I’m Anthony Colangelo.

At a town hall this week, NASA announced that the Human Exploration and Operations Mission Directorate will be split in two: the Exploration Systems Development Mission Directorate, led by Jim Free, and the Space Operations Mission Directorate, led by Kathy Lueders. I discuss what this change might mean for the future of NASA’s human spaceflight program, and why I think it’s not something to worry about if you’re a Kathy Lueders stan.

Last week, Firefly made their first flight attempt of Alpha, and Astra launched their latest vehicle, LV0006. Though both ended in failure, it’s a good time to check in on them and other small launchers that will debut soon like, ABL’s RS1 and Relativity’s Terran 1, and how they may all compete with each other.

Jake and Anthony are joined by Joe Barnard of BPS.Space to talk about what he’s been working on lately, what it’s like being a creator online these days, and various other topics like Firefly’s first launch, Virgin Galactic’s Kobayashi Maru, and what Chuck E. Cheese has been up to during the pandemic.

Eric Berger of Ars Technica returns to the show to talk about the recent crewed suborbital flights by Virgin Galactic and Blue Origin, Blue Origin’s Project Jarvis and their future work, and what the chaotic arrival of Nauka means for the future of the ISS and international space politics.

Jake and Anthony are joined by Chelsea Gohd from Space.com to talk about the rarest of space events: double hot drama! Nauka, after a tumultuous week of its own, almost destroyed the ISS, and Blue Origin wrote an open letter while simulatenously losing its protest.

Richard Branson flew to space aboard SpaceShipTwo on Virgin Galactic’s Unity 22, and Jeff Bezos flew to space aboard Blue Origin’s New Shepard 16. I share my thoughts on the flights, the vehicles, and how I’m currently looking at suborbital tourism and why it does or doesn’t matter.

Marcia Smith of SpacePolicyOnline.com joins me for a round up of space policy news, including how the Biden and Nelson administrations are doing so far, things that are being overlooked or sidelined, the Senate’s NASA Authorization bill, NASA’s Human Landing System contract and the battle for funding, the space tourism learning period, and we finish with a quick look at what China and Russia have been up to lately.

Jake is moving, and has left Anthony alone with the keys to the show. Chris Gebhardt of NASASpaceflight and Jason Davis of the Planetary Society return to the show to talk about our newest Venus armada, China’s new space station, and the space politics cold war of Artemis vs China & Russia’s International Lunar Research Station. And bizarrely, an entire segment about Ares I-X.

I’m joined by Matt LaPointe, Technical Director at Redwire’s Deployable Space Systems, and Andrew Rush, COO of Redwire, to talk about the newest upgrade to the International Space Station: the Roll-Out Solar Arrays that are currently being deployed over the course of several spacewalks.

Phil Bracken, Vice President of Engineering at Spaceflight, joins me to talk about their past, current, and upcoming missions, the Sherpa program, and to dive into the technical details of it all.

This month, Anthony and Jake are taking it bit easier. It’s summer, everyone is excited about getting back in to the world again, and space news will be winding down a bit. It’s just the two of us, and we go through a potpourri of topics from random space stories that have caught our attention, some stray conspiracy theory talk, then talk shop about our plans for the show, our work, our lives, and more.

Brock Howe, the Program Manager for Nanoracks’ Bishop Airlock, joins me to talk about the final build out and launch of Bishop, its installation on ISS, some details of its operations, and its plans for the future on ISS and beyond.

Stephen Forbes, the Program Manager for DARPA’s Blackjack project, joins me to talk about DARPA and its interaction with the rest of the Department of Defense, how they appraoch space initiatives, where Blackjack came from, where it’s going, what they hope to accomplish with it, and how it fits into the near-future of the industry.

SpaceX successfully flew and landed Starship SN15 last week, amid protests of their NASA HLS award by Blue Origin and Dynetics.

Miriam Kramer joins Jake and Anthony to talk about space tourism. From Inspiration4, to Axiom-1, to suborbital flights, to some future adventures we’d like to go on. And some we wouldn’t.

Eric Berger of Ars Technica returns to the show to talk about NASA selecting SpaceX’s Starship for its Artemis landings, Bill Nelson’s nomination hearing, Amazon buying 9 Atlas V launches for Kuiper, and the state of Blue Origin.

NASA selected SpaceX’s Starship as its ride for crew to the lunar surface as part of the Artemis program. As the Source Selection Statement outlines, Starship was selected as the sole winner because of the constrained lander budget. It’s an aggressive, interesting, and exciting move from NASA, so I have a lot of thoughts.

President Biden nominated Bill Nelson to be the new NASA Administrator, so I check in on some of my past thoughts on NASA Administrators and Jim Bridenstine, talk about Bill Nelson’s history in space policy, and what the future may hold under a Bill Nelson NASA.

Our good friend Jake Robins, host of WeMartians and my cohost on Off-Nominal, joins me to talk about the arrival and early operations of the 2021 Mars fleet—Hope, Tianwen-1, and Perseverance. Then we dig into what the future of Martian exploration looks like, including strategy, communications, sample return, and the upcoming decadal survey.

Leo Enright, the guy from Irish TV, joins Jake and Anthony to talk about covering space from a non-traditional space country, how he got started covering space, some current topics including Perseverance, ESA’s new Director General, and to generally have a great time.