orbital tourism

Guest: Dr. William (Bill) Halal. Topics: Space forecasting for the near and long term. Please direct all comments and questions regarding Space Show programs/guest(s) to the Space Show blog, http://thespaceshow.wordpress.com. Comments and questions should be relevant to the specific Space Show program. Written Transcripts of Space Show programs are a violation of our copyright and are not permitted without prior written consent, even if for your own use.

Guest: John Spencer. Topics: Space Tourism Society and space tourism development. You are invited to comment, ask questions, and discuss the Space Show program/guest(s) on the Space Show blog, http://thespaceshow.wordpress.com. Comments, questions, and any discussion must be relevant and applicable to Space Show programming. Transcripts of Space Show programs are not permitted without prior written consent from The Space Show (even if for personal use) & are a violation of the Space Show copyright.

Guest: Dr. George Nield. Topics: personal spaceflight regulations, Office of Commercial Space Transportation within FAA, launch license. Dr. George Nield returned to The Space Show to update us on changes in space policy and regulation per the AST. For more information, visit their website at http://www.faa.gov/about/office_org/headquarters_offices/ast/ . Dr. Nield told us about the many changes and developments within the FAA and AST since his last appearance on the show in the summer of 2008.

Guest: Brent Sherwood: Topics: Options for human spaceflight, NASA, life support factors, destinations. Brent Sherwood was our returning guest for this Space Show program to discuss his recent White Paper which addresses various options for human spaceflight. Brent will make his paper available to me so if you would like a copy, please send me an email requesting it and I'll forward it to you as soon as possible. In Segment 1, we started off the show with Brent telling us something about JPL. Did you know they have seven business lines?

Guest: Rand Simberg was the guest for today's Space Show program. Our discussion started by mentioning that Richardson had withdrawn his name from consideration for Secretary of Commerce in the Obama administration. We talked about this for a few minutes as there were some possible space ramifications to his appointment and now with his withdrawal. We then moved on to the issue of comparing COTS and Shuttle as was done on the RocketsandSuch blog and copied over to the Space Cynics site per our discussion last week.

Guest: Dr. Melcho Antunano, Director of Civil Aerospace Medical Institute at the FAA, was the guest for this Space Show program. Our primary topic for discussion was the role of the FAA in setting policy, guidelines, or requirements for medical qualifications for flight crews and spaceflight participants for both suborbital and orbital space tourism. Dr. Antunano pointed out several times that the FAA does not set the policy or requirements. Instead, they produce guidelines only and it is then up to the spaceflight companies to issue their own standards and guidelines.

Guests: Randa and Rod Milliron of Interorbital Systems, Inc. returned to The Space Show today in order to update us on new developments with their company. Having just returned from the SmallSat Conference and seeing the Millirons there, we decided to start our discussion with their presentation subject from SmallSat regarding Cubesats. Then, we focused on ocean launch which Interorbital is using. Their Sea Star rocket is being designed for CubeSat launches with engine testing and test flights at the end of this year and commercial operations due later in 2009.

Guest: Dr. Patrick Collins was our very special guest for this 1,000th Space Show program! Dr. Collins joined us from Japan as he was also the very first Space Show guest on June 13, 2001. We started our discussion with a type of report card for space tourism in 2001 and now in 2008. We both went through a list of milestones, accomplishments, events, and developments in order to ascertain the level of progress made in developing space tourism over the past seven years. Dr.

Col. Rick Searfoss returned to The Space Show for this Tuesday evening program. We began the interview talking about the commercial space industry and primarily his experience and relationship with XCOR Aerospace. We talked about flying rockets, the Rocket Racing League, suborbital space tourism, safety issues, test flights, and more. As a result of a listener question, Col. Searfoss addressed competition in the suborbital tourism industry and safety given the pressure of competition. Col.