Nathan started the meeting with a bit of space news
Our recent tour to Nanoracks
Launches since our last meeting: https://spaceflightnow.com/launch-log/
Definitely worth watching the press conference afterwards:
Next up in its lunar campaign, China is preparing to launch its Chang’e-5 sample-return mission late this year. Chang’e-5 will launch on the huge Long March 5 rocket and will be the first mission to retrieve samples from the moon since the Soviet Union’s Luna 24 mission in 1976. ” ( https://www.space.com/china-moon-far-side-lander-rover-photos-14th-lunar-day.html )
1794 days till the end of 2024 by which time NASA will have astronauts return to the moon as part of the Artemis program.
Progress is being made testing Artemis I.
If you know someone qualified and passionate about getting humanity into space, please have them apply: https://blueorigin.wd5.myworkdayjobs.com/BlueOrigin/0/refreshFacet/318c8bb6f553100021d223d9780d30be
Other companies are also putting in a bid for human lunar landers
It is worth reading the text and the amendments:
https://www.congress.gov/bill/116th-congress/house-bill/5666/text
As well as watching the markup session.
And it is also worth reading Jim Bridenstine’s response to the bill: https://blogs.nasa.gov/bridenstine/2020/01/27/nasa-authorization-bill-update/
The bill still has a long way to go before it becomes law. But it gets things off on a wrong foot. Please write your representative, senators, and the people on the Science committee.
We then talked about the 2020 Space Communicator program
And Adam Hawkins gave his first speech.
He received a “2020 Space Communicator Candidate” certificate
Then we rearranged the room for group discussion on “Why Space” from Robert Zubrin’s “A Case for Space”
