SSP

Guest: Doris Hamill. Topics: NASA's mission and vision, commercializing human space flight. Our guest, Doris Hamill, wrote two excellent Space Review articles that formed the basis for this Space Show program. The articles, "To Reach Ever Further: A Mission and a Vision for NASA," Oct. 12, 2009 (www.thespacereview.com/article/1487/1#) and "The Second Fifty Years: Expanding Human Presence On The Space Frontier," Oct.

Guest: Mark Hempsell. Topics: Reaction Engines, Ltd., SKYLON, special heat exchangers, low cost space access. We welcomed first time guest Mark Hempsell. Mark is the Futures Program Director for Reaction Engines, Ltd. in the UK. I suggest you follow along on their website with this interview at http://www.reactionengines.co.uk . In the first segment, Mark started out by referencing previous efforts by Reaction Engines, Ltd. with the HOTOL space shuttle project that was cancelled by the British government.

Guest: Dean Davis. Topics: public education, engineers, lobbying elected officials, GPS vulnerability, airborne laser, SSP, satellite protection, Phantom Works. This program is the first of a series of programs The Space Show is undertaking regarding the state of public education in California as well as the rest of the United States. Dean Davis was our guest today to discuss with us STEM education and educational outreach programs for public high school students as well as other K-12 educational programs.

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 Our discussion started by mentioning that Richardson had withdrawn his name from consideration for Secretary of Commerce in the Obama administration.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: Richard Phillips was the guest for this program to discuss the space economy and space commerce participants. We started off with Rich defining the space economy, opportunities within it, entrepreneurial activity, and sustainability. This is a must hear discussion and program. We also discussed Momentum Management, the three arenas for space commerce, which were listed as : space being relevant to security, space being relevant to the environment and energy, and space and universal communications.

Guests: Dr. Tom Jones and Dr. Ellen Stofan were the guests for this program to discuss their new book, "Planetology: Unlocking The Secrets Of The Solar System." We started our discussion with Drs. Jones and Stofan telling us how they got together and collaborated on this book which contains 250 unique color photographs plus an equal amount of exciting and informative text.

Guest: Norman J. Gerstein was the guest for this special Space Show program. Mr. Gerstein was deeply involved in Rover/NERVA and we discussed these programs in detail. He was part of the KIWI-TNT team and involved in the cleanup by picking up the debris with a wheelbarrow and tongs. Norm described these programs in detail along with the nuclear rocket which we compared to chemical rockets. Norm made it very clear that one needs a mission to do these programs. Another way of saying it, is to make sure there is a need. Since there was no need (no mission), the programs were cancelled.

Guest: Dr. Marshall Kaplan was our guest for today's show. We started our discussion with an introduction to his teaching, training, and education company, Launchspace (Please see http//www.launchspace.com/ ). We talked about his upcoming classes, Space Principles and Space Vehicle Mechanisms, plus other courses offered. Dr. Kaplan told us about the market for these courses, who teaches them, and many of the topics taught. In addition to talking about Launchspace, we talked about U.S. space policy, its importance, the risks it faces, and more.

Guest: Robert Zimmerman was the guest for today's Space Show program. We started our discussion with updates on the Hubble Space Telescope (HST) and the shuttle repair mission to the HST. From there, Bob told us about the waiver obtained for allowing NASA to continue using the Soyuz to access the ISS and the letter written by Dr. Griffin to Barack Obama thanking him for his help in obtaining the waiver. Bob speculated that Griffin might be showing Senator Obama that he wants to remain NASA Administrator, even in a possible Obama administration.

Guests: Dr. Bryan Laubscher and Dr. Martin Lades were guests for today's Space Show to discuss the space elevator and the upcoming space elevator conference (www.spaceelevatorconference.org). We started our discussion with the basics of the space elevator concept and why at this point in time convergence is necessary for the space elevator's development. Our two guests covered these issues in some detail and then more when listeners starting asking about why we need a space elevator.