Team Earth (4/4/23)

Good morning. The final uncrewed test flight of the Apollo program lifted off on this day in 1968, paving the way for humans to launch to the Moon on Apollo 8. We’re having a bit of déjà vu as NASA gets ready to send people to the Moon again.

Today’s newsletter: 🌕 Artemis II crew🛰️ Pathfinder #0041🔁 People on the move

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NASA Picks a Crew to Circle the Moon

Humanity has picked its team for the first step in its grand return to the Moon. Yesterday, NASA revealed the crew of four that will circle the moon on the 10-day Artemis II mission.

Without further ado…Here’s the lineup:

1. Reid Wiseman will serve as the mission’s commander. Wiseman is a member of the 2009 astronaut class, former chief of NASA’s astronaut office, and has spent 165 consecutive days aboard the ISS.

2. Victor Glover will helm the ship as mission pilot. Glover is a former Navy aviator, has been a member of the astronaut corps since 2013, and piloted the Crew-1 mission to the ISS. Glover is the first Black person ever assigned to a lunar mission.

3. Christina Hammock Koch is one of two mission specialists aboard the flight. The first woman to nab a lunar mission assignment and the only professional engineer on the flight, Koch holds the record for longest continuous spaceflight by a woman at 328 days.

4. Jeremy Hansen rounds out the crew as a mission specialist and the first Canadian to be assigned to a lunar mission. Hansen worked as capcom at Canada’s Mission Control Center, and this will be his first space mission.

Now that they’ve received their assignments, the astronauts have time to consider what the mission means. “It occurs to me how important it is to have human eyes look back on Earth, seeing it as a small body in the window,” Koch told Payload in an interview. “Looking back on all of humanity and all of our billions and billions of friends—everything we know—I think is a really important perspective that I want to make sure to bring back to Earth.”

Artemis II: The first crewed flight in the Artemis Moon-to-Mars era is scheduled to lift off no earlier than the end of 2024. Rather than touch down on the lunar surface, Artemis II will trace a figure eight that takes the crew aboard the Orion capsule 6,400 miles past the Moon at its furthest point.

“[Artemis II] is the first of many crewed stepping stones to bring humans back to the Moon sustainably, responsibly, and then on to Mars,” said Koch. “This is the first time we are going to be testing out the life support system of the Orion space capsule and many other systems, communication, maneuverability for rendezvous and proximity operations. So many things to learn about, and we are going to be focused 100 percent on future missions.”

+ Stay tuned: We'll be publishing our full Q+A with Koch online later today.

An Apex Exclusive and Pathfinder #0041 with Ian Cinnamon

Apex Space is officially manifested on the SpaceX Transporter-10 mission launching no earlier than January 2024, cofounder and CEO Ian Cinnamon told Payload.

According to Ian, “this will make Apex the fastest company in history to go from a clean sheet design to launch in our size class of spacecraft.”

Rewind a moment: Apex, an LA-based satellite developer, emerged from stealth last October with $7.5M+ in seed financing led by Andreessen Horowitz. The startup seeks to standardize the manufacturing process for satellite buses. Its first product is called Aries, a 100-kg class satellite bus that can support ~100 kg of payload.

A deep dive on Apex

In today’s Pathfinder podcast, Payload CEO and newly minted podcast host Mo Islam chats with Ian Cinnamon. Before founding Apex, Ian was an investor and entrepreneur-in-residence at Village Global and founded Synapse Technology, an AI security startup that exited to Palantir.

Ian and Mo talk about Apex’s origin story, the complexities of satellite bus manufacturing, and the size of Apex’s target market. They also discuss:

• The long-awaited history behind the Cinnamon family name

• Why the Apex team is best suited to tackle this market

• How to successfully work with commercial vs. government customers

• The importance of the SpaceX Transporter-10 mission

• The geopolitical tailwinds supporting the space industry

• And much more…

Pathfinder #0041 is live now…

…check it out on YouTube, Apple, Spotify, or desktop. And reply to this email to let us know what you think!

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In Other News

• Virgin Orbit ($VORB) has officially filed for bankruptcy after failing to secure additional funding and laying off most of its staff last week.

• ESA reopened its Paris HQ after five years of renovations.

• Japan delayed the May launch of its H-2A rocket as it continues to investigate the H3 launch failure.

• Artemis is a case study for space missions surviving political turnover.

• The White House released a new planetary defense strategy.

• A bitcoin treasure chest is launching to the Moon’s surface this year.

• Former astronaut Doug Hurley laments the lack of beer in space in a Busch Light ad urging lager lovers to protect Earth.

The View from Space

NASA tweeted this pic of Landsat 8 in orbit taken by a Maxar satellite.