: and Jared Isaacman. In fact, Elon and Jared, you're probably
19:34
Speaker 4: hanging out together right now. Maybe there was some kind
19:38
Speaker 4: of a doge NASA meeting right now, could be you
19:41
Speaker 4: know where you guys are sipping on a guava smoothie
19:44
Speaker 4: together right now on the couch, listening to Native Stars.
19:47
Speaker 4: And thank you Jared and Elon for listening. We appreciate
19:49
Speaker 4: that much.
19:49
Speaker 3: We appreciate that very very much.
19:52
Speaker 4: Click like and whatever. Anyway, So the idea, though, is this,
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Speaker 4: which of those two guys is actually going to make
19:57
Speaker 4: it to number one? Is e or is it Jared?
20:01
Speaker 4: I mean, and this is a tough choice, right, yep,
20:03
Speaker 4: because they're so intertwined in a way.
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Speaker 3: Okay, well it's almost like they're sharing the top spot.
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Speaker 3: But we we did technically give a number of number
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Speaker 3: two in this not just two number ones.
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Speaker 4: So the hat tip for number one goes to Jared Isaacman.
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Speaker 4: So let's talk about SpaceX first and Elon Musk, because
20:22
Speaker 4: they had one whale of a year. They had one
20:27
Speaker 4: hundred and twenty eight launches by the time we're recording
20:31
Speaker 4: the show. That's a lot. The previous record for launches
20:37
Speaker 4: in a year was held by oh SpaceX at ninety eight.
20:42
Speaker 3: Yeah.
20:44
Speaker 4: So, so they included one hundred and twenty three Falcon
20:49
Speaker 4: nine launches, two Falcon Heavy launches, three Starship launches. And
20:58
Speaker 4: we're not totally oblivious to the fact that this is
21:00
Speaker 4: not exactly the end of the year yet, so these
21:03
Speaker 4: numbers might even shift a little bit more so. So
21:08
Speaker 4: this is a good year, is the point, right, If
21:11
Speaker 4: you just want to count launches alone. Governments around the
21:17
Speaker 4: world have never launched even close to as many rockets
21:22
Speaker 4: as Elon Musk and SpaceX have launched this year. They've
21:26
Speaker 4: launched them from multiple launch venues, from Kennedy Space Center,
21:30
Speaker 4: from the Cape Canaveral Air Station, from from Vandenberg Air
21:34
Speaker 4: Force bace out in California, and from their version of
21:39
Speaker 4: Star City down there in Texas. They've launched from many
21:42
Speaker 4: different places. Sometimes they've launched from all three or four
21:47
Speaker 4: sites within just a few days, or even the next
21:51
Speaker 4: day or even the same.
21:52
Speaker 3: Day, hours right hours later.
21:56
Speaker 4: So so okay, if it was just launch Cadence, SpaceX
22:01
Speaker 4: would be toward the top of this list. But now,
22:04
Speaker 4: let's not forget that they flew the biggest, most powerful
22:08
Speaker 4: rocket ever built by humanity this year and they flew
22:13
Speaker 4: it successfully. That would be a big story by itself.
22:17
Speaker 4: But then they actually grabbed the base booster, the main
22:22
Speaker 4: stage booster, out of the air with a pair of
22:25
Speaker 4: chopsticks called the Mechazilla, so that they didn't have to
22:31
Speaker 4: put landing gear on it, so they could reduce the
22:33
Speaker 4: weight and it would enhance reusability and refuel ability for
22:38
Speaker 4: NASA's Artemis program to take astronauts to the Moon. That
22:44
Speaker 4: alone would have been a big story. But then let's
22:47
Speaker 4: not forget that in the same year, SpaceX was awarded
22:53
Speaker 4: the contract for deorbiting the International Space Station, so they
22:58
Speaker 4: have a new contract tract to build a brand new
23:02
Speaker 4: space vehicle system to deliver the USD orbit vehicle for
23:09
Speaker 4: the International Space Station. But let's also not forget that
23:13
Speaker 4: they have enhanced their own Mega constellation of you know,
23:17
Speaker 4: space based Wi Fi satellites. Anyway, so there's SpaceX has
23:22
Speaker 4: done a lot of stuff this year. Friends, This has
23:24
Speaker 4: been a incredible, historic, record breaking year for Elon Musk, Gwinn,
23:32
Speaker 4: Shotwell and the rest of the SpaceX company.
23:36
Speaker 3: And not to spend too much time on it, but
23:38
Speaker 3: going back to the previous story, you know, Starliner not
23:42
Speaker 3: being able to get their astronauts home and Elon having
23:46
Speaker 3: to swoop in and bring them home with one of
23:49
Speaker 3: his ships. You know, that's that's not exactly you know,
23:53
Speaker 3: bad news for SpaceX either. I mean it's it's some
23:56
Speaker 3: nice optics at least for the company, even if they
23:59
Speaker 3: didn't spike football the way they very easily could have it.
24:03
Speaker 4: In all seriousness, this year really represents a big shift
24:09
Speaker 4: forward from government based space programs to commercial programs, from
24:17
Speaker 4: legacy space companies to new and cutting edge startups in
24:22
Speaker 4: space which are no longer startups. There they've progressed quite
24:26
Speaker 4: a ways down the road, but they were startups fairly
24:28
Speaker 4: recently in the whole spectrum of the of space company history.
24:32
Speaker 4: So this there's there's a landslide of a shift taking
24:37
Speaker 4: place in the space industry, and these last two stories
24:41
Speaker 4: reflect that.
24:42
Speaker 3: Yep.
24:42
Speaker 4: First of all, all all of that going on with
24:44
Speaker 4: SpaceX and then the number one story we have coming
24:46
Speaker 4: up in a moment.
24:46
Speaker 3: Well, and that's the perfect way to segue into the
24:49
Speaker 3: year that Jared Isaacman had. This is someone who you know,
24:55
Speaker 3: having money, having a lot of money, said I'd like
24:58
Speaker 3: to go to space and took care of getting himself
25:02
Speaker 3: to space and did something that you know no one's
25:09
Speaker 3: done before with the Polaris Dawn mission. And then you
25:14
Speaker 3: talk about this transition as far as things moving in
25:17
Speaker 3: the direction of these commercial companies and where things are heading.
25:23
Speaker 3: There's a bit of a marriage of the two that
25:25
Speaker 3: is coming once Jared Isaacman has potentially approved to lead
25:30
Speaker 3: NASA moving forward after being picked by the Trump administration.
25:34
Speaker 3: But let's start with Polaris Dawn.
25:36
Speaker 4: So even before Polaris Dawn, Jared Isaacman became the first
25:41
Speaker 4: ever commander of an all commercial crew that was on
25:45
Speaker 4: the Inspiration four flight. And that did not happen in
25:48
Speaker 4: twenty twenty four. But what did happen in twenty twenty
25:50
Speaker 4: four is he followed that up with his second flight
25:52
Speaker 4: to space, and that was on the first of three
25:56
Speaker 4: proposed missions called the Polaris program. The Polaris mission on
26:01
Speaker 4: the Polarist Dawn mission, Jared Isagman led a crew of
26:05
Speaker 4: commercial astronauts further away from the Earth than we've been
26:10
Speaker 4: since the nineteen seventies and the Apollo program. So there
26:15
Speaker 4: they got to the greatest altitude of any astronaut group
26:20
Speaker 4: since the astronauts that were heading to the Moon in
26:23
Speaker 4: the Apollo program. So that would again already be a
26:27
Speaker 4: Titanic achievement, except that they did more than that. They
26:31
Speaker 4: actually did an extra vehicular activity, a spacewalk of sorts.
26:36
Speaker 4: Not of sorts. It was an actual spacewalk, but it's
26:38
Speaker 4: a little bit different than what we think of as
26:40
Speaker 4: a spacewalk. What they did is they opened the hatch
26:43
Speaker 4: of the crew Dragon, and both Jared Issacman and another
26:48
Speaker 4: commercial astronaut by the name of Sarah Gillis took turns
26:51
Speaker 4: emerging from the upper hatch of SpaceX's Dragon spacecraft on
26:56
Speaker 4: September twelfth, twenty twenty four, becoming the first ever non
27:01
Speaker 4: governmental astronauts to leave the confines of their vehicle for
27:07
Speaker 4: the vacuum of space. Now why was this different, Well,
27:11
Speaker 4: they didn't They went up hip deep, so to speak.
27:15
Speaker 4: They went out through the hatch to the point of
27:19
Speaker 4: their hips. They didn't actually leave and float around in
27:21
Speaker 4: space like on that movie Gravity, because that's silly anyway.
27:25
Speaker 4: But what they did do is that they actually exposed
27:28
Speaker 4: themselves to the hazards of space. Jared Isagman saying one
27:31
Speaker 4: of the hardest tasks he's ever had to achieve. It
27:35
Speaker 4: was a very difficult task because of everything that had
27:38
Speaker 4: to go right and everything that had to be done
27:40
Speaker 4: to make that happen. So again, Jared Isacman would have
27:44
Speaker 4: been in the top ten, probably in the top five,
27:48
Speaker 4: just for that. But then when he came back home
27:52
Speaker 4: on December fourth, twenty twenty four, President elect Donald Trump
27:55
Speaker 4: announced that he was be picking Jared Isacman to lead NASA.
28:00
Speaker 4: And that's the big story of twenty twenty four, friends,
28:04
Speaker 4: is that this billionaire entrepreneur, aviator, philanthropist, and private astronaut,
28:09
Speaker 4: Jared Isaacman is likely going to become the next director
28:14
Speaker 4: of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, the next administrator
28:18
Speaker 4: of NASA. So that is the conclusion of a very
28:21
Speaker 4: big year, and again it represents a shift in thinking
28:26
Speaker 4: about the entire space industry and where we're going in
28:31
Speaker 4: the future as we move off our planet and move
28:34
Speaker 4: out at least into the Solar System.
28:37
Speaker 3: And we pose this question when that story broke, could
28:40
Speaker 3: he be the first NASA administrator to go to space
28:45
Speaker 3: while having the job. It's a possibility. And you know,
28:50
Speaker 3: there's some projects and things that he had taken to
28:53
Speaker 3: NASA before all of this and had them shot down.
28:57
Speaker 3: I suspect he'll have an easy time getting those approved,
29:01
Speaker 3: assuming that he is in fact confirmed to lead NASA.
29:04
Speaker 3: But massive story, massive year for him and Elon Musk,
29:09
Speaker 3: and certainly looks like it'll be a big year for
29:12
Speaker 3: both of them in twenty twenty five.
29:14
Speaker 4: What a great series of stories, right, And the fact, Wes,
29:18
Speaker 4: that you and I get to we get to ride
29:21
Speaker 4: this wave of fun space activities and see it and
29:26
Speaker 4: we got to see this amazing year of twenty twenty four.
29:28
Speaker 4: And a story that didn't make our top ten but
29:30
Speaker 4: probably would be number one on our list, is that
29:33
Speaker 4: Wes and I got to travel to the Kennedy Space
29:35
Speaker 4: Center and actually see the main stage booster for NASA's
29:39
Speaker 4: Space Launch System and the Artemis program come ashore at
29:43
Speaker 4: Kennedy Space Center and be in the press area for that.
29:45
Speaker 4: We got to interview some fantastic members of the organization
29:50
Speaker 4: for both Artemis and the Space Launch System and friends,
29:54
Speaker 4: you can hear those in the archive of nade of Stars.
29:57
Speaker 4: Go back and check out those shows. But it's been
30:00
Speaker 4: a great year for us to be able to watch
30:02
Speaker 4: all of this stuff and what is coming in twenty
30:04
Speaker 4: twenty five. It boggles the mind if we have this
30:08
Speaker 4: many cool stories to talk about from twenty twenty four,
30:11
Speaker 4: I almost can't wait for December twenty twenty five. We
30:14
Speaker 4: can look back and see all the amazing things that
30:17
Speaker 4: take place in the space exploration and space discovery ventures
30:22
Speaker 4: as we study the stars and travel amongst them. So friends,
30:26
Speaker 4: thank you for listening to Native Stars. We're hoping you
30:28
Speaker 4: have a great twenty twenty five, but make sure you
30:30
Speaker 4: stay with us because there's lots of fun to be
30:33
Speaker 4: had in the months ahead.
30:34
Speaker 3: Looking forward to jumping into that new year with you,
30:37
Speaker 3: Sean and tackling another year of these space news stories.
30:40
Speaker 3: Well to our listeners again, as always, we thank you
30:43
Speaker 3: for listening. We hope you're enjoying a great holiday season.
30:47
Speaker 3: Here day after Christmas, Honkkah has begun and that's going
30:51
Speaker 3: on now, So if you're celebrating that and a happy
30:55
Speaker 3: new Year, and we'll be back doing this again January second.
30:59
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