Tag Archives: Podcast

This week we’re doing something a little different and unplanned. On Friday, April 6 Western University in London, Ontario held its 4th annual Space Day.

It’s been almost a year since the government unveiled its latest iteration of a Space Advisory Board and immediately its members were thrown into the lions den.

Inspired by the Canadian Satellite Design Challenge in 2010, a group of students formed what would become the AlbertaSat group. They would eventually design, build and see launched, the first satellite from Alberta. It’s a story and experience worth discussing.

Space mining is an idea that used to be just a concept. Now companies, small and large, are working towards the goal of setting up mining operations on the moon and asteroids.

Deep Space Industries is a five year old privately held company spacecraft technology with a long term plan of mining asteroids that has adapted its business for the long game.

Is the Canadian venture capitalist landscape light years behind in understanding the space ecosystem in comparison with their U.S. counterparts? Will blockchain technology be as transformative as the Internet has been? These questions are answered in this weeks SpaceQ podcast.

At the recent Canadian SmallSat Symposium Dr. Michael K. Simpson was the opening keynote speaker. As Executive Director of the Secure World Foundation Michael works toward the foundations vision of “the secure, sustainable and peaceful uses of outer space contributing to global stability and benefits on Earth.”

Planet took the opportunity while presenting at the Canadian SmallSat Symposium to deliver a very public ultimatum to Global Affairs Canada. Either there is measurable progress on licensing of their ground stations in Inuvik by June 1, or they will dismantle them and leave Canada. And they weren’t the only company to threaten this action.

In the last week and half there’s been an ongoing discussion as to whether Canada needs and should develop an indigenous orbital rocket launch capability. That’s the topic of this weeks podcast.

My guest this week on the SpaceQ podcast is Chris Gebhardt, Assistant Managing Editor of NASASpaceflight.com. Chris and I talked about SpaceX, specifically the upcoming maiden flight of the SpaceX Falcon Heavy rocket.