NASA StreaM

The spotlights came on in the predawn hours of April 12th 1981, illuminating a spacecraft like no other, the space shuttle. Just before liftoff, Columbia's crew climbed inside for the very first test flight into space.

When instrumentation controller JoAnn Morgan was in Firing Room number One for the historic moonshot in 1969, she was the only woman. NASA has come a long way since. Today, the very same firing room is led by a woman, and 30% of the engineers supporting NASA's Artemis Moon program are women, too.

The Rocket Ranch welcomes Sheldon Lauderdale, Program Analyst for NASA's Commercial Crew Program, to share where he draws inspiration and talk about his role supporting NASA’s efforts to expand diversity and inclusion to empower the next generation of explorers.

After a 300 million mile journey through space, the Mars Perseverance Rover is ready to begin the most challenging part of the trip, landing on the red planet. If successful, it will embark on the most advanced mission ever sent here, to discover if life ever existed on Mars.

On this episode of the Rocket Ranch Podcast, we remember Challenger, her crew and their survivors, and how we carry forward the lessons NASA learned with the director of the Apollo Challenger Columbia Lessons Learned Program.

Astronaut Chris Hadfield flew to space three times, and was the first Canadian to walk in space. His cover of David Bowie's Space Oddity that he recorded on the International Space Station has over 47 million views, and as you're about to hear, he's given a lot of thought to the future of space exploration, and what it can mean for all of us.

The NASA Kennedy Launch team has persevered through a global pandemic to get a Mars Rover named Perseverance to the launch pad on time. The cloud of doubt the virus cast over the Mars mission and how NASA overcame it, next on the Rocket Ranch.

Bob Behnken and Doug Hurley will make history when they break the bond from Earth in a SpaceX Crew Dragon capsule that's never been flown by humans before. But find out how the strong bond of friendship they share gives them the edge in space.

And with the number one overall pick in the Kennedy Space Center NFL Draft, NASA selects Jacksonville, Jaguar quarterback and aerospace engineer Josh Dobbs. Next on the Rocket Ranch.

Pluto is not a planet...or is it? Next on the "Rocket Ranch.”

Sometimes history inspires us. Sometimes we find ourselves in the middle of history being made. Now we are in the middle of the most aggressive push for the Moon since we landed there the first time 50 years ago.

Commercial and government partnerships and contracts might not sound that fascinating, but when we're talking about certifying Boeing Starliner to carry humans to space, the challenges and complexities become a whole lot more interesting.

Rockets are dangerous. And before we strap our star sailors in, we need to know there is a proven escape plan.

The air-launched Northrop Grumman Pegasus XL is the vehicle selected to launch NASA's Ionospheric Connection Explorer, or ICON.

For over 20 years, NASA's Launch Services Program (LSP) has been the workhorse of uncrewed spaceflight, enabling exploration of Pluto, the Sun, the Earth and other worlds. In this episode, we hear from Amanda Mitskevich and Chuck Dovale - two leaders within LSP.

Every member of the NASA team is critical to our success, even if they're still finishing school. In this episode, we hear from two of our summer interns, Amber George and Peter Henson, during their first week here and their first impressions.

In this episode,we unpack the need and value of test flights with Jon Cowart, as well as dig into the recent, successful, second test of Orion’s Launch Abort System with Carlos Garcia.

NASA looks back at the Apollo era and ahead at the Artemis missions to come.

We're looking back at the Space Station Processing Facility, or SSPF, as it turns 25 years old.