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i'm here at the payload operations

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center at marshall space flight center

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this is the command post for

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international space station science

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where they coordinate all the activities

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and joining me now is astronaut tj

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creamer who you were an astronaut on the

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space station and now you have a new

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role here at marshall what's it all

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about well thanks for asking this is

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pretty important actually um as you

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alluded to i would spend just just under

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six months at the space station so that

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brings a whole bunch of training aspects

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coordination aspects operation awareness

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and after i came out of my post-flight

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pr period that's when the program was

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ramping up uh payload operations because

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we had constructed space station we're

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going to go into the utilization phase

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now and i thought at that time it might

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be a nice marriage of both my interests

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my experience the operational awareness

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to come to do where the hard work is

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being done so that makes the cruise

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operations easier and this is the place

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to come

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and the opportunity to be a payload

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operations director to to train for that

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to become one and to help out in the the

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ground coordinations was seem to me to

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be paramount for the program let's tell

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folks exactly what a payload operations

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director does

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well like perhaps we can start out with

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an analogy if you've seen the movie

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apollo 13 with gene krantz being the the

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flight director for the for the houston

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control room the analog to that flight

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the director is the payload operations

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director here at marshall and the

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payload operations director becomes the

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focal point for all the coordinations

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for the sub disciplines the people who

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are working with the racks doing the

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computer analysis the bandwidth analysis

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the the schedule maintenance the

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coordinations with the payload

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developers and the

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people who are actually needing the data

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the all that gets filtered through and

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underneath the the operations the daily

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operations of the payload operations

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director who focuses on the real-time

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stuff so tj you've been training since

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september to become certified as a

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payload operations director what's

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what's been going on what you've been

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doing well i've tried to elude there's

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many aspects of this job so as we grow

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in the programmatic awareness of the job

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then we have to get

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more into the details of each of the

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positions the payload rack officer of

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course is looking at the racks

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of great interest that run the

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experiment and we get to learn a little

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bit about their job not become the

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subject matter experts but at least to

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be able to be cocktail party fluent in

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that business so we can have the

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conversations we need to have

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the stoich people of course are

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pretty much rule a lot of the logistical

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portion of our lives on board in fact

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the logistics will

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make the day or break the day largely

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the operations controller

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is our real-time safety officer and of

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course is the second brain power in the

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room to make sure that one individual

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brain doesn't go off

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in the wrong direction

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the person who works with all the data

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flow

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planning and programs and making sure

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that the communications and the video is

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all squared away that's good and then

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let's talk simply about individual

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experiments each of the individual

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experiments gets serviced by

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the

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available resources onboard space

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station and we have to be able to

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coordinate with houston and how is the

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right way of being able to coordinate

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with houston matters about what

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resources are being used

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for that matter we have experience

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experiments in international partner

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modules so we also have to begin to be

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able to understand their needs their

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constraints and the way to communicate

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with them in order to make the

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experiments wherever they're located on

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space station viable

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to me it's a win-win situation you've

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got someone who's been on orbit and and

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it kind of is conversely you're learning

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from them but they're learning from you

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too right i certainly hope so the um

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vernacular that you are able to come

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away with from a space mission certainly

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helps you with the ability to envision

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what's going on as you look at the

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paperwork and the coordinations on the

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ground

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the primary mission here is to make the

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jobs that we need human hands for in a

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weightless environment to be most

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efficient so we can reap the most amount

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of benefit time wise as well as in data

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and in science results

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so where does it go from here what will

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be your job after this after you're

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certified what happens yeah you're

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asking

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all those great questions the training

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since september has been able to provide

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me the opportunity to train towards

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certification and everything goes right

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and perhaps this time next week we might

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be actually a verifiable certified pod

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um but then i hope to be able to

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continue to contribute

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with more visits to marshall be part of

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the pod rotation and to be able to help

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in the joining the two operational

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communities to be quite honest with you

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i'm in a unique position to be a liaison

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between

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the houston operational community and

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the marshall payload operations

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community and be able to liaise

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between these two communities allows us

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to be even more efficient and be able to

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get to understand each other better

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and when you're on orbit you kind of

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become family with with the folks down

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here right so i know now what's it like

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when you talk to a crew member now and

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they get to hear your voice down here it

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is actually kind of cute um if i

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surprise

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them and take over the comms for

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whatever reason it's

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old home week and you can hear the

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smiles and just the voices that come

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down

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on another side though some of the the

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pay comes with whom i spoke with

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while i was up in orbit down here is

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it's interesting and it's fun to joke

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with me about some of the jokes we had

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on orbit or one of the actually the

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eurocom the the european paycom was one

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of the paycoms that i talked to uh while

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i was up in orbit got to talk with her

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today and it was nice to hear an old

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familiar voice and we had shared some

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old times like i should say so it's it's

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nice to put faces to voices and be able

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to have a little bit of a shared

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experience as we go through the

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operations well i know that they are so

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lucky to have you and glad to have you