In this episode of the Audio Signals Podcast, host Marco Ciappelli sits down with astronaut Tom Jones to discuss the book, "Space Shuttle Stories: Firsthand Astronaut Accounts from All 135 Missions.
Guests: Tom Jones, PhD, Veteran NASA Astronaut
On Linkedin | https://www.linkedin.com/in/astronauttomjones/
On Twitter | https://twitter.com/AstroTomJones
On Facebook | https://www.facebook.com/AstronautTomJones
Website | https://astronauttomjones.com/
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Host: Marco Ciappelli, Co-Founder at ITSPmagazine [@ITSPmagazine] and Host of Redefining Society Podcast & Audio Signals Podcast
On ITSPmagazine | https://www.itspmagazine.com/itspmagazine-podcast-radio-hosts/marco-ciappelli
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Episode Introduction
In this episode of the Audio Signals Podcast, host Marco Ciappelli sits down with astronaut Tom Jones to discuss the book, "Space Shuttle Stories: Firsthand Astronaut Accounts from All 135 Missions."
Jones shares behind-the-scenes anecdotes and personal experiences from various Shuttle missions. Starting with fond recollections of growing up near a rocket factory to competitive steps he took to become an astronaut, Jones reveals the rigorous process he faced to become part of NASA's elite group.
He reflects on the historical implications and lessons of the Space Shuttle program, providing both a nuanced and comprehensive look at a significant era in human space exploration.
As someone who was part of 4 missions, Jones sketches a vivid picture of the various challenges, exhilarations, and dangers that came with the job.
The episode closes with discussions about future space explorations and the importance of space learning for the next generation.
If you're a fan of space, exploration, or just love a good astronaut story – this is a conversation you wouldn't want to miss.
Be sure to enjoy it, share, and subscribe for many more conversation about Stories, Storytelling, and Storytellers.
About the Book
NASA's space shuttle was the world's first reusable spacecraft, accomplishing many firsts and inspiring generations across its 30-year lifespan as America's iconic spaceship. In Space Shuttle Stories, shuttle astronaut Tom Jones interviewed more than 130 fellow astronauts for personal vignettes from each mission, complemented by their written accounts for all 135 space shuttle missions, from Columbia's maiden flight in 1981 to the final launch of Atlantis in 2011. The book is a major contribution to the historical record of a momentous era of spaceflight.
Each mission profile includes:
An astronaut narrative that immerses the readers in their personal mission experience
Data about the mission, crew, launch, landing, duration, and highlights
Captivating photographs rarely seen by the public
The Space Shuttle program’s 6 orbiter vehicles (Enterprise, Columbia, Challenger, Discovery, Atlantis, and Endeavour) carried a total of 355 astronauts into orbit on 135 missions aimed at cutting-edge scientific research, satellite launch, retrieval and repair, collaborative work with the Russian Mir station, the launching and servicing of the Hubble Space Telescope, and the construction of the International Space Station. Space Shuttle Stories focuses on the lived, human experiences of larger-than-life space missions. It's a definitive oral history that captures the importance, wonder, and exhilaration of the Space Shuttle era.
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Resources
Space Shuttle Stories: Firsthand Astronaut Accounts from All 135 Missions: https://www.amazon.com/Space-Shuttle-Stories-%20Firsthand-Astronaut/dp/1588347540/%20ref=asc_df_1588347540?tag=bngsmtphsnus-%2020&linkCode=df0&hvadid=79852149837977&hvnetw=s%20&hvqmt=e&hvbmt=be&hvdev=c&hvlocint=&hvlocphy=%20&hvtargid=pla-4583451683194311&psc=1
Smithsonian Books: https://www.smithsonianbooks.com/store/aviation-military-history/space-shuttle-stories-firsthand-astronaut-accounts-from-all-135-missions/
The Shuttle Astronauts Tell All: https://airandspace.si.edu/air-and-space-quarterly/fall-2023/shuttle-astronaut
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Book | Space Shuttle Stories: Firsthand Astronaut Accounts from All 135 Missions with The Author, Astronaut Tom Jones | Audio Signals Podcast With Marco Ciappelli
Please note that this transcript was created using AI technology and may contain inaccuracies or deviations from the original audio file. The transcript is provided for informational purposes only and should not be relied upon as a substitute for the original recording, as errors may exist. At this time, we provide it “as it is,” and we hope it can be helpful for our audience.
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[00:00:00]
Marco Ciappelli: Well, hello, everybody. This is Marco Ciappelli. Welcome to another episode of Audio Signals podcast, which, as I mentioned lately, has been repositioning the antenna to cover not only stories and talk about storytelling, but actually focusing on the storytellers [00:01:00] themselves, because it's important. Sometimes you can go with your fantasy, with your creativity and imagination, but sometimes there are people that actually have lived the story that they talk about.
And today, I'm very excited because this conversation is about a topic that I love very much. If you've been with me, you know, Talks with a few folks that have been up there in the sky. Um, most of them on the, on a space shuttle mission. And today, it's going to be with someone that has been, if I believe on four of those missions, he wrote a few books, about, uh, the history of NASA and a few other topics related to space.
And this one that we're going to talk about today, it's very interesting because he kind of put together. A lot of what could be the, the family of the, the Space Shuttles adventures, um, out of 135 mission, there has been a bunch of people, uh, astronauts that have been [00:02:00] up there. And, what I understand is that Tom actually got to talk with, uh, many, many of them.
And as I just mentioned, his name is Tom, Tom Jones. Welcome to the show. I think I spoke enough. I can just shut up for the rest of the episode now.
Tom Jones: Marco, good to be with you and it's a conversation about my favorite topic, which is the history of the space shuttle. And I got to participate in that program for 11 years as an astronaut and it had a 30 year history.
So, uh, my last challenge over the last three years has been to write this book about the oral history of the space shuttle program.
Marco Ciappelli: That's fantastic. It's like you, you never had enough. You wanted to keep going back, even if not physically, you went back many times in your, in your mind, in your writing and, and sharing other stories.
Tom Jones: Well, I had the chance to fly four times, as you mentioned, and then when I finished my astronaut career, I wrote a memoir called Skywalking that came out about 15 years ago. And that was my story. I got to tell my personal [00:03:00] perspective on my four journeys to space and helping build the space station. But I recognized that what was missing was the knowledge of everybody else's favorite stories.
Um, you know, I had 22 astronaut classmates. I flew with 20 people in space. So I knew their stories fairly well, but I never had a chance to just sit down casually and hear the experiences of the people who flew the shuttle in the first 10 years of the program back in the 80s. Um, and then when I left in 2001, Uh, there was another 10 years of NASA shuttle flights where I was separated then by, by my change in career into writing, into speaking and consulting.
So I wanted to hear their stories too, the people who actually built and completed the International Space Station. So this was my chance with this project, Space Shuttle Stories, to sit down as we're doing and talk to my astronaut colleagues and hear their firsthand impressions in a way I'd never had the chance to when we were so busy working at NASA.
Marco Ciappelli: Yeah, and I [00:04:00] consider myself very lucky. I'm not astronaut material myself, but I've been having a huge admiration for that, maybe because I was born the year that we actually landed on the moon. I was a few months old when that happened, but I don't know. My fascination always been there and I've been lucky.
I mentioned to you before we start recording to talk with people like Eileen Collins and Pamela Melroy and Charles Camarda, Bill MacArthur, which you all No, personally, so it's, it's really cool. The fact that you did the same thing. Um, so you kind of told us about the ideas and we'll get more into the book.
A little background about yourself just to get started about the story of storytellers. How did you get involved with this idea of becoming an astronaut? You don't do it by By, I don't know, random, uh, destiny, right?
Tom Jones: Well, I'm sure in the 1960s, when I [00:05:00] was growing up during the space race between, you know, the U.
S. and the Soviet Union, the race to the moon, I'm sure I was one of millions of kids who wanted to become an astronaut. But, uh, in my case, I was growing up in Baltimore, Maryland, in the mid Atlantic here, and I was a Cub Scout, and I got to go on a field trip to The rocket factory about a mile and a half from my house and the Martin Marietta company, that's now Lockheed Martin, but they were building the rockets to carry the Gemini astronauts into space to rehearse our moon landing techniques.
So here I am in my hometown and the space race had come to my town and I got a chance as a little kid to see these hundred foot tall silver missiles being built to carry the astronauts two by two up into space on Gemini. So at that point, I said, well, here's a job that seems really cool. And I should learn more about this, this job.
So, and I began to learn, learn and read about the astronaut career path. And back then it was all [00:06:00] test pilots, you know, Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin and Mike Collins, all test pilots, all professional aviators. And I thought, In the late sixties, as I went into high school, that that would be the path that I would have to follow.
So in order to learn how to fly, I went to the air force academy out in Colorado and became a, an air force pilot. And then the new space shuttle came out. So what inspired me was the fact that there were lots of scientists and engineers on the space shuttle flights on these crews, and that was my favorite subject in school science.
So I thought, well, Hey, if I get better science credentials, maybe I can better qualify for. Uh, a slot in the astronaut core and it's very competitive. As you know, um, I had a lot of luck breaking my way so that I could get qualified to become an astronaut. And then in the competition itself, uh, I was turned down on two separate selections of new astronauts.
And then the third time I finally had enough items on my resume, enough work [00:07:00] experience, plus my jet flying time. And my work as a scientist that I, I could be a competitive candidate. So there were 3, 000 applicants that year and, uh, they interviewed 120 face to face and then they picked 23. And I was lucky enough to be in that group.
So it only took me. Marco, it only took me 29 years from seeing the rockets in the factory till the time I got to fly in space. So, but I did have a lot of fun along the way and it was always a dream to shoot for. I always tried to maneuver my career in the direction of being qualified for spaceflight.
Marco Ciappelli: Yeah. I mean, the fact that you grew up. Right next to factory. Definitely. It's like, you know, maybe it's meant to be, maybe it's meant to be And the fact that that you had to apply several times This is a recurring story that I hear every time I talk to to an astronaut that It seems obviously it's not Uh, a job that you just apply with no [00:08:00] credential, obviously.
And, uh, but it's incredible the amount of people that do want to do this. And, and I'm, I'm honored to have been talking even with the women that became then commander of mission, because, uh, let's face it at that time, from what I understand, it was. Even harder for them to, to make that dream come true.
Um, let's go into, into the space shuttle. So first reusable, uh, rocket. Now, not really, not the rocket itself, but you know, it needs a rocket to go up there. What make it so special so that we can start?
Tom Jones: So it was a groundbreaking machine. It was a departure from the Apollo missions and the earlier space flight programs, Mercury and Gemini, where everything was, uh, used just once.
Everything was thrown away. The only piece of the Apollo spacecraft that launched from Kennedy Space Center was the little command module where the three astronauts actually lived during their passage to and from the moon. And that's all that came back. Everything else was discarded. [00:09:00] So NASA said, okay.
With our next generation spaceship, we want a reusable craft that can be turned around and flown 25 or 50 times a year so that we can make it the national launch system, the booster for all national security and Pentagon payloads, all the scientific payloads, all the commercial communications satellites.
We all want them to ride on the space shuttle and we're going to make it cheap enough. in its operation that everybody can afford to put their rocket, their payloads on this new rocket system. So that was their ambition. And even though they did develop the first reusable space plane and two thirds of the system was reusable, it did not save money because the inspections and, um, preparations for each flight required a big workforce that cost a lot of money to maintain.
So it wasn't a money saver for NASA. And the spacecraft was never as reliable and routine in its flights as the [00:10:00] original designers had hoped. So instead of it being an airliner type operation, it became an experimental craft for the whole of its 30 year history. But it was. A bridge to the 21st century.
And so it gave us a platform in space where we learned to do very complex operations in low earth orbit, 200 miles up above the planet. And we did the Hubble space telescope restoration and upgrades. We built the international space station. We launched probes to the planets, many communication satellites and scientific satellites were launched from the shuttle.
And it was, um. A mini laboratory with the space lab and space hab modules we practiced for the science that we would do on the International Space Station. So even though it didn't realize all the dreams of its designers, the space shuttle was the iconic vision of working and living in space for 30 years.
And it built the foundation on which the modern [00:11:00] 21st century spacecraft are, are built. Flying on today.
Marco Ciappelli: And it makes me think that without that, you wouldn't have as many people probably being in space. Uh, you would not be able to probably work on and build the international space station and, uh, and give access to people that are not with a military background, but there are like scientists and people that are sent to do other things to just be sure that you.
Pilot. Get to a place. Come back. Safely. On Earth. So tell me about all these people that you talk to. Um, 130. And I'm just imagining. I have a very vivid imagination. I visualize things. It's just you, you know, getting with One of your fellow astronauts and be like, do you remember when? What is your best memory?
How did that go the process of writing the book getting in touch with them? There was like excitement [00:12:00] from from them when they heard from you. I'm like, yeah, I mean I I know you all love to talk about this. I mean, that's my experience.
Tom Jones: It was a great opportunity for me personally because I did get a chance to talk with over 130 individuals.
I think I interviewed 133 and then I borrowed, you know, from previously published interviews in a couple of cases to, to round out the 135 space shuttle missions. So what I wanted to do was to ask everybody about the The most rewarding, the most satisfying experiences. They had the most anxious, the most fun experiences.
And I, so I had a set of questions that I would email them in advance. And just about the time I started this project, realizing that I could, um, talk to 135 people altogether. You know, that was practically doable. I couldn't talk to all, you know, um, 833 who flew on the space shuttle. You know, um, there were 355 individual astronauts and cosmonauts who flew on the shuttle.
No way I could actually talk [00:13:00] to 355 and record interviews. So recognizing that I had this challenge, I just set up a spreadsheet and I looked at all 135 missions and I said, of course, I know most of these people from my profession and from astronaut reunions and so on. Who can I tap on the shoulder to talk to me?
And so that was my choice. I got to choose one astronaut from each flight. In some cases, they were crewmates that I'd flown with to cover some of our space flights together. In others, they were people that I'd worked with on the space station program. But, um, one of the joys of the project was just. out of the blue emailing somebody like Dick Truly, who was on, you know, the second space shuttle mission and asking him how his flight went.
I never had a chance to do that. And I got to talk to the surviving members of the first six women astronauts and talk to them about their groundbreaking missions. First African American astronaut, Guy Bluford as well. So it was a chance for me to really sit down and put these missions and experiences in perspective.
And everybody was very positive and, and. [00:14:00] And giving of their time. It took about 45 minutes usually to talk to them. And then after two and a half years of recording these interviews, it was time to then take a year or to edit them down, take the transcripts and edit them down to something that could be put on the page, about 550 words per page, uh, for each mission.
So it was a both a logistical challenge, but it was also very rewarding along the way to get the chance to talk to all these folks and I hope they're very happy with the way their stories have turned out because I got to add 600 plus amazing photos to go with their missions. And I think that was one of the most enjoyable parts of the book was to pick my favorite shuttle photos over 30 years and put them in the book.
Marco Ciappelli: And are these photos? I know a lot of people on, on the space shuttle or international space station does, they do fun stuff. They kind of entertain, they, they, they share, they do a lot of STEM, they talk to [00:15:00] people, they, you know, they do a little PR, let's say for what they're doing out there. Seeing people playing song on a guitar and experiment.
So were those feature part of their own, uh, personal archive? I mean, I guess it's nothing is personal there, but that they actually took themselves.
Tom Jones: Yeah. NASA and the government own the photos, but they're public domain. So anybody can use them. So that was not a problem for me. They're all largely cataloged on the internet at NASA's photography website.
I think it's called, uh, Gateway to Astronaut Photography of Earth is one site, and the other one is NASA's Image and Video Library website, where you can just look up any mission and see the dozens of, uh, digital photos that are posted there. Not all equally, um, so the earlier missions, the first 10 years of the shuttle, there's a paucity of, uh, photos.
Maybe only about 25 might be online. Um, of the film shots that were taken. And once we switched to digital around 2000, um, many hundreds of pictures became posted on the [00:16:00] internet, of course, by NASA. So what I did was when I interviewed a friend or a colleague, I would say, give me your five or six favorite pictures from your mission.
Then they sent those to me and I put them into the mix to add perspective and context to the story that we were trying to tell. And then, of course, there were, um. If there are five or six people on a crew, everybody's taking dozens of pictures every day. So you really can't point to who took the pictures, but you get, you get the team view.
And that's how we treat these pictures is that they were taken by the team, not some individual, even though I might remember which ones I took here and there. Mostly it was about. Giving the team credit for those, those images.
Marco Ciappelli: Now, where I was going to go with the personal touch on the story, and I love the fact that either they took the photo or they, they choose them themselves.
It's that maybe, um, I was trying to get into the, the mindset of how. This interview was going once you get the opportunity to get it started, meaning where [00:17:00] they leaning towards more technical aspect of the flight, more the scientific discovery, or most were more like memories and experience that maybe inspire them to come back to you.
Planet Earth and say, you know, I mean, I'm kind of touching on the overview effect and other experience that it may have up there.
Tom Jones: Well, with the sample questions that I sent to them were, um, to steering them towards their personal experiences, you know, I did ask, give me an overview, an elevator speech. Of your mission.
What would be the themes of the mission that you could just give me in just a minute or so, but then we spent the bulk of the time saying, what was most satisfying? What was most rewarding? What frightened you the most? What were you most worried about? And what was the, the, um, what were your impressions of your crewmates who, who made a special impression on you?
So we covered a lot of territory and obviously I could not edit that down and put it all in the book. But what I tried to do was from each individual, I would get [00:18:00] something unique. That hadn't been talked about before. Um, try to get something that was unique about not only their experience, but tell me something unique about the mission that distinguished it from the other 134 that there were.
And so I think I was pretty successful in varying across these stories. Um, a lot of different new stories that you'll still be surprised by when you're on mission 133. Um, but at the same time. Um, you'll see some common themes throughout the book, you know, the, the excitement of their first space shuttle launch was always a theme that people would talk about, um, the amazing experience of flying back through a hypersonic re entry was another one, and what came through loud and clear was the satisfaction of being part of a team that was doing something really extraordinary and special.
That was common. And then the, uh, Just the, the view of our planet from space. Almost every astronaut touched on the awe that they would experience in looking [00:19:00] back at the home planet. So now I don't have 135, you know, passages saying how neat the earth looked, because that does get repetitive, but I took the best of those.
Impressions and I think I got them nailed down in the book too. So it was great to hear the common themes, but also to be surprised by things I've never heard before.
Marco Ciappelli: Anything in particular that you want to kind of tease in? Oh, sure. Stick out in your mind,
Tom Jones: you know, we lost two shuttles and 14 astronauts on those two accidents on Challenger and Columbia.
So, you know, we lost Columbia in 2003 because of the heat shield being compromised by damage from debris that struck the heat shield during launch. Long before 2003, there was a shuttle mission STS 27, uh, in 1988, just two flights after Challenger was lost, and this crew took off, and their heat shield was damaged by debris coming off of their solid rocket booster, [00:20:00] and when they got to orbit, they saw these Um, hundreds of damaged heat shield tiles.
And Hoot Gibson, who I quote in the, in the book, said the first time he looked at the camera view of their heat shield, he said, we are going to die because of the compromised heat shield. He didn't think that they could make it back. However, they completed their Pentagon mission. It was a classified military mission, completed that, then you have to come home.
There was no way to repair the heat shield by going on a spacewalk. They, we didn't have those tools at the time. And so they had to put the ship on its re entry path and bring it back home. And Hoot Gibson, the commander, along with Guy Gardner, who talks about the experience, they were watching the gauges on the instrument panel, looking for any sign that the heat shield was burning through or that the flight controls were not going to operate properly.
And so they, you know, Gibson gritted his teeth for 45 minutes [00:21:00] through the reentry, uh, arena and brought the ship back into a safe landing. And so they made it back to the ground. When they got out, they looked at the space shuttle on the runway and there were over 700 damaged tiles. One was completely burned away.
by the damage that had been inflicted. And now the metal skin of the orbiter was starting to melt. Fortunately, they passed through the peak heating phase before it had a burn through. They got back on the ground. But if NASA had only remembered how close they came to catastrophe in 1988. And in 2003, 15 years later, we might not have had that same problem with Columbia, if they'd only internalized that lesson and beaten that problem of debris damage to a minimum.
Marco Ciappelli: Yeah, and I remember the story, because again, talking to Aline Collins that she commanded the return to flight and Charlie Camarda that was on that, I remember there was a, there were talking clearly about the tension and something that did [00:22:00] happen. If I remember, there was some kind of like a belly flip that they did to track the, uh, the actually shield underneath.
And so they were very aware of the, of this. And, uh, I mean, there is a big risk. Um, it's not like going to the coffee shop and, and get your cappuccino in the morning. So a big, a big admiration for All that they have done. Let's, let's talk about the fact that now we're going back to, to the moon.
At least that's the plan. I was listening just this morning about, um, private company landing, um, robotic, uh, piece on the moon. Very hard to land there, apparently. Um, but we've done it many times and then for 50 years, nothing happened. And, but we're going back now there. Um, yeah. Have you guys touched in the book about the future where, where Disastronaut sees NASA going and maybe the [00:23:00] collaboration of private and, um, and NASA being the, the good solution for the next step to go back up
there?
I
Tom Jones: think that the lessons conveyed in space shuttle stories, uh, from the space shuttle program are still applicable to our efforts to return to the moon. Uh, and it's all about remembering the near catastrophic mistakes that occurred during the shuttle program. The fact that we did have two accidents, if we can remember those lessons as told by the astronauts in this book and convey them to the people who are Both managing and preparing technically for our return to the moon.
Then we'll have a way to reduce the risk of going back into deep space and returning astronauts to the moon in a, in a, in an ambitious way. I'm very excited by the prospect of us getting boots back on the moon surface in the next three years or so. Um, I think it's time to tap into the resources that are available on the moon to help us go farther by, you know.
Finding propellants on the moon [00:24:00] in the form of water ice at the poles of the moon. You know, the space shuttle taught us almost everything that we know how to do well in space, and we're applying those lessons on the International Space Station today, and then those go forward from the shuttle and the station into developing the way we operate on these lunar return missions.
And so I hope that we can remember the costly lessons of the past and the value of this book. I think is that it trains explorers and managers and flight controllers in the mindset of what you have to look for when you're facing the unexpected.
Marco Ciappelli: And the technology that's been used on the, on the space shuttle, I mean, because it's been going for so many years, that mission, I know there've been adaptation to the computer system, throughout the years.
Many adjustments for security reasons, but also I'm assuming for performance and, you know, there is several, um, of this machine that they, they all look the same, but they're probably not the [00:25:00] same. I would say. And, uh, and how do you apply this? How much of the space shuttle goes into the next mission that maybe, uh, The next few years is going to bring people on the moon.
Tom Jones: Well, in a very concrete way, the, uh, the new moon rocket that NASA has developed called the Space Launch System. It's the big booster that's going to carry the Artemis, uh, missions to the moon. The Orion spacecraft is at the top of the SLS. That new SLS launcher uses extended solid rocket motors from the shuttle program.
Uh, there are three main engines at the base of the shuttle orbiter, but there are four of those same motors on the base of the core stage of the space launch system. So shuttle technology is directly incorporated into the new moon rocket for the Artemis program. And then in the way that we will do Um, spacewalks on the moon, the moonwalks, if you will.
You know, we're not going to be using the old space [00:26:00] shuttle suit, but the lessons we've learned over 30 years of, we're still operating that suit on the space station, that translates directly into the design of the new moon suit. And then I think it's more, um, the other intellectual transfer is, again, When you make mistakes, let's learn from them and let's carry them forward in the way the control team operates in Houston, in the way the astronauts operate in their spacecraft.
And while we've automated much of the functions of flying a spacecraft to the moon, and most of the job of piloting now is going to be robotically done rather than flown by a test pilot, they still have to be able to recognize the unexpected situation and step in. And as you say, it's a difficult task to land on the moon.
I bet you there's going to be someone, a human in the loop. Just as they were in flying the shuttle to a safe landing. I think you'll find a human in the loop for landing people on the lunar surface.
Marco Ciappelli: Well, you know, with all the AI that we have, I still think we need to have the human supervision, but that's a [00:27:00] different story that applies even here on our planet.
I would like to go into storytelling. This show is about that, and I would like to So I'm going to tap with you into the reason why you do write the book that you write, um, how you decide, well, I'm going to talk about this one instead of being about my career or about something else in terms of technology and, and space exploration, but it's going to be more personal.
So where I'm going with this is. Education. I always tell we're made of stories. I like the idea that we inspire the next generation, we inspire change in our planet, and I think that when you have the experience, and by you I mean all of you astronauts that have been up there, you're a very important piece of the storytelling.
You're all amazing [00:28:00] storytelling. I mean anyone I've talked to, it's pretty amazing. The importance of sharing these stories. For, for our future, for the next generation. I love your thoughts on that.
Tom Jones: That was my motivation for this book because I hadn't heard the stories of my friends in sufficient detail.
We have an astronaut reunion every couple of years and you'll see your crewmates and you'll see some of your astronaut classmates and you'll sit around at a dinner table and you'll hear a few stories here and there, but nobody had produced a record of all of these missions and tried to capture the essence of those missions in a human framework.
Now there is NASA Johnson Space Center in Houston. They have an oral history program where they've talked to, you know, a good chunk of individuals, probably maybe 15 percent or so of the shuttle astronauts have been interviewed for that program. But because of funding, they've suspended it. So there is no ongoing effort to systematically capture [00:29:00] the shuttle crew members stories.
So that's where I thought I could help out with the storytelling effort is to tackle at least one from every mission. And I was glad I was able to do that in this, in this three year project. So it is very important to convey those stories for, um, future lessons learned, but also to get the, the human spirit of exploration on, on the record, because, you know, it's all paid for and the NASA case and the international space station case, it's all paid for by the taxpayers of all these international.
countries working together, they deserve a chance to hear what the experience is really like and what kind of people they're sending into space and what they do up there. So that was really a something in my mind was to give back to the people who made these adventures possible. And then, uh, the younger generation is a target for a book like this because, um, I regularly go out and speak at schools.
I'm going to one tomorrow to talk to a young audience in an elementary school about how they can participate in human [00:30:00] space exploration in the future. They might be the people who first walk on Mars in about 20 years. So I wanted to take, um, these These historical lessons from the space shuttle, which, you know, stopped flying in 2011.
We have a lot of students I'll be talking to tomorrow who never saw the space shuttle fly for real. They've seen it on TV.
Marco Ciappelli: I saw the last flight. I was on a, I'm in LA. So I saw it when it You know, it was going over, uh, the beaches there and then landed in the old parade. So sorry, I had to interrupt because it just came in my mind.
was a piece of history right there.
Tom Jones: So I wanted to, you know, I want to make this, uh, this machine that retired 12 years ago. I want it to come alive in their minds by reading this book and then encourage them towards putting themselves in that same story 20 years from now when we are heading out to deep space and to the asteroids and Mars.
Marco Ciappelli: Well, let me ask you this and this I asked is I think a couple of other times and [00:31:00] not just to astronauts, but other people that talk about space and that excitement. When you, when you look at the movie, I mean, you have people like me that I love to read book about Apollo 8 and the landing on the moon.
They all, I mean, they all race to space. It's fascinating to me and I get excited, really excited. But I don't see even in the news the excitement that we used to have in in the 60s in the even in the 70s and maybe the one that we had in 1981 when there was a first space shuttle and and so on kind of like it I feel like it plateau a little bit and and I I'm not I'm not happy about it because you know, I love this stuff Where do you see?
The issue. Am I, is this just in my head or do you think that there is a little bit less? What's the interest in, in the general [00:32:00] population for what happened up there?
Tom Jones: I think there's still an interest. I do think younger people are still excited by, you know, dinosaurs and astronauts and, and, you know, going to the moon.
The same category. Yeah. Um, I believe that the potential there is to, is to excite these people to embark on their own path of exploration. And, and I always tell people we need their, we need their skills, their talents, their inventions to help us. Do things 20 years in the future, like set foot on Mars and continue the search for life there.
Because of the frequency of human spaceflight has dropped off since the retirement of the shuttle. We're only going up, you know, twice to the space station every year. Um, we're flying a couple of private missions every couple of years on these new, you know, Crew Dragon spacecraft or the new Blue Origin, uh, spaceship or the Boeing Starliner.
The frequency has gone down, so it's not in the news as much, but I do believe that when you put people back on the moon for two weeks at a [00:33:00] time, and every day there's video of them looking over the next boulder or across the next ridge or through the next, across the next crater, Looking for the discoveries that will mean we can have a permanent presence on the moon and they can be a part of that.
I do believe when we, when we see people in deep space, looking back from a spacewalk and there is the earth and the moon in the same frame while they're working on building this little mini space station called the gateway around the, uh, the moon that will excite people again. Um, complimented certainly by robotic visions.
From Mars and from the moon, but we don't give parades for robots, you know, we, we give parades for people who are putting the human presence out there. And even, um, in the 21st century, I don't think we're so jaded that we still don't live vicariously through the excitement seen through the eyes of an astronaut or an explorer out there on the surface of the moon.
I think that's, that excitement level is going to come back when they realize how it's possible now for [00:34:00] the average person to go to space and eventually you. The average person is going to be able to go to the surface of the moon on a, an extended vacation in a, in a generation, you'll be able to go to a hotel in low earth orbit, I think.
Marco Ciappelli: Yeah. It's, it's always hard for me to. Pick my questions because we can go in many different direction and the time is limited. So again, uh, I guess I said the beginning, if you had fun, I invite you to come back and talk about other things. Amongst the other things that I see on the kind of like the script of possible question, there is one that you talk about space tourism and that's, that's very interesting to me to see how commercial and it's going to drive the next phase.
Of, um, of space exploration. But there is one thing that I, that I wanna finish with, which is that you went to in trouble to some of the sites that you saw when you were flying [00:35:00] around. And those are big sites like the Soviets and Panama Canal or the pyramids or any other thing that you can see up there.
And I'm always fascinated when I see this fast moving. You know, sunset, sunrise and aurora borealis and all of that when when you go in rotation on the the space shuttle and or the international space station how did you pick those and what made you? You decide, well, okay, being in space four times, now I'm going to go visit some of these places here on the planet.
Tom Jones: Right. You get this incredible view of the home planet from orbit. And you realize that you're never going to live long enough to see every One of the marvels down there on the earth's surface that you might see from space. But I try to take pictures of my favorite spots having to do with the history of the, of our society on our civilization.
How, how did we migrate from Africa across Asia and into Europe? You know, what were [00:36:00] the big, um, the big voyages of the age of discovery back 500 years ago when we circumnavigated the globe for the first time and discovered the new world. So Those are the kinds of themes that I would, I would be interested in looking at the earth.
And so I've been able to go on my bucket list, uh, to some of those places. I haven't been to Antarctica yet and I'd like to get there, but you know, I have gone to, you know, the world war II Normandy beaches, uh, where the course of world war II changed in Europe. I've been out in the Pacific and gone to Hawaii and Pearl Harbor and visited some of the, the islands in the Philippines where, you know, on the earth science front, I saw erupting volcanoes there.
But on the, on the, uh, the history front, the Philippines, uh, were a big part of the, the second world war campaigns in the Pacific. So those are places that I try to get to. Uh, just recently I got to the far East for the first time and I wasn't, I'm not old enough to have flown, uh, for the air force in Vietnam.
My air force career was just after the Vietnam war I did, but I just [00:37:00] recently got to Vietnam and visit that country and see a little bit of the, the way the history is told by the communist regime in Vietnam. And you know, I know my side of the story, but I was interesting to see the perspective of the communist government there.
You know, I think it's biased, but it was still interesting to see the people of Vietnam today and be happy for them that there's been no shooting over there for the last 50 years. And, you know, visit a society that was such a big part of American history. So those are my ambitions is to get to as many spots like that around the planet that I've seen from space, that I can touch with my own hands, with my own eyes, in the years I've got left.
Marco Ciappelli: And I love that. And we're going to close with the With these thoughts, because I when I talk about society and technology, I often say, especially now with generative AI, and we never talk about ethics, and we never talk about looking into biases and things that we that we have done in the past. And [00:38:00] again, going to philosophical conversation about Technology like we've done in these days because you almost like find yourself looking at yourself in the mirror with AI.
And I felt like we have done the same thing with space exploration. Um, astronauts went up there and discovered new things about humanity. Uh, kind of like testing the limits and then as you do you you kind of find more interest in what the planet Is and maybe you see more of a unity So it's it's exciting that you went there you got inspired to to by looking down to then say yep I I got to go to see this place.
I need to look back into into her history And um, I don't know. Do you think that's the main reason why we go? To space to learn more about who we are. And
Tom Jones: it's undeniable that, uh, as human beings, we are curious and we do want to see what's over [00:39:00] the next horizon. So, you know, from orbital perspective, I got to look over the horizon, you know, 848 orbits of the earth.
I got to see a lot of, of, of the geography and geology and, uh, life on our planet from space, but. I haven't had a chance to experience that personally. So, you know, over my horizon here on the terrestrial level, I want to get over that to that next place where I can make a new discovery that would satisfy my own curiosity.
But that's what drives us out into deep space is to, you know, look for new resources to make our lives better. On the moon, eventually, uh, resources, the asteroids will be tapped and then we'll find knowledge on Mars that will help us develop as a species. And I think ultimately, um, I love this planet, but we have to establish ourselves on other worlds so that we'll survive some potential catastrophe of the future, whether it's a rogue asteroid or another pandemic.
So it's an insurance policy for us. And, you know, that's, what's driving us forward is, is that curiosity [00:40:00] plus the desire to make sure that our species goes on. It's, it's. It's something internal that does maybe even subconsciously drive us forward.
Marco Ciappelli: Well, Tom, I want to thank you so much for spending this time with me and, uh, telling little portion of your many stories, but, uh, uh, I want to invite everybody to find Uh, your book and the experience and the stories again, very short story of their experience in, uh, in perspective of, uh, of all the 135 mission that the space shuttle flew and, And all the stories that are told firsthand by astronauts that have been up there.
I know that the book has been, uh, published October 31st, 2023. So it's available for everybody. I'll put links to get in touch with Tom and his website and all the social media to the book. And, uh, I invite [00:41:00] everybody to, to read it. I certainly will. And, Tom, thank you so very much for sharing all these stories with us.
Tom Jones: It's a pleasure and I hope folks enjoy the book.
Marco Ciappelli: I hope so too. Thank you very much. Everybody stay tuned, check the notes, subscribe and there'll be many more stories coming to you from Audio Signals. Thank you very much.
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