NASA’s human spaceflight program took big strides in 2020 with the official kick-off of the commercial crew program with SpaceX, and on plans to return humans to the surface of the Moon via the Artemis program. NASA Associate Administrator of the Human Exploration and Operations (HEO) Mission Directorate Kathryn Lueders has been there for it all, and actually rose to her current position from previously serving as Commercial Crew Program Manager, so there’s no one better to speak to the agency’s achievements and goals around putting humans in space.
Lueders will join us at TC Sessions: Space this year, which is happening December 16 and 17. It’s a fully virtual event, featuring all-star programming from across the space industry, public sector, and of course the startup scene. Associate Administrator Lueders will be joined on stage by moderator Emily Calandrelli, scientist, engineer, and host of the hit Netflix show Emily’s Wonder Lab.
We’ll be talking to Lueders about NASA’s historic certification of SpaceX’s Falcon 9 and Dragon human launch system, which ends the U.S. reliance on Russia’s Soyuz for transportation to and from the International Space Station – and becomes the first commercial spacecraft certified for human flight ever.
Dragon will make history yet again with its first-ever operational crew mission, set to take three NASA astronauts and one JAXA astronaut to the ISS this weekend.
Associate Administrator Lueders will also be able to talk us through the ongoing effort to gain a second commercial crew mission provider with Boeing, which is still in the process of certifying their Starliner spacecraft, and NASA’s work toward putting the next American man and the first American woman on the surface of the Moon with Artemis. She’s also the perfect person to talk about the agency’s future with commercial and startup partners when it comes to human spaceflight.
You can get an Early Bird Ticket for just $125 until 11:59pm tonight, Friday, November 13. And we have discounts available for groups, students, active military/government employees and for early-stage space startup founders who want to pitch and give their startup some extra visibility.
