- [Interviewer] Well, thanks very much, just maybe start out by telling me, again, your name, and your title, and kind of, you know, what you do here at NASA. - My name is Victor Glover, and I was previously a Naval aviator and test pilot, and I am now one of NASA's newest astronauts, showed up in 2013, a part of the 21st group of astronauts, and I'm really looking forward to that 22nd group getting here. - [Interviewer] Kind of a cliche question, but, you know, and I'm sure you've heard it many times, but, you know, how did you come to join NASA, and, you know, is this something you dreamed about as a kid, or what inspired you? - So what inspired me to apply for the astronaut program, it's actually a two part answer, as a kid, I saw a shuttle launch on television, and I thought to myself, I want to drive a space shuttle. I mean, that's how little I knew about it, I didn't say I wanted to be an astronaut, I didn't say I wanted to even fly the shuttle, I said, "I want to drive a space shuttle." But as I got older, going into the military test pilot school, having an engineering background, I had a lot in common with folks that had been successful in the application process, and I was at an engineering conference, and Pam Melroy spoke at that conference, and that's when it became real for me, when it became a professional pursuit. Listening to her speak about the technical accomplishments, that was the solar array repair, if you remember the cuff links story. Listening to her talk about that amazing technical feat, but how much it was really about the people that she worked with, that really was inspiring. - [Interviewer] Yeah, that picture of Scott Parazynski out on the arm, dangling off of it, it was pretty amazing, amazing one. - Really amazing, absolutely. - [Interviewer] That, that mission. Did you dream about going to the moon, Mars, or what was your, or was it just getting into space? - The very first thought was flying the space shuttle, so I'm a machine guy, I would go off and, after college, join the military, and become a pilot, I flew the F-18 on and off of carriers, and so working as a part of a high performing team, and doing something different, high-speed, going fast, going high, that was, that was important to me. And so the machine was a part of it, and a rocket is an even faster, higher machine. Once the professional pursuit actually began, and the idea of going into space, you know, was a potential, going to the moon was obviously a dream, it is my dream, that's my dream now, I want to walk on the moon. But I at least would like to see the dark side of the moon with my own eyes. - [Interviewer] Um, it's a really interesting time for NASA, because the space shuttle, obviously, came out in 1981, first flight was designed in the '70s, and now there are three vehicles being developed with NASA funding, Orion, Starliner, Dragon 2. It's, it's going to be an interesting time for an astronaut from that perspective, having all of this new hardware, spacecraft, untested coming, coming online. - You know, standing where we are, looking out on the horizon, and having Orion, and SLS in development, having Space X and Boeing vehicles in development, is an interesting time, it's, it reminds you of all of those stories that you've heard about the care that it took to create Apollo, and all the vehicles leading up to that, as well as the space shuttle, and the Space Station. And so, you know, it's a reminder for us that we have to be vigilant, and do all that we can to ensure their learning those lessons, and that we remember those lessons. We talked earlier about the importance of just being able to talk to those Apollo era guys, and pass on some of those things that are just not obvious about working and living in space. But it's also a very exciting time, so there's the very serious aspect, and then there's a very motivational aspect, in that we are very soon going to be operating, on a regular basis, five spacecraft. Orion, Starliner, Crew Dragon, or Dragon 2, and we'll still be flying, living, and working on the Space Station, and we'll also still fly the Soyuz vehicle with the, the Russians, so it's a very interesting time, and I like to, it's a great time to be a new guy here. - [Interviewer] A lot of opportunities ahead. When your class came in in 2013, and you guys were candidates, and I don't know if they talked to you about this during the interview process, or actually after you, they got here, but were they hiring you to do Space Station, or were they hiring you to do deep space, or what was your, you know, what were you kind of expecting to do when you came in? - We are absolutely, when NASA hired our class in 2013, we were showing up to be long duration International Space Station crew members, and that is still true, and that will be true as long as we have a Space Station, or whatever station that we follow on with. But one of the great things about this job is that it's not just the six months or a year that you're, you're blessed to work and live on the Space Station, you also have a commitment to all of the operations and planning that go into it, spacecraft design, those are great things, but there's lots of procedure development. We work on emergency procedures, and we're a part of the meeting and the groups that develop payload procedures, and the science, so there's the experience that you gain from space flight that applies to all of these different operational and planning efforts that go on here at Johnson Space Center, so you, we also knew that we would have an opportunity to work on Orion, my first job was working on launch landing and recovery systems for Orion and SLS, and so there is an opportunity to be involved in lots of different aspects of the exploration mission, but we were hired to be long duration astronauts. - [Interviewer] What's one or two things, maybe, that you've learned since becoming an astronaut? I'm sure you've learned many things, but I'm sure you had some preconceptions about spaceflight, or NASA, or being an astronaut, or, you know, the relative ease of getting into space, or working in space. What are, you know, kind of one or two things that, you know, surprised you, or that it really stuck out to you as you sort of, you know, spent the last three or four years here? - Some of the surprising things that I've learned since showing up here in 2013 are just how hard that the crews are working in the training flow, just how hard the work is to fly in space, learning the US segment of the Space Station, learning the Russian segment, having to go to Russia and learn, in a foreign language, and then having to come home and be here, briefly, and probably doing some very intense training then, just to see that training flow up close, that, that has been a big surprise. And also, when you're assigned to an ISS mission, you're probably the only US crew member, or maybe there's another international partner with you, and so there's also a little bit of an isolation piece to that, you're traveling internationally quite often, you have your own training schedule, and so they're on their own training program. There's a very unique schedule for those folks in that training flow, and so you have to be emotionally ready, as well as intellectually ready, and that was a surprise to see, as well. - [Interviewer] Yeah, I've heard that the, or, I had the pleasure of going to Star City a couple of years ago, and sort of seeing some of the training that's done over there, and it's, they, the way that they give tests there is a little different than you have here. - A little different. - [Interviewer] So, it, you're right, there is, definitely like, it's almost like grad schooL. - Yes, yeah, absolutely, a lot of this job is, it's like continually being in school, yeah. - [Interviewer] Graduation's a little better, though. - The graduation is awesome, awesomer, is that a word, it's awesomer. - [Interviewer] So how is your Russian? - It's, I actually just came here from Russian class, and it is one of those things that is volatile. If you stop for a week, it just seems to go away, so we have the opportunity to take classes every week, as often as you have time, and I try to get four to six hours a week, and it's tough to balance with all of the other requirements, but I think my Russian is at least good enough to find a bathroom and pizza in Moscow, so I think I'd be okay. - [Interviewer] So you complete, your class completed training in 2015, is that right? - That's correct. - [Interviewer] What was that like, versus what you'd been doing for the last two years? - Astronaut candidate training completed for us on July 8th of 2015, it was the same day we got the first images of Pluto from New Horizons, that was, so that's a cool day, that day will always stand out. Astronaut candidate training was amazing, because you did it as a class, the eight of us were together a lot, and there was, you know, the focus on that group, and getting them sort of from, from, you know, what you came in as into neophyte astronaut, that process was amazing. And then after that, it starts, you start to get introduced to that training flow, that intellectual and emotional challenge that the assigned folks experience in, you're now spread out doing different things to support the office, and you spent a lot of time together, and so now you have to expand that network, and get to know the rest of the office, and so we all went into different programs, some of us worked Space Station, I worked exploration, Orion and SLS, some of us worked on commercial crew, robotics, EVA, and, but it's to really broaden the knowledge base. And since then, I have assumed a new job working ISS realtime operations, so I'll start attending all of the meetings for the planning, and I'll be the crew representative in the planning meetings that we do here on the ground. And so it's been, it's been a learning experience, I, this job is like being in college, I learn something every day, and I go home and I am mentally exhausted most days. And so it's been two years of learning, of learning, there is a lot to learn, and when you think you've learned something, well, the sand has shifted, something's changed, and so now you have to go back, and maybe it's one data point, but maybe it was something fundamental, the organization of the Space Station, and so now you have to really relearn some things that you knew that were related. - [Interviewer] I was wondering, you know we spoke with some of the original astronauts, and they talked about, you know, being in a battle rhythm, you know, just, they're soldiers, they're doing the thing that they were prepared to do, and you have a legacy of NASA behind you, and it seems like there's a lot of focus on intellectual activity, and I'm wondering if there's, kind of, because of this huge legacy, if there's a sobering moment for you where, you know, not, you're, it's beyond the, you know, I have a job, and I need to get that done, where you see the bigger picture. - I,I wouldn't call it "sobering moments," a "sobering moment," I would say that there are sobering moments, and yeah, I could name quite a few. Beginning in astronaut candidate training, when we started our earth science and geology training, we had two guest lecturers, Dave Scott and Harrison Schmidt came by to talk to us about their training, and just to say hi, and to meet our class. And so that was sobering, to meet these two gentlemen that had been to the moon, and to listen to them talk about some of their experiences. And things like that happen on a regular basis, but I think the idea of going into space, working and living in space, for a new guy, it, there are a plethora of sobering moments. When the flight directors invite Chris Kraft to, you know, to come back and to speak, and they come up into our conference room, and you listen to them talk about some of the things that they dealt with, and some of the challenges that they overcame. That, those are, they're often, they're frequent here, and so we have an opportunity to stay in touch with that legacy, and that's something that's very important to me, because the intellectual development, I think we've, we've got that pretty well figured out, but the emotional preparation is something that you have to constantly be thinking about, or it can get away from you. And if you read things like, I'm a, actually, the book, The Right Stuff, most people know The Right Stuff, I think The Right Stuff is purely about social, emotional development. And there's another book called Deep Survival by Laurence Gonzales, and I read them close together, and it really made me think about this importance of emotional preparation with your intellectual preparation. And I won't go into any details, but if you look, if you read that book, you'll find plenty of examples of these professionals that were intellectually prepared that had mistakes happen when they were in the moment because of emotional responses, so, all that said, there are, we are replete with opportunities to sort of have that profound, you know, wow, I could be sitting in a meeting, talking about a valve, and you'll get really into the technical details, and you'll start talking about pressures, and numbers, and fluids, and then you'll remember, you're talking about this valve that goes in a spacesuit or a spacecraft, because you might wear it or fly it in space one day. And so I think you have plenty of opportunities to have profound moments here at Johnson Space Center. - [Interviewer] So speaking of books, Mike Mullane, he was an astronaut who came into NASA, I think in 1978, he was the first shuttle class, and he writes pretty vividly in his book about how he really wanted to become an astronaut, but then, once he got here, kind of, like, with his classmates, it was closeness, but there was also competition. - Mm-hmm. - [Interviewer] Because you wanted to prove you were the best, because you wanted to get selected to fly, and that was at a time, you know, when they were talking about flying six, seven, eight shuttle missions a year. - Yeah. - [Interviewer] Lots of flight opportunities-- - Absolutely. - [Interviewer] You know, it's about four seats a year for US astronauts. - Correct. - [Interviewer] Going to station, and so as you wait in line, and there were these limited opportunities, however difficult is it, how do you manage that, that delay, and I don't know, I don't want to call it frustration, I don't want to put words in your mouth, but how do you deal with that? - Yeah, interesting question, and, and I would say that the waiting, everyone probably deals with it differently, but it's also important to go back and remember, not, the flight rate is different than it was in the shuttle era, so that's a huge part of it, and the idea of competition is also different, because we're, it's long duration space flights, so now when you get up on the Station, you're going to be there for six months, or maybe a year, and so this idea of being a team player and working together has a whole new level of importance. And so I think the competitive spirit is still there, and it, but it's really now against physics, or the training program, right, those are the things that we're working against, not each other, we work really hard to work together well, and you can put a group of people together and have them work together well, or you can focus on it, and really optimize. And that's the difference, I think we are optimizing our ability to work together as a team by focusing on that as a part of our training. So, for me, dealing with the wait, because it is a potentially long wait, and if you're going to do, you know, wait for 10 years to fly in space, for me, I say I'm not here every single day waiting to fly in space, I have things to do here. A big part of this job is terrestrial, you get the, the fortunate opportunity to fly in space, but you have lots of work to do on the ground first. So that's the main part of, for me, it's realizing the breadth of this job, and flying in space is sort of the icing on the cake. But, I said earlier, it's also a really good time to be here, for a new guy, because we have those five vehicles that will be operating at one time, so it's going to be a very interesting phase, I think we're going to look back on this time, and we will look back on it fondly, it was a special time, and it will be. So knowing that, well, I could be assigned tomorrow, and go to Russia, Viking, or launch on a Soyuz and go to Space Station for six months, or I could wait a few years, or even more years than that, and fly one of our commercial crew vehicles, fly Boeing or Space X, I'm going to stop saying "commercial crew," I don't like that term, fly Boeing or Space X vehicles to Space Station, or I could fly Orion to the moon. I mean, that, it actually, that was one of those profound moments, the fact that I'm not saying that, like to one of my buddies that, hey, that's something that would be awesome to do, but to say that I could fly Orion to the moon, NASA's building the vehicle, and I work in the office where people are trained to go to space, so that could easily happen, that's amazing. So it makes it easy to wait, when you know that those things are on the horizon. - [Interviewer] Why don't you like the term "commercial crew"? - I just think the term is a little bit confusing to the public, and it really is a program term, and so when we start saying that in public, though, people are, I, and I'm not trying to insult the intelligence of the public, but if folks aren't studying NASA programs, and realize the nuance there, that these are NASA missions, NASA will have possession of the vehicle, NASA's crews will be on there, and our international partners will be on these vehicles, they are in the commercial crew program, but they will support NASA missions, and that's where I think the nuance is important. So if I fly on a Space X Dragon 2, or a Boeing Starliner to the Space Station, when you see it launch from the pad at the cape, you're not going to use the term "commercial crew," you're going to say, "Those are our people going to the Space Station." - [Interviewer] Well, that's an interesting point, and I kind of agree with you, that the term "commercial crew" doesn't really mean much if you don't know-- - Right. - [Interviewer] If you, you can't really figure out what it means-- - I would like for us to stop using it in public, it's great for meetings, it means something very specific in here, inside the walls, outside the walls, it's just seeding the ground for confusion, so I try to say the Boeing Starliner, or Space X Crew Dragon when I'm talking about those programs. - [Interviewer] So a couple of years ago, there was a special screening of The Martian down the road, I think you were there, I think I saw you there when, a couple,got to go over there, too, for that, with the JFC people, so as you're sitting there watching this on the screen, are you thinking, damn, that could be me, or what were you thinking? - So it was, we were fortunate to have a screening of The Martian here in Houston, and watching the movie, there were a lot of thoughts and feelings, and one of them was, yes, one day that could be me. And that would be awesome, I would love to go to Mars, I will do all that I can to stay healthy, so that however old I am, NASA can say, "Hey, are you ready to go," and I can say yes. But it was really profound to be sitting there, my classmates were around me, there were flight directors in the same row, and other folks that work on all these NASA programs, and to be sitting there with that team, it was really different to sit in a premier of this movie with NASA folks, this was open to mostly NASA folks, as opposed to just going and seeing it with my family. Now, we read the book, and we saw the movie multiple times as a family, but to sit there with the NASA team, and, again, going back to that legacy, and to think about folks like, like Glynn Lunney, and Chris Kraft, and Gene Kranz, and to think about guys like Jack Schmitt, and Dave Scott, and to sit there, with the folks that could make what was happening on the screen reality, and to be a part of that was another one of those profound moments, it was just really amazing to watch. - [Interviewer] Do you have any advice for the passengers that are going to be going up on Blue Origin's new Shepard vehicle in a, probably a year and a half, or two years? - Oh, wow, if you sat me here long enough, I could probably just keep talking, but I would say this, when I learned to fly the F-18, one of my instructors said something once, very briefly, he didn't repeat it a bunch of times, but he said it once, "Master degraded mode operations." And that advice has just, it's come up throughout my career, in the Navy, and here at NASA, and it's something that you don't always have time to do, it's not always the core part of your training, but knowing how things work when they're not working normally. Even though they may show up to a system where they say, "It's plug and play," you get in, you go up and down, like you don't study to go on a ride at an amusement park, but your life is in that, especially in the beginning, and you want to know all that you can, and that's the way we do things here at NASA. We try to understand and characterize a system, so I would just suggest that they master degraded mode operations. Now, that said, I would hope that they would enjoy those beautiful windows, when you're up there, take a moment to enjoy a view that is very unique, and you're more comfortable doing that if you know that you could fly the vehicle in any situation, or respond, in kind if there's a problem. - [Interviewer] What do you think about when you see them doing some really interesting tests in West Texas, and you see Space X doing some pretty cool things, you know, landing on, at landing zone one, and then on the boat, and then flying that rocket again. - All of that makes me think of how special it is that humans can do these things at all. Working and living on a carrier, I'm amazed that humans built aircraft carriers, and so seeing these things done, it amazes me that humans are accomplishing these things, so I'm very grateful that there are smart people out there making these things happen. And I always say, all space is good space, everything that's going on right now, the applications that we have for the next astronaut candidate class, it set a record, it was almost three times as many applicants as folks that applied for our class. And I think it's because it's a great time, it's a great time to be a new astronaut at NASA, it's a great time to be a part of the human spaceflight mission, it's a great time to be at NASA. And I think the public is just, whether it's NASA influenced what's going on in the public, or the public is influencing what's going on at NASA, both of them are important, and the media, the movies, the books, the buzz you see in the media going on, I think it's all important, and it's all because it's a really unique time here for the space agency, and for the human spaceflight program. - [Interviewer] What, what is the rational, in your opinion, for human exploration of the deep space, either the moon, or Mars, or both? You know, obviously we can do a lot with probes on Mars, we can do things on the moon with probes. When you think about it, you know, why, why should humans be on sort of the, "no bucks, no Buck Rogers" idea, or, no Buck Rogers, no bucks, depending on. But, you know, why should humans be involved in the exploration of deep space, do you think? - Wow, okay, why should humans be involved in deep space exploration, or space exploration period. We have amazing machines, and technological answers to looking around at our universe, but to make a, to use a piloting example, there are just some things that you can't do with a remotely piloted, or un-piloted aircraft that you can do with a person. We have great machines for sensing the weather, for example, and if you look at a radar map of where bad weather is, and you see this image, and it's a spread out blob of thunderstorm, well, yeah, you want to stay away from that. However, they're three dimensional, and so sometimes there's a big mass over here, and a big mass over here, and when you look at it from the top, what you see is just that big mass. But when you look at it from the side, you can see the three-dimensional nature of it, and when you put a person in there, you can move the things around appropriately, you can manipulate the technology to really answer the question, and so I think I heard someone say that the rovers that are on Mars now have collected data for years, and it would take a person about a week to do the same amount of data collection. But the person could also do in situ signs, they could do analysis, and make decisions right there, and that the machines can't do, but all of the data they've collected over those years, a person could do it in a week or a month. So that's one reason, that's a little more technical, but I also think what you said earlier, about the "no bucks, no Buck Rogers," and the no Buck Rogers, no bucks, the inspirational piece of this, going to aerospace companies, I met a gentleman that worked for one of the companies that makes our rocket engines, and he's worked for that company for 30 years, and he said he had never met an astronaut. And I think that belief, and it had nothing to do with me, but for him to meet an astronaut, it made his day, he wanted to take a picture, and he was just excited, and it made him want to do his job a little bit better. I think that inspirational piece, not just in the emotional sense, but what it creates in the corporate world, what businesses push themselves to do, it's why we have companies like Space X, and it's why we have the space director at Lockheed Martin and at Boeing, and I think that trying to put people in an environment that they won't naturally survive in, it means you have to have great engineering, medical, physiological, and every other type of technology working together well, in harmony. And so I, I really think that inspirational piece is a little bit deeper than we give it credit for sometimes, it inspires things in all of our different scientific and political endeavors and areas. I think that is a very important part of why humans have to be involved, if there's no Buck Rogers, there's also not as much emotional connection to it, and even though, whether you like politics or not, the word "politics" comes from a word that is rooted in this Greek idea of Polis, which is the city, the people, the waterways, it's the resources of the land. And when you think of politics in that term, the politics are also very important, and the person being in the arena makes the politics that much more supportable. - [Interviewer] I certainly agree that to engage with a broader audience, you need, you need that emotional connection. - Yeah. - [Interviewer] I'm not going to ask you about politics, but I'm going to bring up policy, just for a second. You got here in 2013, a couple years after the cancellation of Constellation, which would, you know, hit this space center pretty hard, there were still some emotions left over. - Yeah. - [Interviewer] I imagine, you got put on an asteroid mission, NASA got put on an asteroid mission which has since been canceled, you know, there was a journey to Mars, and there's still a journey to Mars, but now there's, you know, a lot of interest in Congress toward pushing the focus back toward human activity on the surface of the moon, and you've got the Deep Space Gateway, which kind of represents, you could either go to the moon or Mars from there. - Yes. - [Interviewer] I guess what I'm saying is there is a lot of uncertainty, and setting aside, you know, the, the maelstrom in DC surrounding the presidency and Congress, okay, even without that, there's a ton of uncertainty with regard to destinations for NASA, and for what, you know, what humans ultimately are going to do. What is your own perspective on the future of NASA's human spaceflight program, and sort of, how do you manage that uncertainty? - So how do I deal with the policy and vision of the agency right now, and the changes that are a part of that, and some of the uncertainty. I, I personally feel that in the last several years, given the nature of the leadership and the vision, and things like the Astroid Redirect Mission, and working in the vicinity of the moon on this journey to Mars, it actually has opened up this space to think about capability development, vice a single point mission, going to the moon, or going to Mars, or going to 250 miles above the surface of the earth, and we started to look at developing systems that could give us the ability to explore, and to build in space, and to stay in space longer, and to become earth independent. And so I think we actually have a pretty good direction, at this point, and I'm, I'm exciting about what's going on, the idea of the Deep Space Gateway, this deep space transport, we are going to send Orion to the moon, we are going to have Boeing and Space X vehicles resupplying astronauts to the Space Station, we're going to have multiple partners in industry resupplying the Space Station with cargo. It's going to be a really neat time, it is a really neat time to be here, because all of those things are coming over the horizon. So, you know, the vision, I can't ask Congress to make this the policy, or the White House to ask for this in the budget, but I think NASA's done a great job of managing what they do have, and one really comforting sign of where things are going is the support that the White House and Congress have given our current core plans, and missions, and programs, and so to see the budget requests, and the, not to get into too much politics, but to see the vision, policy, and budget, our clear direction, that is the guidance, and to see the direction that those things are going, especially from Congress. To see that many people, there was a letter about a year ago that almost 100 congressmen, sitting congressmen, senators and congressmen signed to show support for SLS, that was very comforting, it's exciting to see that type of support after something like Constellation, you mentioned Constellation in your question. So I'm comfortable with where we are and where we're going. - [Interviewer] Yeah, so one of the things we're trying to do with our series is to take a look back, starting with the Apollo mission, and having a look to the future, you know, so I want you to think about that timeline, and maybe talk about it from your perspective. Like, would you have been really excited to be a part of that first push into space, you know, what are you most excited about in the future? - Wow, so when I think about the legacy of human space exploration in total, first,it's just amazing to actually be a part of it, you know, to know that it runs right up to and through me is, it's pretty humbling. But there's also a lot of serious work to be done, and we spend a lot of time thinking about some of the tragedies that we've had to deal with, AS-204, STS-51L, STS-107. But we also have a duty now to be vigilant, you know, I love that saying, "The price of freedom is eternal vigilance." And so that's a part of this job, as well, and it means that we have to do all that we can to capture the legacy, to spend time talking to the flight controllers, engineers, the corporate entities out there that had experience in that part of the space program, and try to capture, well, first, to try to build relationships with them. You can't make a relationship on demand, so to have a relationship first, where you can then have discussions about the tough things that we had to do, overcome, or live with in the quest of putting humans farther and faster out into the cosmos. The opportunity to be here when folks come back to visit I think is one of the most special things that we have access to, sitting in mission control and talking to the crew on the International Space Station, that is great, it does not get old to watch one of your friends float by in microgravity, I love that, but being here when, the very first person that came back to visit was Al Bean, when I was getting my physical in Branch Med, in the medical clinic, and to just happen to be there when he happened to be there, and then to get to meet this astronaut that had done something amazing was very special. And I think those moments are a very important part of this legacy, you know, I, talking about training, I often say that I learned to fly by sitting in an airplane and working on the controls. The instructor was there to make sure that you didn't crash the airplane, or kill he and yourself, but you learn to be a military officer from other military officers. There's a part of any profession that you just can't get out of a book, you can read about camping, but you, if you've never been out in the bush, you can't say you know everything about camping, and so spending time with that part of the legacy has been a very special treat, but it's also, I think, very important to hear. We went from sort of a faster, or a higher up tempo with the shuttle, multiple flights a year, the crews were larger, to a slower up tempo, deeper science, spending more time, instead of two weeks, it's two quarters, six months in space, you fly four people, vice 20 people a year, and that change in pace changes, it has a ripple affect throughout the entire space program, a human space flight program. And now we are ramping up to get back out of low earth orbit, we're going to still run a Space Station in lower earth orbit, and we're going to do those at the same time, and we're also going to invite industry partners in to help out out in a major way, with cargo, and bringing astronauts to lower earth orbit. And when you think about that, for me, I'm excited, but I'm also cautious about this new paradigm, and, again, that eternal vigilance, it's going to be very important for us to think about what that's going to feel like, and the size of our astronaut core, and having people in different places, thinking about this vehicle, vice that vehicle, vice that vehicle, and then meeting in a different vehicle. And the training that it's going to take to sustain operations like that, I think we are in for a bow wave that is going to change the culture of this space center. And again, I'm excited about being here for that, change is interesting, but it also should make you a little cautious, and you should be thinking about the way that you train, the way that you sustain proficiency, and just be ready to adapt and overcome. So I think there are going to be challenges, there are going to be challenges, but, you know, we have those lessons from Mercury, Gemini, Apollo, the Skylab program, Apollo, Soyuz, the shuttle, we were able to get from, from not having those programs to operating and sustaining those programs, so we're going to be able to do that now, it's just that we may do it with a lot more, in a shorter period of time. And so I, I'm excited, but I'm, I also have a little bit, I'm guarding it, I'm cautious with that excitement, because, you know, wanting to get there so bad can be a part of the problem, so we have to want to get there the right way. You can't want it so bad it turns out bad. - [Interviewer] Yeah, exactly, that's well said. One other question, you mentioned you had worked with Exploration Systems Development, and you were a representative in the recent past. So you got sent to the systems needed to safely survive in deep space, and, you know, I've read through a lot of oral histories over the last month during this, and one of the things Robert Gilruth has said was that, you know, he didn't think people had realized quite how hard it had been to put people up around the moon in Apollo 8 and then land them six times, and he said that's something that, you know, they'll find out when they try to go back and do this again. And I'm just wondering, you know, do you think there is a real appreciation of just how much harder, more energy, you know, the radiation, all of the factors that, that once you sort of break free of the cradle of low earth orbit, just how, how difficult and challenging it is to take that next step? - I, I would have to agree with that statement, that we don't always appreciate just how difficult it's going to be, just breaking free of gravity, getting out of the atmosphere, and then going beyond low earth orbit, just how difficult those things are going to be. If, if I could change one thing about the perception of our program, it, actually it goes back to something in outreach, I love outreach, I love doing outreach in this position, and I'm trying to change this belief that when you, when you see astronauts, people generally will say, "Wow, you must be smart." And I encourage them to say, "You must work hard." Because one, it's true, that's the common denominator of folks in our office, but it's also something that people on the other side can control, that's something that a little kid can say, "I'm going to do that right now." Smart, I don't, I think I can affect that, maybe if I go study and put a bunch of stuff in here, but is that smart, it's the decisions I make, too, what I do with it when it comes out, so. Working hard is a common part, a common theme in human spaceflight, and NASA has this way of making what we do look easy. We had a major computer system failure on the Space Station on Saturday, and less than three days later, less than 72 hours later, it was repaired. Well, it took a spacewalk, two humans had to go outside the Space Station and fix it, and Jack and Peggy were able to go out and do that. Less than three days later, that is a Herculean effort, and it went great, they even got something else done. What people don't see when they see those snippets, those little clips played on NASA TV of the cool parts, or the things meaning around and floating in microgravity, what they don't see is the hours of study, the hours of preparation, the hours of meetings, the hours of risk trade discussions, "If we do this, "this could happen, and how would we be prepared for that?" That's something that I wish we were better at sharing, because lots of kids want to be pilots, lots of kids went to be engineers when they grow up, and if we share this part of it with them, it'll help them to understand what those steps really are to get from here to there, and it will also help people to understand, if we meet challenges that happen to be public, I hope we don't have to go through something like AS-204, STS-51L, STS-107, but if we do, there's a reason. And if we do, we've also thought about it, and thought about the next step of how to recover from it, and so I think it would, would help public, the public understanding of what we do a little bit better, for us to share just how challenging some of these things are, and then it's not such a big surprise when that shows itself, that characteristic of human spaceflight shows itself. - [Interviewer] That's a very interesting perspective for two reasons, first of all, the Apollo, a lot of the Apollo people told us when we asked them for advice to people, to younger people, it was, "Work hard," you know, "If you work hard, you'll be proud of what you've done." - Yes. - [Interviewer] And the second thing is that yeah, I mean, when the space shuttle was flying, most people's perception of it, you know, you wanted to drive it, but, you know, you saw the crew walking out hand in hand with the launch pad, lifting off, and then landing like an airplane, everything was fine. - Yes. - [Interviewer] You know, there's no recognition of the thousands of systems that all had to work right. - Yes, yes, you didn't see the all day long SIMPs that they went through, or the debriefs from those, or the studying, the manuals that are this big, and that's just one of the systems that they pull off the shelf from a stack of books about systems that are that big, so that's a, that's a very important part of this to understand. - [Interviewer] Well, we would like to have you speak to, you know, people, young kids who are potentially interested in spaceflight, and what kind of message you would have for them. - Oh, great, what is my message for young people that are interested in human spaceflight, and aeronautics, and space in general? Well, this applies to anyone, young, old, and it's something that I strive to do, and I'm working on it, as well. Be gritty, be a lifelong learner, and be a good person, work very hard trying to be a good person, being the best you that you can be. Being gritty, I like that word because it's unique, and it's not used in a lot of places, and it just means to work hard, it means to be comfortable in uncomfortable situations. One of my classmates, Anne McClain, gave a commencement speech at a high schooL, and she said, "Your dreams don't love in your comfort zone," that's beautiful, and it means getting comfortable with that idea, being a lifelong learner, this job is like college, I think that's, like the fourth or fifth time that I've said that. And, you know, you have people that say, "I like school," "I don't like school." You know what, when you work hard at something and you look back on your life, and you remember those moments that you were doing whatever, that's what people refer to when they talk about passion, and this idea, you hear people say, "Follow your passions," I think if you work hard and pour yourself into something, if you learn a foreign language, if you learn to draw or paint very well, you're going to look back on those moments where you struggled, and where you succeeded, and that's going to feel like passion. You can grow passions, following your passions is a recipe for success and disaster, but if you grow healthy passions, that's a, that is one of the keys to success, I believe. And then the last one is, you know, making decisions that you can sleep well with at night. Whether you're making the decision to put people on a rocket to send them to space, or what you're going to say on a camera when that someone asks you, "What would you tell young people to work on?" You need to be able to live with those things, and to sleep well at night, and so work very hard to be a good person, do all the things that you can to make your mother, and your father, and your siblings, or your coworkers proud, and if you do those things, be gritty, be a lifelong learner, and try your best to be a good person, I think that's a recipe for success in anything. - [Interviewer] Awesome, thanks very much, Victor. - Thank you.