Tuesday, June 2, 2020

NASA and SpaceX supply inspiration and unity over turmoil and division

With all the negativity we're constantly inundated with (and we've seen plenty over the past year, month and week), we need not brush aside what we're getting right. Saturday was one of those moments that we should remember with our families and for future generations...

Before gearing up for yet another launch tomorrow (resuming satellite launches), I, among many, am still in awe of the reboot of America's space program over the weekend. And the viewership numbers seem to prove that sentiment out, as SpaceX's 1st astronaut launch proved to be NASA's most-watched online event ever!
NASA's "Launch America" drew much of the nation in. On Saturday (May 30), SpaceX launched its first-ever crewed mission, a test flight called Demo-2 that sent NASA astronauts Bob Behnken and Doug Hurley to the International Space Station (ISS).


The liftoff was the first orbital crewed launch to depart from American soil since NASA retired its space shuttle fleet in 2011. And a record number of people tuned in to watch the milestone online, agency officials said.

"We’re still collecting the data, but some of our metrics are saying that peak viewership for the joint NASA-SpaceX launch broadcast across all of our platforms was at least 10.3 million concurrent viewers — the most-watched event we’ve ever tracked," NASA Associate Administrator for Communications Bettina Inclán said during a news conference on Sunday (May 31), shortly after Behnken and Hurley's Crew Dragon capsule arrived at the ISS.

To be clear: The record Demo-2 just broke is for internet traffic, not viewership of all kinds. For example, it's estimated that about 600 million people — one-sixth the global population at the time — watched the Apollo 11 moon landing on TV on July 20, 1969.

In the midst of everything going on out there, VP Pence also brought up an interesting comparison of the times...
Several high-ranking American officials, including Vice President Mike Pence, have drawn parallels between the famed Apollo missions and Demo-2, noting that both took place in times of extreme turmoil and division in the United States.

Apollo's backdrop included protests against the Vietnam War and widespread civil-rights abuses. And today the nation is beset by the coronavirus pandemic and social unrest stemming from the tragic May 25 death of George Floyd at the hands of Minneapolis police.

The Saturn V rockets that launched the Apollo missions "rose above the tumult and the clamor of their times. They were a symbol of national strength and unity," Pence said on Saturday shortly after Demo-2's liftoff. "I believe with all my heart that millions of Americans today will find the same inspiration and unity of purpose that we found in those days in the 1960s."

Right on. And this is the uplifting unity we want to remember of this time, not the turmoil and division manufactured out there. Reach for the stars once again, pioneers.
Related links: With SpaceX's first astronaut launch, a new era of human spaceflight has dawned
SpaceX's 1st Crew Dragon with astronauts docks at space station in historic rendezvous
SpaceX's Crew Dragon has that 'new car smell' and flies 'totally different' than a NASA shuttle
Watch NASA astronauts fly SpaceX’s Crew Dragon using touchscreens
Posted by an ebb and flow at 11:11 PM