American Dynasty

     Tis the season of promotions at the Christa McAuliffe Space Center in Pleasant Grove.  Several of the Center's top volunteers worked hard to earn their Blue and Navy over the last several months. Yes friends, it is all in the color. Volunteers wear traditional black. From black, a volunteer can enter the CMSC's Staff Training Academy and work their way to Supervisor Blue and / or Flight Director Navy.        Let's take a moment to congratulation our newest inductees into the Supervisors and Flight Director's Guilds.   NEW CMSC SUPERVISORS       Jackson and Kaleen (Cassini) Nan (Cassini)  and Rylan (Magellan)      I work with Jackson, Kaleen, and Nan on the Starship Cassini.  Their promotions are well deserved. They were trained under the watchful eye of Jon Parker, Cassini Set Director.  Helping them along their journey to Supervisor Blue was Ellie, Hyrum, and JJ.     ...

  Jon Parker (right) at the FD Station.  Kaleen at IIFX, and a control room full of volunteers and staff in costume ready to splash on the Cassini's Bridge  bringing a new season of Canada to the Space Center      The USS Canada has returned to the Christa McAuliffe Space Center.  Why is that post worthy you ask? Because the USS Canada was the first overnight mission I wrote specifically for the new Starship Voyager back in 1990-91.  Bill Schuler did the video tape for the mission and played his beloved character Admiral Schuler for the first time.  Let the mayhem behind       USS Canada was told on a semi-regular basis from 1991 to 2012 in the Voyager and then retired from the mission library - until now.  Jon Parker, set director for the Starship Cassini at the Christa McAuliffe Space Center, pulled the mission from obscurity and restored its binder to the Cassini's shelf of active missions.  Jon tells the...

     Fortuna, great goddess of fortune and misfortune, rose in majesty and glory this month at the Space Center. The CMSC is familiar territory to her mischievous antics. Over the last 30 years her appearances brought moments of consternation and programming chaos to the staff. This blog is littered with such posts (easily found by using the search feature in the right sidebar) for your enjoyment - if seeing staff scratching their heads and throwing up their arms in exhaustion brings you joy.       Jon Parker and James Porter working on finding Fortuna's villainous work within Thorium's programming        Over the last couple week's the USS Cassini's Thorium software began resetting during the missions.  The resets happened regularly during the flight.  They tended to occur more frequently during the five hour long programs.        Jon was seen to pound his fit on the counter and kick the control r...

I'm sure you've seen many Mr. Cool air conditioner commercials on YouTube and TicTok, but have you seen the commercial filmed at Utah's Space EdVenture Centers?  Below is the commercial for those you haven't had the pleasure.  You'll notice the following sets in the video: The commercial starts at "Mars Mission Control" aka. the bridge of the Starship Voyager at The Space Place at Renaissance Academy in Lehi (above).   The commercial switches to the Christa McAuliffe Space Center in Pleasant Grove where we find the astronauts in the Magellan's hallway (Mars Base) above.     The next set piece is the hallway leading to the Cassini, Phoenix, Magellan, Odyssey, and Galileo above.  I'm sure the Mr. Cool air conditioner pictured on the wall above the astronauts is good, but the CMSC doesn't need it. Believe me, the Space Center's air conditioner is powerful enough (if the contractors can only get the bugs worked out in its air distribution flow)...

Kade and Canon man the Operations Station on the Starship Voyager It is a busy summer at Utah's Space EdVenture Centers.  The Space Place at Renaissance Academy and the Christa McAuliffe Space Center at Central Elementary are either at capacity or nearly there.  I'm enjoying my time at both locations.  I'm a flight director on the Starship Cassini at the CMSC. I help wherever Bracken needs me when I'm at The Space Place.  The Voyager's Brig holds a couple galactic  troublemakers waiting to be questioned                  The Voyager's Defense Station with Maintenance at the back Last week I spent some time on the Starship Voyager to take a few pictures and video of the crew at work. Seeing these young campers in this immersive environment, working together to solve the multiple problems a 5 hour long mission throws at them, is impressive.   The Starship Voyager may be the largest starship simulator in the Spa...

Hello Space Fans, Last week I received and email from Dr. Ryan Anderson. He is the director of Telos Discovery Space Center and a co-founder of Telos U.  He gave me an update on the newest special effects being created for the Farpoint Universe.  Farpoint is the science fiction universe used by Telos U, The Space Place at Renaissance Academy, and the Space Center at American Heritage School in American Fork.  The effects were done using Unity and illustrate the direction we are going in mission development.  Ryan's email also included news of  Dimension X, the company started by his Unity developer friends from Lockheed.  Dimension X will be creating starship simulation software which will give those who want to create space travel simulations the tools necessary to accomplish their goals.  Check out the links he gives in the following email:          We are continuing to upgrade the quality of our visuals for tacticals. I...

The Starship Voyager Control Room. Please Forgive Livy for eating during the photo.  I  came with cupcakes and Livy couldn't resist. Renaissance Academy, Lehi Converting a School Building for summer space camps is something that happens yearly at The Space Place at Renaissance Academy in Lehi.  With teachers and students gone for the summer, the school's halls, classrooms, and gym are perfect locations for those favorite "away mission" story elements.  An "away mission" gives the campers a break from the starship bridge. The venture out into the darkened school hallways to explore, retrieve, or discover.   The Space Place's staff and volunteers await the campers in character be it as aliens, or human characters in the mission's storyline.      The Space Place volunteer staff for the June 8th space camp just about to get dressed for their away mission characters dark plastic curtains are hung to section off away mission areas and to prevent c...