Catching up PART 1 – NEST

…the heck have I been? Well, dear readers… There’s been quite a gap in my posts save what I’d sent forward in time from the past. (The “jumping the timestream” posts were written and sent forward into the future by scheduling an automatic publish date years after they were written..) Why the gap? Lots and […]

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Everything You Wanted to Know About BEAM but Were Afraid to Ask

Humanity’s first human-habitable inflatable spaceship, (or as those in the industry prefer to call it, “expandable” spacecraft), is soon to launch off-world.  Tucked inside a Dragon cargo transport‘s “trunk” and perched atop a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket, this momentous departure targets the International Space Station (ISS) and is slated to occur today. The precious expandable […]

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Leaving Bigelow Aerospace

While I can’t speak too explicitly about the circumstances surrounding my departure, it’s time for me to update these chronicles to report that I’ve left my position as lead human factors analyst and radiation modeler/instrument designer at Bigelow Aerospace. I expect that this news may perplex many readers who know how long I’ve been working […]

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Recalling Dr. Edgar Mitchell

  We recently lost one of humanity’s pioneers – one of twelve to step on another world and a man who made a distinct impact on me, though in an unexpected way. Famous for his belief in extraterrestrial life and dabbling in the science of consciousness and extrasensory perception, he is most widely known for […]

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The Science Behind “America Declassified” – White Sands

Unintended Consequences My adventures as a scientist-host with the Travel Channel television series, “America Declassified” took me across the blinding flats of the White Sands Missile Range, which had unintended consequences.  Unnervingly, it deposited a sliver in my mind that I simply cannot ignore. In forging outward across the staggeringly-immense, derelict runways we now know […]

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“Astronaut Politics” Meme

One of the universally-championed benefits of human space exploration is not actually related to any physical activities performed while in space.  Instead, an important aspect of leaving our world is the change in perception that space exploration has upon astronauts themselves, and the societies that receive them, upon their return. Irrespective of country of origin, […]

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Treatise: Abandoning OldSpace’s Conceit

Space Exploration is suffering an identity crisis. Like atmospheric flight before it, space exploration is evolving to include a spectrum of public and private participants, motivations, and goals.  However, even amongst space enthusiasts and professionals, there is much (mostly friendly – I’ll get to that) debate regarding just what exactly it is that qualifies as […]

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