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[Music]

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welcome back

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i'm joshua santora coming to you from

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near the kennedy space center

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when i left you last time i thought we

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would be in full swing of launch

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preparation

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but we've had a couple delays and so we

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figured we'd take time to hit another

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episode in our series

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of how the nasa's kennedy space center

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is enabling

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deep space human exploration today we're

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going to head on gateway

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and how our commercial collaborations

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and partnerships are helping us

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explore and even pioneer new worlds

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gateway in short

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is an outpost that will be orbiting the

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moon that will enable us to reach a

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variety of locations on the moon surface

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as well as travel to mars and other deep

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space destinations

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it is a multi-center effort and the

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kennedy space center has been given the

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responsibility of the logistics element

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so to learn more about what that is and

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what's involved with making logistics

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happen

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i'm joined now by jeff smith who is the

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element architect for deep space

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logistics jeff how you doing today

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i'm doing great how about you josh

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thanks yeah i'm doing really well uh

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always excited to talk about gateway

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it's

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time i talk to somebody about it i feel

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like i'm learning so much more

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so excited to hear from you tell us more

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about your specific role with gateway

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the deep space logistics architect

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uh looks forward at what are the crew

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and the cargo needs going to be

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in the next three years the next five

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years the next 15 years

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it's my job to try to understand all of

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that and then boil it down into

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something real and implementable that we

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can go do

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i mentioned a minute ago that this is a

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multi-center effort and kennedy has a

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piece of that

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can you unpack for me a little bit more

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what is this logistics element and

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kennedy's role in making that happen

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yeah the logistics element is one of the

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modules of gateway one of the parts of

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gateway gateway

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uh in its very early phases will have a

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power and propulsion element

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uh and a halo element a habitation and

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logistics outpost element does two small

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parts

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only the halo element actually could

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have people in it uh

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orion will dock there the human lander

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system will dock there and a logistics

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vehicle will dock there

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that's where we come in uh so the the

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logistics

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vehicle this this dragon xl in this case

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uh

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our first contractor and partner to be

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able to uh fly to the gateway

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uh that vehicle you know it really

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doesn't look

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like the dragon 2 capsule that just

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brought crew back successfully from the

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iss

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but under the hood it's all the same

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only with a couple of little tweaks

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and a much bigger section for putting

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cargo in there

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jeff just listening to you today i think

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i had an aha moment

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i've been envisioning this as a one-time

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uh

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sounds like that's not the case that

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this is actually a recurring mission

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is that true it is uh uh

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a recurring set of missions and we're

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nominally expecting maybe one mission

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per year uh

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over the lifetime of gateway uh the the

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vehicle will be

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loaded with over 5000 kilograms of cargo

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and supplies and experiments and and

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other types of things

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it will go up autonomously docked to the

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gateway uh

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then it will stay there for up to one

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year while the crew

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come and uh do their sorties to the

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lunar surface or another work that they

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have to do

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after the crew have left uh the trash

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will be will have been loaded into the

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dragon xl

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will depart

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and then go into a disposal orbit

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probably somewhere

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you know going around the sun where it

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will be safe and and not

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interfere with other missions as the

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series suggests and as nasa missions are

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clear

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uh the moon is not the final destination

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although it's really important

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we're headed to places further mars and

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beyond so

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how is gateway enabling that sort of

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exploration beyond the moon

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uh this is going to be the proving

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ground you know where we've gone from

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iss and low earth orbit where we're only

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just a few hours away from help should

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we need it

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uh we're moving out to gateway here um

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you know 240 000 miles from earth

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several days journey to get there or to

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get home if something uh

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something needs to be done uh gateway is

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going to really

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increase the level of independence that

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the crew need to have

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in order to do the operations uh in this

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remote environment with longer and

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longer time delays between

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earth and gateway and then eventually

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earth and mars communication

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gateway is going to be the proving

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ground for all of that and then

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when we do need to start moving on to

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mars gateway is a great staging point it

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really doesn't take a lot of energy

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for a vehicle that's docked at gateway

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to then boost itself

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into an orbit that can take it all the

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way to mars a mars transit orbit

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so gateway is going to stay a part of

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our program for a long time

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has that staging point that hopping off

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point to mars

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jeff can't thank you enough i appreciate

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you being here uh good luck to you

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and the entire team i know there are

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some very fun and exciting but very busy

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years ahead of you guys

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thank you thank you josh great to talk

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with you

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there's no mystery that we're relying

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heavily on spacex and the dragon xl

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to make the logistics element for

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gateway happen uh but they are far from

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the only company that is helping support

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our exploration efforts

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to unpack more about the the broad look

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at commercialization and exploration

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i'm joined now by mary faller who is a

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senior mission manager with the launch

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services program

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and they call the kennedy space center

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home mary thanks for joining me

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absolutely mary looking at the past

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of kind of the way nasa's done business

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with our big space programs

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we have done a lot of dictating to

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contractors for things like the space

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shuttle

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uh we're working we're owning this

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process but now we're shifting gears

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and this commercialization really means

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that we are operating like a partner

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um can you tell me more about the

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changing landscape and what that means

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well so nasa lsp we've actually been

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doing this for

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over 20 years launch vehicles have been

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launching

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commercial for decades obviously

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so uh you know historically we nasa

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bought hardware

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uh they owned everything they owned from

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the design they owned how to build it

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uh but now we're transitioning into

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buying just a service so we just say

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we need to go up into this orbit get us

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there i don't care how you do it just

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make sure it's safe

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and so we don't own all of the interim

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steps

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and now we just have targeted insight

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into what the contractor is doing so we

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can

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knowledgeably agree with what they're

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doing

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and then we have also very targeted

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approvals kind of in those very high

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risk areas or mission

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unique areas and allows for a lean team

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and allows for the industry to really

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innovate for us

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so stepping back and understanding where

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we can take a little bit more hands-off

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approach

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has really allowed the significant cost

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savings and more emissions to actually

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go forward

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rather than just a handful of really

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exquisite expensive missions

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yeah thanks for kind of talking about

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some of those benefits there

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appreciate that obviously important to

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talk about those but i'm guessing that

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it's also brought some new challenges

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with it so

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where are the growing pains for us and

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what are some of the challenges with

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this new operating model where

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ultimately we're relying more on

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commercial companies

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so it's really a cultural shift for most

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of nasa

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um trusting the industry to do the right

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thing is always hard because nasa does

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it pretty darn good

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so allowing the ownership of those items

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to reside with

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industry and letting go and of the

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telling them how to go do everything

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versus a more commercial approach of

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focusing on what we really need to be

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delivered and in the end

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not a step-by-step approach of focusing

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on

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how they need to get there right we just

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need what they are

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going to provide also commercial

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entities they are now responsible for

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the mission success it will be

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perceived that nasa has a failure if

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there's a failure

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even if that responsibility uh lies

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with the contractor so that's really

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needing to manage

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expectations of the public and

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you know everybody else who thinks that

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this belongs to nasa and you need to own

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it that's a challenge

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last big question for you today is this

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something we can expect to become a

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staple like is this the model going

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forward

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where we'll see broad partnerships and

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collaborations

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for human exploration so really as the

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commercial companies they

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see the benefit of commercially

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exploring space

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the industry base the customer base

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grows

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there's real excitement of pushing

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humans beyond

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low earth orbit going to the moon going

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to the gateway going to mars

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so that's going to continue as that

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industry grows there's no going back

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it's just a much more efficient and

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effective way of doing things

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mary a big thanks to you for your

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insight and expertise and taking time to

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talk to us

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obviously launch services program has a

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huge part to play

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in the robotic explorers that will be a

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part of our sustained presence on the

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moon and beyond

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so good luck to you and your entire team

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thank you very much i really appreciate

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it

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here today now we think we're going to

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take that break for these amazing

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launches coming up

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specifically the two that are the most

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noteworthy are the crew one launch

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from the kennedy space center and the

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sentinel 6 michael freilig mission

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from california so please check those

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out nasa.gov for more information on

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those

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another big thanks to jeff and mary for