[music]
[Peter] All right here we are,
Downtown Cocoa Beach.
[man] You’re in the middle
of the Space Coast.
And you guys you’re from here.
-You grew up here Jack and Greg.
-Yeah grew up here.
It’s my first time here
so I’m excited to learn from you guys.
[Jack] The history of Cocoa Beach
is not a long history.
It was originally developed in the 1920s
by a lawyer from Georgia
named Gus Edwards
who built a bridge out here.
And it went from the mainland
back 20 miles behind us
to the sand here
on Cocoa Beach on the beach.
He built a casino
divided the property
up into lots and put in a grid.
The problem was of course
the Depression.
The plans he had for Cocoa Beach
kind of cratered.
And Cocoa Beach stayed
a small fishing village
all the way through the ’40s.
During the wartime
there was an Air Force base down south
where they were training
people how to fly seaplanes.
So this was all kind of
off limits during the war.
A lot of submarine action
and U-boat action occurred offshore,
a bunch of sunken boats.
Okay.
And it was the route
of the Spaniards with their gold.
So from Sebastian, 20, 30 miles
to the south all the way to the cape
there’s a string of sunken
Spanish galleons and Spanish gold.
But Cocoa Beach was
pretty much nothing until
they decided to put
the missile test range here.
[Peter] US Navy or Army?
Well back then
there was a special agency
that had taken prisoner or guest,
I don’t know what,
Wernher Von Braun
and his crew from Germany
and they decided they needed
to start a missile program.
So this became the test range
for a lot of reasons.
One, when rockets go up
they always go east.
And there’s nothing east of here.
So if they blew up
which they often did, no harm, no foul.
They go east because of
the spin of the earth right?
Either east or north, yeah,
but ultimately east.
And there’s a string of islands.
The Bahama chain and even past
the Bahama there’s a string of islands.
And back then they had to set up
observation posts on all those islands
to watch the missiles.
It was called the Eastern Test Range…
Tracking Range.
And so this was the perfect place
to start a missile program.
And so during the late ’50s
Cocoa Beach started to get some of
these engineers and scientists coming.
And if you read the book The Right Stuff
Tom Wolfe kind of analyzes what happened.
But it was a kind of crappy beach
with a bunch of crappy beach houses
and now a bunch of young engineers coming.
And then when Kennedy said
we’re going to the moon in 10 years
everything changed.
All the engineers,
all the scientists, everybody came here.
So Cocoa Beach in 1960
probably had 500 people
and in 1965 had 12,000 people.
And Cocoa Beach became
the epicenter of the world.
And now here it is 70 years later almost
and you can see out there
the launch towers of Blue Origin.
-Okay, out in the ocean?
-Yeah.
-Okay, way out there.
-Way out there.
[Peter] And the big players right now
are SpaceX, Blue Origin, and NASA, right?
-And we’ll get into that today.
-Yeah you’ll get to see that.
But those are the big three?
Big right now.
They always say surfing,
when you get to the beach,
“You should have been here yesterday.”
Well you should have been here yesterday.
There was a beautiful launch
last night and one tomorrow.
It’s like living by an airport now.
-Beautiful launch?
Don’t they all look the same?
-Oh no, everyone’s different.
-The best part is the return.
The pad when the sonic booms hit
and they land the first stage out there.
[Peter] Okay.
[Peter] Before we leave this area
there’s something we have to see?
We’re in the Barmuda Triangle.
That’s what they call it.
-Barmuda?
-Yeah Barmuda Triangle.
Just so you know this is the last beach
you can drink alcohol
on the beach in Florida.
So all the spring breakers
are coming here.
So you can’t tell the Space Coast story
without showing this scene huh?
Oh no.
There’s 30 bars within three blocks.
When you’re sitting in these bars
you don’t know who’s next to you.
It could be a doctor, a lawyer,
an Indian chief, an astronaut.
It could be any… Oh it’s you!
[laughter]
-How are you?
-I’m good.
It’s so good to see you.
I fall in love with you more
every time I see your posting.
-How are you?
-Good.
You look terrific.
You never get any older.
-It’s true. Honest, it’s true.
-I don’t know about that.
This guy’s doing a podcast.
-We’re doing a video about Space Coast.
Awesome.
Do you meet many astronauts, engineers?
-No.
No? All right. You killed the story.
-She wouldn’t tell you if she did.
-Right?
She wouldn’t tell you.
In the 1950s, all of a sudden
engineers from every college,
every university,
every everywhere,
big city, are coming here.
And so it turned into
a Las Vegas-type strip.
There were clubs and restaurants
all up and down this strip.
And my dad had a bar right there
on this corner called The Missile.
It was the first adult entertainment…
They didn’t call it that then.
But the original astronauts
all hung out in there except for one.
John Glenn never showed his face.
-They’d hang out at the strip club?
-Right.
At this place was Bernard Surf.
It was a community restaurant,
slash bank, slash hangout
from the ’40s until the ’60s.
By the ’60s
it was the epicenter of Cocoa Beach.
And you see it’s gone now.
And that’s the story of Cocoa Beach.
Everything that was here
is getting transformed.
This is a brand new building,
that’s a brand new building,
the new city hall.
Everything is starting up again
which is a result of the ebb and flow
of the space industry.
Cocoa Beach went crazy in the early ’60s.
Engineers and all
the associated businesses
that come with educated
young partying people
with a mission to go to the moon.
We never saw our parents.
They were all busy
sending people to the moon
and related to it in one way or the other.
And then Nixon ended the Apollo program.
Ten years of glory.
And now it’s 1970.
The engineers and everything
that came with them left.
The unemployment rate in
1970 here was almost 20%.
-Everybody left.
-Okay.
The businesses closed.
The engineers left.
Houses were in foreclosure.
It was as bad as it could get.
And the population went from all
30-somethings to all retired people.
Retired military that heard about
this Patrick Air Force Base
where they had a commissary
and a hospital live in Cocoa Beach
and houses that were only 5 or 10
years old picked up for nothing.
Then they decided
to do this space shuttle thing.
Reusable airplanes stuck on solid
rocket boosters with a big old gas tank.
-That was the ’80s?
-That was the ’80s.
And again it boomed.
All the engineers, all the businesses,
everything went crazy again
until the first explosion.
When Challenger blew up
it all stopped again.
-And then when they fixed it–
-1986 right?
They fixed the O-rings.
They did all that stuff.
Then it started back up again.
But everybody knew
that the shuttle was gonna end
and then what?
Nobody knew.
And so the economy
and everything of Cocoa Beach
goes up and down with
the rocket business until
they figured out what was going on
and decided tourism, and the port,
and cruise ships might help.
[Jack] Bob Salmon!
[Bob] Hey.
Jack Kirshenbaum!
[Greg] Greg Galzerano, I know you.
-Give me some knuckles, doggy.
How are you?
-Good.
Did you get that at junk food bakery?
-I like that place.
-They got lots of cookies.
The donuts, I’m a donut guy.
They don’t have donuts
except on Fridays and Saturday.
Okay I’ll remember that.
We gotta run,
I don’t want to run over your toes.
[Peter] Who’s that?
[Greg] He’s the local surveyor.
He was the smartest,
brightest surveyor ever.
And then he had a medical issue.
And now he’s retired.
He eats cookies.
Now something else happened
in Cocoa Beach.
California and the surfing craze in Gidget
hit Cocoa Beach in the early ’60s.
And Cocoa Beach, Florida has two things.
-Weather all year that’s nice.
-Yeah.
And the best surf, most consistent,
on the east coast of Florida.
And it’s produced a number of champions
including a guy named Kelly Slater.
Right.
Kelly Slater grew up here,
traveled the world,
became the 11 time world champ
and this is a statue dedicated to Kelly.
Now the surf industry became
a huge economic driver in Cocoa Beach.
-I’m going to run out there.
Are you okay with that?
-Sure.
-The mic will pick you up.
So Kelly still resides here
as well as in Hawaii and other places.
But Kelly and his two brothers
became local heroes,
world heroes,
because of Kelly’s accomplishments.
And he still surfs.
He was surfing the pipeline event
just a couple weeks ago.
Beautiful statue. That is so cool.
I think Jack is still talking.
He’s great.
I press play
and he hasn’t stopped for one second.
[Jack] …dressed in Christmas attire.
And Surfing Santas is another event
we can talk about.
But surfing became
a giant, giant thing in Cocoa Beach.
And a guy named Ron DiMenna
was selling surfboards in New Jersey
at Ship Bottom, New Jersey
and he decided he needed to expand.
So he took a trip
down the East Coast selling surfboards.
And when he came across
the bridges to Cocoa Beach
he said “Oh my God, this looks like home.”
And so he opened
a small shop called Ron Jon’s
which is now the biggest
surf shop in the world.
With a dozen locations and–
[Peter] It keeps going, Ron Jon.
[Jack] Now I’m going to take you
by another baked in attribute.
I Dream of Jeannie is a 1960s
sitcom starring Barbara Eden.
Where she is a genie and her master
is an astronaut, Tony.
It’s great if you haven’t seen it.
-So space culture has baked into
the local culture here. Fair to say?
-Completely baked in.
In the olden days
there was a hotel right back there
called the Cape Colony Inn.
It’s gone.
But the original seven astronauts
all got a piece of it.
The developer decided he would give
the astronauts a piece of the action.
And that was the end of being able to
use your space fame as an economic tool.
-So the astronauts and potentially
the engineers are the stars here?
Oh the astronauts for sure.
Now that was before there
were a thousand astronauts.
When there were seven astronauts,
or twelve, or thirty,
everybody knew them by name.
When they’d show up at a shop they got
a lot of respect, a lot of admiration.
Famous people?
There was a group of girls
called the Cape Cookies
whose goal was to sleep with
all seven of the original astronauts.
-They were called the Cape Cookies.
-Were they successful?
There’s a book out called the Cape Cookies
and it’s probably based on a true story.
Like what I’m telling you
this is all based on a true story.
If someone else tells it
I’m sure it’ll be different.
But I don’t think they got all seven.
And somebody’s going to have to–
-Who was the holdout?
-I’m not at Liberty to discuss that.
Okay.
So are there a lot of not liberty
to discuss topics here in this area?
-Yes.
-Oh yeah for sure.
There’s all kinds.
There’s military secrets,
family secrets.
There’s alcohol and drug secrets.
There’s like any small town,
this is a small town.
It used to be called
either Mayberry by the Sea
or Mayberry on LSD.
You just never knew.
In the ’60s and ’70s it was
as wild as any place you could be.
[Peter] This video
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Now back to the story.
[Peter] You’ve never lived anywhere else?
You know I had two regrets in my life.
One was I didn’t eat
the live scorpions in Beijing.
But I have since eaten them in Bangkok.
And I didn’t get to live
in a big city when I was young.
Now that regret
I’ll never be able to cure.
But I grew up here, went away to school,
and came back here to work.
So me and my family
have been here since 1958.
What was your work?
I was a lawyer.
-Okay.
I was a lawyer.
[Jack] Now this was the first public park
in Cocoa Beach, Allen Shepard Park.
He of course
was the first American in space.
Even the schools are named after stuff
like that like Freedom Seven and the like.
[Greg] I went to Grissom High School.
It was Ed White, Grissom, and Chaffee.
And they all three died
in a capsule in a test out here.
They burned up inside the capsule.
[Peter] Do you remember
when Challenger blew up?
I watched it.
I mean I watched the pieces
hit the ocean all afternoon.
-Wow.
My office was on the fifth floor
of a building in Downtown Cocoa Beach.
Right on the ocean.
And I had glass walls
on the north and on the east.
I invited everybody in my staff
into my office to watch it
and as it was ascending I said
I would give up all of you
and all of this to be there.
And at that moment it exploded.
And those of us that knew,
knew exactly what happened.
There was a catastrophic failure.
We saw the solid boosters
cross in the sky.
They were no longer attached.
We could see pieces
falling into the ocean all afternoon.
-It was just… Devastating.
-All afternoon?
Well it was going up at tens
of thousands of miles an hour.
So after it exploded
it continued to ascend in pieces.
I mean look at the videos.
I can’t look at them.
But it was horrific. Horrific.
-And that happened right here
outside of Cape Canaveral.
-It happened right out there
just to the right. Yeah.
This happens to be the Cocoa Beach Pier.
When they decided to build
the Saturn Missile
they built it on Merritt Island
which is the backside of the Cape.
They had no way to get
the pieces built in Huntsville there.
-Oh yeah, I made a video
about Huntsville too.
-They had to dig a ditch
and on both sides of it it was military
but the port they dug
created an erosion problem
for all the beaches to the south.
We had to sue the Corps of Engineers
to get them the promise
to re-nourish the beach.
Every seven years
what they’re doing there,
that’s the beach re-nourishment project.
-Okay so there’s pipe going through here?
-Yeah.
We sued the Army Corps
of Engineers in 1990
and settled in 2000.
It took a decade.
It was the first and only time
the Army Corps of Engineers
ever settled a case
for a re-nourishment project.
-So when you sue the Army Corps
of Engineers you sue the government right?
-Yeah.
-Shut me up where you want to but
in a way you’re suing the taxpayers right?
We all contribute to the betterment
of our country in some way.
[Peter] Thank you.
[Jack] If they build a road
and they take your house
to build their road,
you are compensated for what they took.
It’s in the Constitution.
When they took our oceanfront land
because of erosion they caused
the court determined
that was a compensable taking.
-Okay.
-And they had to pay for it.
So instead of paying the billions
and billions of dollars of damages
they agreed to do
a re-nourishment program.
And if you look down here you can see
how they’re extending the beach.
When we started the lawsuit
there was no beach.
The high tide went
all the way up to the vegetation.
[Peter] This is probably the
coolest pier I’ve ever seen.
-You see those towers there?
-Yeah.
Greg, fill them in on what he’s got.
[Greg] That’s Blue Origin.
And that’s their new billion dollar pad.
-[Peter] Blue Origin way up there? Okay.
-Yes.
[Greg] Built it in a year.
It went up really fast
and they’ve got the rockets
usually inside the building.
Tall towers are
lightning arresters around it.
You have the water tower
that floods a pad when the rockets go off.
I wouldn’t have thought Blue Origin
is a big player here but it is.
Oh they’re huge.
-You hear about SpaceX all the time.
-Blue Origin has a longer range plan.
Heavier, fewer rockets as opposed to
lots of little teeny satellites.
[man yells] Hey!
-[Peter] Spring break?
-[Jack] Yep.
-The drinking starts early?
-Yeah.
-Oh here we go.
-This is I Dream of Jeannie.
Okay, there she is.
Kelly Slater.
So basically everything
you’ve talked about today.
John Glenn.
The surf contest.
That’s Friendship Seven climbing in.
-So did those two groups blend at all?
The surfing and the space communities?
-Everybody was surfing
and their parents worked for space.
It was all part of the deal.
And at the same time this area of Florida
stayed relatively economical.
Because a day at Disney
costs what, 500 bucks?
A day here costs $10 parking.
Okay. You’re saying
it’s not super expensive here?
Super inexpensive.
[Peter] Okay…
Oh and we have a book here on the floor.
The City of Cocoa Beach
The First 60 Years.
I feel like it’s better listening to you
than reading that.
Okay so why is it inexpensive here?
-Yeah that doesn’t make sense.
If you look at Florida,
the Southeast, Miami,
Fort Lauderdale, Palm Beach,
were where all the money went.
And then the beaches around the big cities
became the expensive beaches.
We’re not close to a big city.
-Orlando’s big isn’t it?
-Yeah but it’s an hour away.
For example one of these homes,
cool modest mid-century ’50s home.
-How much for one of those do you think?
-[Greg] Probably 500.
-That close to the beach?
-Yep.
500, 400?
Now we consider that outrageously high.
[Peter laughing] Wow.
Now all of a sudden a friend of mine
who was in the travel business
in the early ’70s
hooked up with a Norwegian guy
and they said
Port Canaveral is the furthest north
a cruise ship can be
and get to Nassau overnight.
And so they started
a cruise line called Premier.
And they had two or three boats
they called the Big Red Boat.
And they then did a deal with Disney
that Mickey would
make appearances on their boat.
This is 30 years ago.
And all of a sudden everybody said,
“Hey gee, this cruise business
can be unbelievable.”
Ultimately Disney bought them.
And now the Disney cruises out of here
are the most popular cruises in the world.
And that’s where the boosters
that Elon Musk sends into space land.
They come back here.
And it’s where
all the big parts of the rockets
that they have to assemble
at the Kennedy Space Center
come in on barges.
And it remains a fishing port.
And it is a huge recreational port.
This is a super-secret Trident
nuclear-powered submarine base.
That bay right there.
[Peter] Okay.
Nuclear-powered submarine base?
-That’s right. Trident missiles.
Now Cocoa Beach High School
is called the Minutemen.
That’s their mascot.
Minutemen was the original
intercontinental ballistic missile
that was developed in the ’60s
to combat the Soviet threat.
And they tested them
here at Cape Canaveral.
Hence the Cocoa Beach Minutemen.
Had nothing to do
with the Revolutionary War.
Okay. Do you know much about
our nuclear sub-industry,
whatever you want to call it, arsenal?
No, but I can tell you it’s called NOTU.
NOTU?
Navy Ordnance Test Unit.
And if you Google that you’ll find out
all you want to know about that.
How many subs do you know, roughly?
Well even the British
and the French subs come in here.
They don’t stay here. They come and go.
This isn’t like Kings Bay in Georgia
where they build them and arm them.
-They come here and replenish.
-Okay.
I think that could be
a Navy sub-tug isn’t it?
-Sub-tug?
-When they come in here they need tugs.
All I know is when they
launch a missile out of here
15 minutes it’ll be…
It probably has enough nuclear warheads
to destroy every city along the way.
I grew up here during
the Cuban Missile Crisis.
-You ever hear that?
-Of course.
Okay well I grew up here
during that crisis.
And every day we had drills.
We had to pick up our desks
and crawl underneath a frickin’ desk.
-You think a desk helps you out?
-No but they’d find us all together.
-All right.
They’d vaporize us all together.
[Peter] That’s great infrastructure
for fishing.
[Jack] …for today?
[man speaking inaudibly]
[Jack] Yeah.
-Haven’t seen any?
-Saw some turtles.
Yeah lots of turtles.
-Yeah.
-Yeah.
It’s mating season for the turtles.
Here’s a good shot of that dredge.
[Peter] Oh yeah.
[Jack] They dredge the bottom over there.
-Okay.
-They pipe a slurry
of water and sand to the beach
and it comes down that pipe.
The water drains into the ocean.
The sand is left behind.
And it increases the size
of the beach about 100 yards.
[engine running]
[Peter] Okay so we get
two, three more minutes of Jack.
Anything else you wanna say?
‘Cause we’re going to go up to Titusville
meet up with a reporter up there,
Greg Pallone.
-Yes.
-The other Greg.
What else can you tell us about your–
The most important thing is
in a short-term history like Cocoa Beach
of a 20, 30, 40 year arc
you have to always look at the context
in which the minute is occurring.
Because things change a lot quick
and the changes are really significant
if you pay attention.
What do you think about
this current iteration?
Um I think the jury is out.
I think that these Airbnbs
can decimate the neighborhoods
and therefore the public schools
and then it will no longer be
a community of families and kids.
It will become primarily a tourist… area.
Which would be a bad thing.
The jury’s out. I’m not exactly sure
where it’s all headed.
How about with the space industry?
I think the space industry it’s going to
bring a lot of high-paying jobs here.
It’s going to bring more people
but Cocoa Beach and Cape Canaveral
are pretty much built out.
With the height limitations in place
and the density limitations
it’s hard to get more population
in those two places.
-And so–
-So the values are going to go up?
The values are going
to continue to increase
and with the additional pressure
of the Airbnbs
it’s going to be interesting to see
what happens to the neighborhoods.
-Those are some of the cruise ships.
-This is wild.
-[Greg] The crane straight ahead.
-Yeah.
Those are the cranes
that lift the boosters out.
-Okay so the–
-Space X.
[Peter] The ships bring the boosters in
and the cranes lift them out?
-Yeah and they have an autonomous barge.
They tow it offshore
and it goes by itself.
No captain, nothing in it other than…
It just automatically goes to a spot,
sits and waits for the rocket
to come down on it.
More proof we’re living in a simulation
and the machines are gonna take over.
We’re in a simulation, Jack?
-Fair to say?
-Mm-hmm.
-100%?
-No question. Yeah, 100%.
Another universe.
They’re peeking through
the atmosphere laughing at us.
We’re in some alien’s Game Boy.
[laughter]
-Okay get up by the fence.
-All right.
On your left is a restaurant
that’s been here a hundred years,
and then you get the cruise terminal,
and then the cruise ships.
-Yep.
-And then across you get the Coast Guard,
Blue Origin, SpaceX,
COMEX Industrial Products,
and the jetties, and the port,
and parks, and more restaurants.
-That is wild.
-Down at the end there
we have Trident Submarine Base.
This port is everything to everybody.
And what the port’s trying to do now
is chase out all the restaurants and bars
and make all of this cruise terminals
including the marinas
which are on the other side
of this restaurant.
-How do the locals feel?
-Oh they’re pissed.
-They’re pissed?
-All right Jack. Thank you for that.
-Here’s your stop.
-Your wealth of knowledge.
-You’re welcome.
-Good to meet you. Good luck.
-Appreciate it. Loved it.
All right guys, we are off to Titusville.
Greg Pallone, Space Coast Reporter.
-Channel 13.
Channel 13 is going to bring us
through all the nuts and bolts
of what’s going on here.
And here’s our Uber.
[music]
This is called Veterans Memorial Park
but it’s all part of Space View Park.
Which is this area. You’ve got
the Mercury 7 monument right there.
-So you had a big launch last night right?
They tried to launch.
They had a technical problem
so they had to scrub it.
It’s a crewed launch.
[Peter] Are we in your way?
-No, we in your way?
[Peter] Don’t want to edge you out
with the GoPro.
[laughter]
Okay so this is the place to report from?
-Yeah this is a great view.
-So I’ll go in with my great telephoto
and show you what’s going on.
So a lot of reporting out here for this?
Obviously people are interested.
There’s so much interest.
It’s ironic,
this park right here, I was here…
It was right around 2011.
That’s when the shuttle program…
You know obviously
they retired the shuttle program.
I was just going to talk to people
and see what they thought
and I ran into this guy from Indiana,
and I said,
“What are you doing down here?”
He said, “I’m visiting.
I love Florida and that type of thing,
I would love to see a launch.”
I said, “Well they’re not flying anymore.
The shuttles aren’t flying,
people aren’t flying.”
I said “Would you come if it was
just a regular rocket launch?”
He said probably not.
He wants to see people.
He wants to see our people going to space.
Okay.
And I always equate it to
kind of like Daytona.
What if the race cars were robotic?
There weren’t people in there.
There’s always a danger.
There’s always a thrill to knowing
that our people are on board
these incredibly powerful rockets
and capsules that are going up to space.
Launching right out of here,
that landmass right across from us?
That’s the Kennedy Space Center.
You’ve got the big building
is the Vehicle Assembly Building
or as Greg knows, the VAB.
It’s been here since the early ’60s when
they were starting up the Apollo program.
-Is that NASA now?
It’s NASA. It’s always been NASA.
But basically this is the landscape
of the launch pads out here pretty much.
You’ve got pad 39B
all the way to the left.
That’s what they call a clean pad
where they can bring
the mobile launcher out there
and bring any type of rocket
which they’re going to be doing soon.
I think people see launches,
especially crewed launches,
and human launches
going up to missions to space.
I think they see it as something
that they’ll never be able to do.
And so they’re dreaming about it
and seeing it in reality
through their eyes.
So that’s why they really relate
to these astronauts.
Most of these astronauts
have very interesting stories.
It’s not just the NASA astronauts.
It’s the ones from Russia, Japan.
We’re all partners and that’s why
they have the Space Station
’cause it’s a partnership
between all these countries.
-I’ll have my wife zoom up
on that as much as we can.
But watch your work to see the real stuff.
-There you go.
-[laughter]
-Yeah there we go.
-You smarty.
-Old school.
-Smarty.
Okay so for those that don’t know
much about the Space Coast
I’ve learned pretty much everything
I know in the last couple hours.
Or the industry, you hear of SpaceX right?
Right.
You hear of NASA, that’s not what it was.
And then you hear Blue Origin.
What’s the breakdown?
What’s going on here exactly
for those that don’t know?
The way it kind of went down
is in the 2000s
basically W. or George W. Bush
pretty much said, “Sorry shuttle program.
We’re not going to fund you anymore.
We need to shut it down and move on.”
So at that point NASA had to decide
what they were going to do.
So that’s really when the advent
of commercial space really came on.
Roughly around 2007, 2009.
Shuttle program retired 2011.
So there was a gap.
But that’s when Elon
really got going with SpaceX
and started launching
his original Falcon rockets.
And of course a lot of them blew up.
I mean it’s a test.
You got new things, new technology.
So he just saw a gap in the market?
Here’s an opening and I’m going to
jump in and fill the void.
-Basically I think he started around–
-[Greg] 2020 right?
Well I think he actually started around–
-2002.
-Yeah, 2002.
And they started launching
basically around 2010, 2011.
And that’s when that gap was
when the shuttle program had shut down.
-Okay.
-So he saw that window.
And so what NASA decided was
they decided that instead of building,
which they are building now,
but instead of building rockets why don’t
we rely on these commercial companies
to fly what we need to fly?
When it comes to satellites
or deep space missions or whatever.
Maybe eventually flying our people
to the International Space Station.
So NASA became a customer
of these commercial companies.
How did those feel at NASA,
those engineers at NASA,
who had their careers with NASA?
Did they jump over?
Some did if they were young enough.
-Okay.
-Many retired.
There were massive layoffs
with the shuttle program.
But understand that even the shuttle
program dealt with contractors.
They had a main contractor
and they would have
announced every couple weeks
a few more hundred layoffs.
They were cutting away
as the program was going away
and essentially moving
toward a more leaner way
of dealing with
the commercial space companies
so that they could do the work for them.
And then later NASA has been
developing their Artemis program
to go back to the moon.
We have not sent people
to the moon since 1972
and that was the Apollo program.
So now that NASA has a new mission to send
our astronauts back to the moon
to essentially colonize the moon.
Get a moon base and that will essentially
be a jumping off point
for missions to Mars or deep space.
You have to bring everything with you.
So just now there’s actually
two lunar rovers that are on the moon
that were launched by private companies
that are trying to map out the moon
and seek out water. Any type of water.
Water is extremely heavy.
You can’t launch it.
It’s really tough.
-Oh interesting.
-Yeah.
So where you go
you need to find that water source.
It’s not just for drinking and living
but also they can use the hydrogen
for fuel so it’s interesting.
-I’m going to be asking
some rookie questions.
-You go man.
-There’s actually water on the moon?
Well they think there are
signs of liquid ice
but they think it’s on the southern pole
which never sees the sun.
So they need to go explore those craters
and see if they can find them.
-Okay.
-‘Cause if they find water they’re set.
Okay. Now this program NASA
is operating now,
that’s in motion right now?
Yeah.
Matter of fact in the Vehicle
Assembly Building right now
they have their heavy lift rocket
partially stacked up.
Okay, so NASA is doing
more than I thought.
And then you have SpaceX
which we all see for the most part right?
The rocket’s coming
back down into the tweezers.
-The chopsticks they call them. [chuckles]
-Okay, chopsticks.
That’s eventually going to happen here.
-Right there.
-Okay.
-They’re going to launch from here.
-And that’s happening in Texas right now?
It’s happening in Texas
but their primary launch
is gonna be out there at pad 39A.
-Blue Origin, what are they doing?
They’ve been flying their New Glenn.
Morning… afternoon.
Their New Glenn out in Texas.
The ones that they flew Shatner on
and the people who are paying.
Their New Shepard they just launched,
that’s their heavy lift rocket.
They just did a test and flew that
just a couple of months ago.
-And that’s from their pad out there.
-Okay.
And it’s incredible.
That’s the first time
they’ve flown that rocket.
So they’re on their way at least.
They’re good at building rockets,
now they need to fly them.
They did their first test flight,
deemed it a success.
So many more upcoming.
And hopefully they can get a cadence like
SpaceX, launching all the time.
So are they all three in just
fierce competition with one another?
I would say there is
a healthy competition.
SpaceX is obviously leading the way.
But Bezos is definitely interested.
And he’s got the will
and the capital to do it.
Right.
So yeah they compete for contracts
with NASA and other customers.
Is it just a fight for engineers?
-They’re just batt–
-There’s a demand.
There’s a big demand.
-Huge demand?
-Yes. Big demand.
And these are high paying technical jobs.
If you think about it
at the height of the shuttle program
there were some 20,000
federal workers for the shuttle program.
-Living out here?
-Yeah.
Living on the beach. Living in Titusville.
When the shuttle program shut down
this town took a big hit.
-And so Titusville now, comeback?
Yeah big comeback. Big comeback.
-And then what’s going on here,
“Gemini – Titan booster”?
Well this is the Gemini program.
This was the very first
rocket program for NASA
that flew in the late ’50s and early ’60s.
They were flying the first astronauts.
These were contractors.
Martin Company, General Dynamics, Aerojet,
General Electric,
that’s a familiar name, Lockheed.
These were familiar companies that worked
and made the Gemini program possible.
It was Mercury first,
then Gemini, and then Apollo.
So Greg what’s your fascination
with space and doing this coverage?
There’s just something about
exploration you know?
Finding the unknown, going to do
something that we’ve never done.
That to me is just so interesting
and I just…
This area, this place, the Space Center,
you know, this is my Graceland.
This is my Disney.
Other people like those places.
This is… I just feel so at home.
I remember back in 2007
when I saw just an ad for this job.
You’re going to cover Brevard County.
I said where’s Brevard County, Florida?
Then I looked and I saw,
oh, it’s Cape Canaveral.
Oh it’s Cocoa Beach,
The Kennedy Space Center.
And then I read further and it said
you will be covering shuttle launches.
And I raised my hand
as high as I could and said, “Sign me up!”
Because that just sounded incredible to me
to be part of my beat to be space.
-Where’d you come from?
-From Georgia.
There’s just so much stuff,
there’s space all around.
If you look at the streets,
you’ve got Astronaut Boulevard.
This is Gus Grissom. This is the Gemini 3.
Gus Grissom and John Young and the
name of the capsule, The Molly Brown.
They flew in March of 1965.
John Young was the commander
of the very first
space shuttle mission, STS-1.
-I went to Grissom High School.
-This is your Hollywood Boulevard?
-This is Hollywood Boulevard right here.
-For the Space Coast?
-This is great. Yeah. This is awesome.
And you were saying off camera
talking to the engineers
or anyone working in the industry
is pretty much impossible?
-Yep.
-NDAs.
Secret stuff.
They have technology
they don’t want to reveal.
This is actually Space View Park.
You’ve got to love the Florida
element here with the alligators.
-Always have to have the gator warnings.
-[laughter]
But yeah these are
all the names of the engineers
and the different people
who’ve worked on these programs.
Here’s Harrison Schmitt.
That’s his handprints.
He flew on Apollo 17.
-How about our space industry
versus anything international?
Are we leading everything right now?
-By leaps and bounds.
-Hands down?
Elon’s… 90% of all the rockets
going into space are from Elon.
And then 5% is China
and the other 5% is–
[Peter] Russia?
Whatever… yeah.
Well SpaceX’s Cadence is they’re
launching the Starlink satellites
so they can provide
all this Internet service
in places that can’t get it
in other parts of the world.
-President Kennedy, nice.
-Yeah.
Most famous phrases for mankind ever.
And I thought it interesting he was
giving this speech at Rice in Houston
and he pronounced decade “decaid”.
I always thought that was interesting.
Is that the way
you’re supposed to pronounce it?
-I’ve never heard that.
-If you listen to it, he says it.
-Well he had that Boston accent.
-That kind of Massachusetts.
Right.
This guy he’s the one
who set us on the way.
-So this is when it was the competition
between the US and the Soviets.
Yes, Cold War.
-And the Soviets had us in some ways.
They put the first woman up there,
the first dog up there.
-First satellite too.
-First space station was them right?
-Mir was Soviet.
-Yeah.
And they had a… I mean
it was all about like that game right?
Whoever was winning space in a way
it was a metaphor for winning.
It was like sports right?
You’re winning the battle on Earth.
-We were in the Cold War.
-Yeah.
And what’s the ultimate
military high ground?
-Space.
-Yeah.
And Congressman Bill Posey who I know
you know, Greg, he’s from this area.
He recently retired but when
I first met him and I got here
he worked for NASA in the ’70s
in the Apollo program.
And one of the first things
he said to me, he goes,
“Do you really think that we went
to the moon to collect moon rocks?”
And I thought about it.
Then said it’s the military high ground.
-Yeah.
-It is.
And that’s why the conquest
for low Earth orbit
for the moon and further
that’s where the power comes from.
Did you know the Russians
built a space shuttle?
-They built the space shuttle?
-They built a space shuttle.
-They never flew.
-I didn’t know that. Why not?
They ran out of money
because of their economy.
That’s why the Soviet Union collapsed.
-Their base is in Kazakhstan.
Yeah.
That’s where they fly their Soyuz rockets.
And we have an exchange program
with the Russians
the United States and them
is that back in 2022
they came into an agreement
that they would alternate
astronauts and cosmonauts
on either Soyuz rocket
flying from Russia
or our rockets to go to the space station.
So it’s been a partnership
despite the political–
-Is it still a partnership?
-Seriously?
-There’s one flying tomorrow. Yeah.
There’s a cosmonaut.
Yep.
-With us tomorrow?
-He’s over there right now.
-He’s over there right now.
-And a guy from Japan.
Yeah. And we have a Japanese astronaut.
Then two female pilots.
The commander and the pilot. Yeah.
-I like that no matter what
the geopolitical situation is.
-You know that falls–
-Yeah, space unites people.
[Peter] These guys have tiny hands.
[Greg] Yeah, astronauts
are usually not very big.
How tall are they usually?
I’d say probably about my height.
There’s not too many tall ones
’cause especially in the old days
you’re trying to fit in capsules
and put three of them in there.
Think about when
you’re watching Apollo 13
how squeezed in that tin can they are.
-They all had to be pretty skinny?
-Oh yeah.
Fit, everything, yeah.
-So what’s going on with the
guys up there now right?
Isn’t that what the next launch
is for, to get them out?
-Rescue–
-Well let’s be real careful here.
I don’t like to use those terms.
You know the original launch
for the Boeing Starliner was a test.
Did they expect they would
be there for nine months?
No, but they rolled with the punches.
You had two astronauts who said,
“Hey we’ll make the most of the time.”
They ended up doing
a lot more experiments, a spacewalk,
and they celebrated
the holidays and all that.
So they made the most of it.
But what they did was
Boeing Starliner capsule,
NASA deemed it was not safe
to bring them back on it.
So they brought it back unmanned.
And then they decided to go ahead
and get SpaceX and their Crew Dragon
and make them a part
of the Crew 9 mission.
-So they flew two astronauts up.
-Okay.
And now they’re going to bring
those two back on the Crew 9.
And once the Crew 10,
which was supposed to launch last night
hopefully will launch tomorrow night.
Once they get up there,
they’ll switch off,
and they’ll bring them back
hopefully Sunday.
-Nine months? Is that the record?
-No.
-What’s the record?
-A year.
-A year.
But that was planned. That was on purpose.
Okay. So have they been in contact
with the media, those astronauts up there?
-They’ve had some availability.
-Okay.
They’ve done a few things like that.
Have they been asked those questions?
-Yes, but they’ve been very diplomatic.
-Okay.
There are those who want to
sensationalize it and say
they were stranded and it was a rescue.
But that’s just not the case.
I mean they had some issues.
That’s what they do.
That’s why they test for the next time.
So it doesn’t happen again.
Engineers will tell you all day long
they want things to go wrong
so that they can address them
and not have people on board
and running that risk.
-So things happen.
-Okay, yep.
Space is hard.
So that’s why you have the two companies.
You have Boeing and SpaceX.
So there are four big players?
Well more or less.
You have SpaceX, Boeing, and Blue Origin,
and also you have a group that’s
been around for a long time
called United Launch Alliance, ULA.
They’re flying a brand new Vulcan rocket.
I know that sounds like Star Trek
but they’re going to be
doing missions as well.
[Peter] And it’s on the upswing
right now, right?
-What’s going on out here?
-Yeah.
The cycle went down
and now it’s really charging?
If they have their way
the possibility of 300 launches a year.
And what was it five years ago?
Couple.
We’ve had 20 so far this year.
20 launches so far. We’re in March.
March 13th.
And if they get to a point
it’s going to be like an airport.
If you think about it they’re gonna
bring a rocket out, launch it,
bring another one out, launch it.
And more launches here
than in Texas or California right?
-Way more. A lot more.
-Way more?
-Rapid and reusable.
And that’s the key right there,
reusability.
That’s what SpaceX
really got on the cutting edge
and bringing their boosters back,
catching it with a chopstick
or landing it on a drone ship.
Landing it on the landing zone
which will happen tomorrow night
with the sonic boom.
They just get that thing,
refurbish it like a used car,
get it all ready to go,
and put it on another rocket, and go.
It doesn’t matter what we’re going through
in the country when it comes to
division or whatever it may be.
No matter who you voted for
we can always unite through space.
There’s something about humanity
getting together and getting behind this
and just going on the adventure you know?
It’s just one of those things that
I mean if you think about
back in the Apollo program
landing on the Moon,
just the whole world was so excited.
Not just because…
I mean yeah it was The United States
but people all around the world
were so excited for that
because it brings that moment.
We all bleed red
and it’s just it’s one of those things
that they may not understand
the technology behind it
but they just know that people
are leaving earth and they’re exploring.
And I think everyone,
at least a little bit, is an explorer so…
Everyone inside is an explorer
and this is the embodiment of that.
This is a way we can go on that journey.
I love it.
All right. Greg thanks for your time.
You got it man.
You didn’t have to do this.
Thanks, your wife.
I have to thank my wife.
She’s a big fan of yours, brother.
-Okay, I appreciate that because–
-So how about a shout out to Katie?
Katie. Shout out to Katie.
Thank you Katie
for bringing us Greg today.
Oh Greg. And this is sort of like
an overview of what’s going on here.
Right.
You’re the expert, the specialist.
How do people find your work
and your reporting?
Well we’re Spectrum News 13.
We’re one of 30 stations
across the country.
We do have YouTube.
You just search News 13 Orlando.
Part of our website
is devoted to our space coverage.
-Upcoming launches.
-Cool.
We have launch coverage,
details about the missions.
So everything’s right there.
-We put a lot of stuff on YouTube as well.
-Awesome.
[Peter] Okay so we can’t drive by SpaceX
because it’s far from the road.
-But this is Blue Origin.
-[Greg] Yes. Manufacturing facility.
They’re manufacturing
the rockets inside these buildings.
Okay the rockets are in there.
We saw the launch pads
from super far away earlier.
They’re competing with the big rocket.
And then I know that
Jeff Bezos had ideas to build
O’Neill colonies in outer space
and all that stuff.
They also got a lunar lander
under contract with NASA.
[Peter] This facility is huge.
[Greg] Oh yeah. And they are
very fast and quick in building.
I haven’t been out here in six months.
The cranes are new.
The parking garage is new.
There’s probably four or five
new buildings that have come up.
-So that’s how fast they’re building.
-Wow.
Oh this is cool.
So tourists can just come down?
-Yeah this is it.
-Kennedy Space Center.
[Greg] This is a complex for tourists.
You can come walk
through the rocket garden
and look at an IMAX film.
[Peter] So this just fills up
with tourists from–
-All around the world.
-All around the world huh?
Okay we were just gonna go in
to get some shots near those rockets
but it’s look at that Greg, $160.
-Wow.
-For two tickets. That’s wild.
You want to go into outer space?
We can get the shot over there.
-Yeah.
But that is wild.
Imagine taking a family of five.
I mean it must be awesome.
-Are you filming for YouTube?
-I am.
Wait how many subscribers do you have?
I got like 15 subscribers.
I’m going to get 17 this weekend.
-Actually? 17 subscribers.
-Can I say what’s up on camera?
-Do it. Do you guys like YouTube?
-Yo, what’s up?
Oh yeah.
Subscribe I’m going to have
18 subscribers.
Yes sir. I got you.
-What’s the channel?
-Peter Santenello.
-Are we going to be in your video?
-Yeah what do you guys think?
[all] It’s cool. Amazing.
-Amazing? Nice. Nice.
-See you guys.
-See ya.
All right this view will do
for the closing shot
but first you wanted
to show me something Greg.
-So this is the launch, landing,
and deployment of a SpaceX rocket.
It’ll take off the pad and then
when it gets to stage separation
it flips around and fires its rockets
and comes back into Earth orbit
and lands on the drone ship
or on land.
-So this is basically a–
-Drone ship?
Yeah they’ve got the barge offshore.
So this is what’s gonna happen tomorrow.
Well when the astronauts
go to catch the space station.
They’re going to leave Florida.
The space station’s circling the Earth.
It’s just traveling around
in a continuous orbit.
They’re gonna take off and catch it,
follow a ring like this.
-Oh that’s cool.
-They’re going to have to catch it
in probably 12 hours.
It’s going to accelerate until it
rendezvous with that space station.
-How many times does it have to
orbit the Earth to get to that?
I don’t know exactly
but I mean the thing’s going…
it’s going to be going about
22,000 miles an hour to catch it.
The growth of
our science and education
will be enriched by new knowledge…
By new techniques of learning
and mapping outer space.
-[Peter] All right Greg thank you.
-No problem.
I appreciate it
because you made this happen.
You put it together. You got Jack.
Jack was a tough one to nail down
but he was great on camera.
100%.
And then Greg having
expertise and understanding.
Double G triple G.
Double G triple G
’cause you’re Greg also.
Very unique place,
Space Coast, I will say.
-Nothing like it.
-Haven’t seen anything like it.
All right guys. Thanks for coming
on that journey. Until the next one.
[music]