The Accidental Astronaut—Chris Sembroski’s Unlikely Journey —and Why You May Be Next

Guest: Chris "Hanks" Sembroski – Inspiration4 Astronaut, Engineer, and Space Enthusiast

Episode Overview

In this thrilling episode of the Space Cafe Podcast, host Markus Mooslechner speaks with Chris Sembroski, one of the civilian astronauts aboard SpaceX's Inspiration4—the first all-civilian mission to orbit. Chris shares his incredible journey from an ordinary life to an extraordinary experience, reflecting on what it means to step into the unknown, see Earth from space, and how the adventure reshaped his perspective on humanity's future in space.

Key Topics Discussed

[00:01:00] From Earth to Orbit: The Phone Call That Changed Everything

[00:03:00] The Overview Effect: Falling in Love with Earth

[00:08:00] Family, Risk, and Courage: The Emotional Rollercoaster

[00:14:00] SpaceX and the Dragon Capsule Experience

[00:21:00] Life in Microgravity: Adjusting to Floating

[00:40:00] Purpose Beyond Launch: Lessons for Earth

[01:00:00] Looking Ahead: Democratizing Space Exploration

Inspirational Quotes

• "I think my bigger fear would be not being able to go back to space."
• "When you look at Earth from space, you don’t see borders—you see connection."
• "We’re not passengers on spaceship Earth; we’re its crew."

Music for the Aspiring Space Traveler's Playlist

Chris Sembroski adds "Colors" by the Black Pumas—a soulful celebration of life’s vibrancy and connection to Earth—to the official Space Cafe Podcast playlist.

Links and Resources

• Inspiration4 Mission: inspiration4.com
• Frank White’s Overview Effect: overviewinstitute.org
• SpaceX Dragon Capsule Details: spacex.com/dragon
• Follow Chris Sembroski on X (formerly Twitter): @ChrisSembroski

Final Thought

Chris’s story is a testament to the power of dreams, resilience, and the unexpected paths that can lead to extraordinary journeys. This episode challenges listeners to rethink their relationship with Earth and imagine a future where space exploration becomes part of everyday life.

Spread the Cosmic Love!

If this episode made you dream bigger or view our planet in a new light, share it with fellow space enthusiasts. Don’t forget to rate, review, and subscribe to the Space Cafe Podcast on Spotify and Apple Podcasts. Follow us on LinkedIn and X (formerly Twitter) for more cosmic conversations.

Until next time—keep looking up!

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Transcript

SCP_123_Chris_Sembroski

[00:00:00] Chris "Hanks" Sembroski: SpaceX's mission is to, um, send people to Mars and this, uh, opportunity of sending people to Mars. Non government astronauts to space is a step in that direction, 

[00:00:13] Markus: Hello everyone, this is the Space Cafe Podcast and I'm Markus. So most of you who have been listening to this show for a while now know how I like to end each episode. By asking my guests if they'd be ready to fly into space if the call came. Well, this time I'm asking the question to someone who actually got the call, completely out of the blue.

Chris Ambroski wasn't a trained astronaut. He wasn't preparing for a mission. He was just living his life. Until one phone call turned it upside down and sent him rocketing up into orbit aboard SpaceX's Inspiration4 mission, the first ever all civilian mission. In this episode, you'll discover how Chris went from Everyday life to extraordinary adventure.

What it means to step into the unknown and how that journey reshaped his view of Earth and the future of space travel. Now I challenge you to ask yourself the question, could this, could his story be a glimpse into your own future? Well, let's find out. Welcome Chris Ambroski to the Space Cafe Podcast.

Let's go.

[00:01:31] Chris "Hanks" Sembroski: I think my bigger fear would be not being able to go back to Space. Um, but being in space, I felt more closely connected to Earth as my home. Which is kind of a strange thing to realize, it's not what I expected to feel, but it was one of those things where you about going to the stars and we're always as kids and grown ups looking out into space and continuously thinking about what's it like to go out and travel to the moon or to Mars or to deep galaxies as they do on Star Trek or in the sci fi movies and, uh, And all you want to, all I wanted to do once I got into space was turn around and look back at the Earth. And it felt closer and more connected to me personally than it ever had before. So that was, that would, that would probably be something that, that I definitely would miss would be another opportunity to feel that closeness to, to the Earth. Um, would miss having a chance to go back to space for sure. I don't think I'd have that feeling of. Oh my gosh, Earth is no longer my home if I go back to space, but they're very connected in a very strange way. You know, it's, I think my bigger fear would know, knowing that I've, I've seen that the clouds from the other side, I would, I would really hope we have, I get the opportunity to see them that way again. So it, it changes you in a way that's really difficult to explain, but 

[00:03:06] Markus: Try. 

[00:03:08] Chris "Hanks" Sembroski: I could Try.

[00:03:09] Markus: Yeah, yeah, try, try. What comes close

explaining it?

[00:03:15] Chris "Hanks" Sembroski: Right. so there's this author named Frank White, and he's been trying to understand what this feeling is that a lot of astronauts have come back with in explaining, I've explained to him, and he calls it the overview effect. And it's that sense of, Experiencing the Earth in a new way and in obviously an incredibly high altitude and seeing the Earth hanging in space alone with the thin blue atmosphere that keeps us safe from the vacuum of space and You see not the moon and the stars going across the sky as you do at night looking up. And it's as if you're seeing a canvas go across the sky, a slow motion movie, as you could possibly imagine. It's when you're in space in that way and you see the Earth and the moon and the stars. out there separate going across this incredible universe in this galaxy as three or four multiple different entities separately floating and orbiting each other. Um, and experiencing the earth in that way, you look back and you don't see those, those lines, you don't see those divisions that we draw on a map, but you see the earth in a way that kind of makes you in a way, I guess. Fall in love with it in a way that's hard to explain. It says, seen some really great interviews of other astronauts come back and the moments that they've experienced, even on suborbital flights, and those are short hops that you just three to five minutes of microgravity. And where you go straight up and then straight back down for maybe a 10 minute or hour long flight. The experiences they've come back with, from William Shatner to Sarah Sabry, Emily Calandrelli, the way they've been moved by seeing the Earth in that way just a few short minutes is Incredibly impactful. Um, to, for Sarah Sabry, she described it as the, that view that the earth kind of just enters you and fills your, your insides, your heart, your soul in a way that's just For Emily Calandrelli, she described it as seeing her newborn babies for the very first time and seeing the Earth in that way.

Like, this is absolutely incredible. The Earth is new. It's, it's as if seeing the Earth reborn in an entirely new light. Shatner's experience was Very much the opposite, though. He, he saw that darkness of the vacuum of space, um, and look in and how that contrasted with the bright reflection of the sunlight on the earth and realized that that there is a vacuum and death out there. Um, and almost moved him to tears. Well, it did move him to tears, but it was a very impactful emotional experience for him. And for me, I saw the earth as just a place to live, but the best place to be from. That is very dynamic, that, especially in the night passes across the dark side of the Earth, uh, on the, where the opposite side from the sun was, obviously. you get to see these incredible thunderstorms and all these cloud formations. And you realize it's impossible. One interconnected system. a very dynamic place. Um, it's not just inhabitants who are alive, but it feels as if the earth itself, um, is dynamic and is alive. And 

[00:07:08] Markus: you think, 

[00:07:08] Chris "Hanks" Sembroski: yeah.

[00:07:10] Markus: do you think it's, it's comparable to the sensation you may get when you're separated from your loved ones, like when you're going on a business trip and, and, and then you're appreciating from afar, you're appreciating the relationship. To, to those you, you are around with all the time and you, you get used to, you get accustomed, you go on each other's nerves.

And then once you're at a distance, you're seeing that person in a different light and you're appreciating that relationship in a different light. Maybe this could be. could be somewhat a comparison to what you experienced.

[00:08:00] Chris "Hanks" Sembroski: I think you're right. I, I, because it, you realize some of those things that you bicker about when you're with someone else that you're struggling with, and those conflicts. little idiosyncrasies that we all have that really annoy us, or we are really trying to one up someone else over some sort of small issue. You zoom out, or you go away, and you realize all those things fall into insignificance. Seeing the Earth from that way, you feel insignificant. And incredibly small. And a lot of those problems that we think so much on, uh, really have very little meaning when you start to realize how big the universe is and how small those little moments are of conflict.

We have much bigger and much bigger problems to solve that getting a view of the Earth in that way kind of puts things back into a better perspective. Where we are just here to work together, and the love we have for one another needs to grow, it needs to share, um, in, all the resources and opportunities, and what, what's incredible about all of that is that you realize that we are all on, as Nicole Stott, the NASA astronaut has said, that we are on spaceship Earth, and we are crew, not just passengers, and you, you start to hear those things, and they sound like taglines, or just phrases that, you know, Okay, they're just spouting these things off.

But when you sit with that for just a moment, and you realize that this Earth is kind of like a small spacecraft in space, just so happens to have a few billion humans on it, you realize, realize that we are of the spaceship, that we are crewmates and not just passengers. And so the actions we take have meaningful impact on each other, on our spaceship, on our beautiful planet. We should be more active intentional about the things that we do to make this place a better place to be from.

[00:10:08] Markus: So it's a, it's a matter of

perspective, um, 

[00:10:12] Chris "Hanks" Sembroski: is, 

[00:10:13] Markus: literally about perspective. And, and so now and then you hear when you're in, I look, I don't know, frustrated or you have issues whatsoever. People saying change your perspective. And I think this is exactly what this is all about. The benefit that you got to experience was that you physically got to change your perspective on something.

So maybe this is, this is even the easier path toward Changing one's viewpoint, because changing one's viewpoint just mentally is even more difficult, I could imagine.

[00:10:56] Chris "Hanks" Sembroski: is. And you could discuss it, you can read all the books, and you could start to understand each other and listen more, and that really gets things along, along, pushes things along in a good direction. But when you're, yeah, I guess, seeing the Earth from space in that way, it just, you're face to face with that realization, with that new perspective, and it's a lot of like, why do people want to go to the top of the Space Needle or to the top of the Eiffel Tower or at the top of the Empire State Building and, and look down or take hot air balloon rides?

And what is it about that particular perspective where you get to see for, you know, five, 10 miles out in all directions? Transcribed is appealing and draws you in. And it just magnifies those experiences, you know, by another factor of 10 when you can see it from 100 miles high or 200 miles high. You, it's, all those things just kind of feel, you know, Like, it's like seeing the ants crawl around on the ground below you as those cars go down, drive by on the road.

It's, everything turns miniature and small, but, uh, you're really realizing that all those things are, are insignificant and small to how your own problems are. And, uh, we, we, it, that whole new shift of perspective just really just hits you really hard that you, you have to face it. And if you, I think if you don't experience a change, it's, it's because. Maybe you weren't open to that experience, or you weren't thinking about, uh, what's the Earth going to look like when I look out the window from space.

[00:12:39] Markus: Technically, Chris, how does it work? Um, so you're in that capsule and you have a bunch of windows, I don't know, 360 degrees, do you have windows everywhere? Tell us about the moment you saw Earth for the very first time from afar.

technically work? Yeah. 

[00:13:00] Chris "Hanks" Sembroski: Yeah.

about some of these, favorite moments in space. So, you know, we had a unique mission on Inspiration4. We were a free flyer flight, which meant we weren't going to the space station. And so we didn't need to have that docking adapter from the Dragon spacecraft. that would allow us to connect to this international space station. so instead, they removed the, that docking adapter and placed, um, an incredible window. And this window is half of a bubble, essentially half of a sphere, uh, that you can, uh, fly into. And, uh, essentially your head feels like it's spacewalk and, uh, really get immersed in a 360 degree view of space, of everything that's around you. And, uh, Yeah, there was that incredible moment when we opened up the hatch to reveal that window for the first time, and just the amount of reflected light off the earth, the incredible blues and whites, it was such a bright moment. And in totally, uh, engrossing experience that all the work that we were doing is to, to maintain the cleanliness and safety of the capsule, just paused for a couple of minutes as we all just stopped what we were doing and just looked out this window, uh, as all this lights flooding into the capsule and, uh, you get inside and poke your head up inside this window, and you can turn in any direction and see the uninterrupted horizon of the Earth. And so the Earth, beautiful round sphere, is hovering above us as the orientation that we were looking. So Earth was always above us. And we had this incredible circle of the Earth, uh, of the sphere of the horizon, um, in all directions that we could see, uh, without seeing a break in it. So there were some times where it was fun to just take a of just spinning around in the capsule slowly to capture this amazing, beautiful sphere. 

[00:15:09] Markus: Did you, did you take turns or was this, is the capsule big enough to fit the four of you?

[00:15:18] Chris "Hanks" Sembroski: we managed to get the four of us in there for at least a photo opportunity, right? So you have to do the obligatory crew selfie in space and jam everyone in there and have somebody get the, The camera in a certain, certain angle. Um, normally it was just one of us, but it was comfortable to have two people in there at a time.

Uh, and so often that would happen whether, uh, that, you know, if someone's commenting about something and sharing it with someone else, like Cyan saw some Starlink satellites crisscross our paths or, um, And we saw the, just the very edge of Antarctica at a moment, and I think just a little bit of the aurora from that window. And so we kind of, we got a chance to share this experience with another crew member frequently. Um, and then there were lots of times where we were busy with science experiments or other activities inside the spacecraft. And I would be up there alone with the, uh, Nikon camera taking as many beautiful pictures as I possibly could.

Um, Because that was my personal goal for the mission, was that if I'm going to go to space and have this incredible gift, incredible opportunity, that I'm going to remember back to my wedding where my wife and I decided that, well, we could spend our money on an incredible party, but we're going to forget what the food tastes like. We might need to put more resources in the photography because those are the things that we're getting out. that we're going to have forever, besides our spouse. Um, and our memories might fade, but those pictures will always be there. And so, I took as many pictures and tried to capture those views as best as I could, because I know that My memories will start to fade, but those pictures will always be there to remind me and put me right back there in that cupola bubble in that window so that I can remember those views.

[00:17:09] Markus: Do you think, Chris, do you think that this memory can ever fade from your mind? The one memory about seeing Earth, or is that, is that imprinted, um, on your mind?

What do you think?

[00:17:26] Chris "Hanks" Sembroski: a couple of that burn brightly in my mind, definitely. There are moments, though, that I get reminded about, it's like, oh, I forgot about that view, or I forgot about this activity. I don't recall until seeing a video where four of us will get again periodically and pull out our phones and show a picture or a video that had been on our mind, and it sparks memories in the others, and it sparks new memories for me, too. And so, yeah, of them really do fade, and it's, you know, It's sad that you try to remember and write down all those thoughts that you, you had in those moments. but it's just being part of being human. Um, and so being able to share the story and talk about it, like we're talking about today and, uh, revisiting those photographs, it, it really is one A treat for me to think about and talk about because I'm back in the capsule again.

I'm back on that rocket kind of reliving and remembering and putting those memories back in the long term.

[00:18:37] Markus: Your career path for becoming an astronaut is kind of unusual. So you weren't trained like as a super athlete, I guess, like back in the Apollo days. I was.

Tell us that story.

[00:18:55] Chris "Hanks" Sembroski: Yeah, definitely grew up thinking that NASA astronauts were heroes. I, my brother grew up collecting baseball cards and, I grew up collecting 8x10 glossies of NASA astronauts. You know, so I was always a space geek or I loved rockets and built model rockets as a kid. And in college, I had a chance to build high power model rockets and, uh, work at NASA. U. S. Space Camp, taking kids through simulated space shuttle missions and different simulators and gave tours of Kennedy Space Center, the launch pads and the different exhibits out there. I had a chance to meet several astronauts and just to hear their stories. And I remember one time in high school where an astronaut had just come back from space and was doing his tour and visited our high school.

And table, uh, a small round table of students got to ask him questions, and he was, giving us his insight and his stories, and he was very excited to share them as well. And so those moments kind of really just in my mind that I wanted to be part of. space in some way. And then when I went to college in Florida, I had the opportunity to see a space shuttle launch at night for the first time.

And from about eight or 10 miles away, it was a night launch. The entire night sky lit up so brightly that you could have read a book by the light of the solid rocket booster engines. Um, and the alligators all came up out of the water to sing love songs to the rocket. Uh, that's. came across the water, but knowing that humans could engineer that and that there were people on board that, and the way that everything was just lit up and vibrating and shaking, I knew that I had to be a part of something incredible because that was really exciting to me. so I, I, I knew that I could stay close by training like an astronaut at space camp or, um, Trying to do things to, to stay close to aerospace, and so I joined the US Air Force and worked on, intercontinental ballistic missiles in Montana, which unfortunately, well, fortunately, those never flew anywhere, but those are, those are big rockets, right?

So, uh, stayed close to large rockets, um, and then moved out to the Seattle area using some of my, um, Skills I learned in the Air Force had always just loved airplanes and rockets. And, you know, Boeing is out here in the Seattle area the Museum of Flight is south of the city. And they have an incredible collection of aerospace history that, you know, that that's static now, but you can imagine what it's like to see it fly.

And then how did I become an astronaut? It's through all of that. I would also in college took an opportunity to Go to Washington, D. C. and was part of this. Uh, Citizens Space Lobbying Group, and it was dozen people from around the United States that would go to Washington, D. C. to talk to Congress about what we wanted to see in space.

We knew at this time it was only the space shuttle and the Soyuz that were getting people into space, to get commercial satellites, Or any sort of satellite you had to get through the U. S. government, uh, regulatory process. And so we, we all have had this dream then of, we do want to open up space for more, uh, Americans and for more, as many people as possible.

And if we can get that launch cost down from 25, 000 a kilogram, um, down to something more reasonable, then that will open up more opportunities. And so I did that with, for several years as a college student. Um, and so. One of the guys that I convinced to go with me to Washington, D. C. You know, we were, we were going to college in Daytona Beach, Florida.

So lots of sand and sun and beach, but I managed to convince some people during their spring break that they needed to go to snowy, cold, uh, uh, Washington, D. C. and, uh, hurt their feet on the hard marble floors of the Capitol, of Capitol Hill, and go talk to Congress people about opening up space for more people. And, uh, It was effective. Not only did a couple bills get passed by our efforts, but the friends I made and one of the guys ended up being the best man at my wedding, he ended up being the person whose name was drawn when I entered a sweepstakes to win a trip to space in 2021. And so, that sweepstakes of trying to go to space in 2021, uh, was during a Super Bowl commercial, and, uh, he and I live in different corners of the country, and neither one of us knew the other one had entered the sweepstakes, um, which I absolutely, absolutely, I lost.

I did not get my name drawn, but his name was drawn, he couldn't accept the prize. He just thought he was helping out St. Jude Children's Research Hospital through his donation, and he might get a patch, I might get a patch for my donation. Um, And, uh, when he couldn't accept the award, he gave Jared Isaacman, who's the CEO of Shift4Payments, and, uh, the, the, the, the, the, person who's funding this flight, he gave Jared my name without telling me, and so I got in a strange Zoom call, one Sunday morning in March of 2021, and, uh, I get to meet Jared Isaacman, who I didn't really understand who he was just yet. And then I saw my friend Kyle on there and I was a little bit surprised because I thought this was a follow up call as they are interviewing a deep pool of candidates and, um, and here in the call, I find out that no, Kyle has won this ticket to go to space that he's giving to you, Chris, and you're going to go to space, Chris.

And I'm going to pick you up in three days. And we're going to go to UCLA Medical Center and start doing some screenings. then in six months, we're going to fly aboard a Dragon capsule on a Falcon 9 rocket. 

[00:25:06] Markus: You're kidding me. 

[00:25:08] Chris "Hanks" Sembroski: and, 

[00:25:08] Markus: kidding me. Yeah. Why wouldn't, why wouldn't your friend in the first place not accept that?

for himself.

[00:25:16] Chris "Hanks" Sembroski: right? he had done a lot of the same things I had done in college, hugely passionate about opening up the space frontier, uh, built high power model rockets with me that we launched in the Florida swamps, um, other amazing people. Um, and it's, it's one of those things that if, if you are, uh, not quite ready to accept something like that, uh, or Sometimes there are physical constraints that they have to, uh, know, right now we're still working on making space accessible for everybody. And it's still just not quite that way. And so there's still height restrictions and weight restrictions. And if you don't fit into those buckets, even though those are widening and they're, They're getting broader every day. They built the spacecraft, originally the Dragon spacecraft, with NASA astronauts in mind, who are the top percent of 1 percent of human specimens.

So, it wasn't quite accommodating for what he needed physically to be able to fly safely. So, he had to, unfortunately, pass on the experience. um, he knew that That 

[00:26:25] Markus: knew someone. 

[00:26:26] Chris "Hanks" Sembroski: as equally as excited as

take that flight.

[00:26:30] Markus: But, uh, so first of all, he couldn't accept it. But then if I were in your shoes, I would immediately think of the perfect college prank. This is the perfect college prank. So was, was there any doubt on your end? No. Wow. Was she cool with it? Hmm. Hmm. Hmm.

[00:26:54] Chris "Hanks" Sembroski: I heard my wife about her story later. So it was during COVID. So everybody, everything was shut down still. And so we had our, our office in one room and My wife was going to be on a Zoom call at that same time with her friends, and so I was taking the call in our children's playroom, so that I had beautiful green walls behind me, and some butterflies hanging from the ceiling, and some, you know, kid art around in the background. But what was funny is that my wife was telling her friends like, Oh, my husband's doing his space interview today. He wouldn't just be so funny if Chris ended up flying to space. And next thing you know, I come upstairs and she says, I'm just kind of buzzing or shaking, and I'm kind of in a state of shock. Uh, really excited, but also very uncertain as to what's going to happen next. And I kind of peek around the corner, um, to where she is with our daughters. And I just say, so, uh, think we're going to ride a rocket. And, uh, and Well, and then it was, it was, it was a pretty powerful and very emotional moment in our house for a little while there. Not to digest. Oh gosh, her eyes turned red instantly. And so I had to say to her, I see you. then we sent the kids downstairs with a couple of devices and screens and snacks. And we closed our bedroom door and had some heart to heart conversations about, you know, this is an incredibly exciting opportunity for you, Chris. also this is In her mind, it was very risky the consequence would have been that I would have left her with two young girls to raise on her own, which so it's a lot of risk for her to bear, which is absolutely something to keep in mind as we venture out that there's a lot of things to keep in mind about the support for the astronauts and people going into space need to be paid attention to. So we had some heartfelt conversations. She was incredibly supportive, though, throughout the whole thing and made it happen for our kids and took all those hard questions from our older daughter, who was thinking deeply about, you know, the pluses and the minuses and the what ifs. In my mind, I was Looking back and realizing that how the engineering has changed so much and how so much more safety has been built in into these space vehicles. Um, but in her mind, it was either you're coming back safely or you're not coming back at all. And am I going to do in those moments? And so there was a lot of conversations we had around that. It was, it was, it was challenging to navigate and going through it. I think not enough attention was paid to each other in understanding how both of us felt in those moments.

And so I would have done things a lot differently with understanding how she was feeling. And I know that she would do things a little bit differently to, uh, understand how I was feeling in different moments. Uh, but man, it's, it's still, it's still incredible to talk about with her and understand what she was going through and she would hear what I was going through and And we're still each other stories and understanding each other's perspectives, even years later.

[00:30:29] Markus: I think it's also, I think it's also a great test for a relationship, how healthy a relationship is, because this is definitely a major a major decision to make, a major hurdle. And, um, I'm just wondering if, if it was her and not you, how would you have reacted?

[00:30:53] Chris "Hanks" Sembroski: I would have, it's a hard thing to put yourself in those shoes, right? Um, I would have hoped that I would have been completely supportive. And you know what? Realizing that there's a lot of opportunity here for me to or break this moment, Um, whether I, I shut down and say, no way, this is, I can't support you in all this, or versus, wow, this is an incredible opportunity for you.

I want to make sure that. That we work through this together, that not only are you this once in a lifetime opportunity, the experience that our kids have through this is also a positive one, because it's going to be a bumpy road. Um, there are going to be a lot of new things coming at us. we're going to probably need to ask for help. And, uh, it's going to be very challenging. We've got a deadline of something major approaching. And how do you prepare for that? You know, how do you get yourself, um, in a mentally great space with the great amount of people supporting you, around you? Um, Yeah, and how do you, how do you reach out when you know that maybe you're scared to say, I'm really not okay right now.

Can we talk about this? Or how do we reach out and say, I know it's, I'm having a great day. Let's, let's celebrate it right now. And the time constraints a lot into that because the time you have with one another feels a lot shorter than it used to, because you're jumping from one activity to another activity.

And there's more time away from home during this, time leading up to flight. Right. But I think 

[00:32:30] Markus: far out?

No, no, go ahead. 

[00:32:32] Chris "Hanks" Sembroski: was saying, but the

of it was that, um, the crew that did come together, brought with them amazing people. And so it was, it felt like our family grew during that experience.

Um, and so we still have some, gosh, we have some great family connections and friends now from this, this forming of inspiration for that my wife and I hold dearly onto and growing that, group of people around us. They say it takes a village to, to raise young kids. And it's, I think it takes a village of support to send an astronaut to space because it's not just them going.

It's, they're behind some incredible people that they value tremendously, that will need support along the way. And, it's been a lot of fun growing our family of friends, uh, throughout the whole experience.

[00:33:27] Markus: There you have the overview effect again.

[00:33:33] Chris "Hanks" Sembroski: Yeah, that connecting of people in a way that is hard to describe. Yeah. Yeah. 

[00:33:40] Markus: how far out from T minus zero

[00:33:45] Chris "Hanks" Sembroski: So I found out on March 7th and we flew on September 15th of the same year. So just over six months,

[00:33:55] Markus: That's insane. So was, so what was the process then? You agreed to, to do this and then what next? What was the process to, to really, truly become the selectee and to be on board that, that mission?

[00:34:15] Chris "Hanks" Sembroski: had to go through we had to all go through medical screening and it felt like to me the old right stuff where They're trying to find ways of eliminating us from this group but it was You So different. It was the exact opposite. It was going through all the medical screenings to figure out, okay, what could happen and how can we best support you to be able to be successful in this experience? 

[00:34:37] Markus: So they wanted you

[00:34:39] Chris "Hanks" Sembroski: They And it took me a while to believe that. It took me three months, I think, to believe that they're not trying to kick me out. that they're trying to include me in something, um, that we are opening up space, that we are truly democratizing this experience. Uh, I think they were just maybe more concerned about who is this person that was essentially drawn at random through this sweepstakes?

Is he mentally stable? Is he a good person? Does he pass background checks? because you do need a crew that can support one another. that you could trust in because it is just the four of you essentially alone for three days and in an environment where you are at a minimum four hours away from Getting back inside the atmosphere to where anyone or anything could possibly support you So it's we go through several experiences like mountaineering Climbing Mount Rainier out here in Seattle, which felt very close to what it's like to go to space where you don't Need to carry with you in your pack as much as you think you do. going to be uncomfortable. There'll be times where you're not feeling great, but. You get used to that idea because the rewards way outweigh the struggles. Um, and you start to realize who's going to quit, who's going to stick with it, who's going to support one another. Um, and I think that was the biggest hurdle of all of that was just being comfortable with the idea of being uncomfortable and enjoying being in those moments.

And we had an incredible crew that really embraced that. And that was awesome.

[00:36:14] Markus: speaking of, um, comfortable being uncomfortable. Um, how about the other crew members? Did you immediately click with them?

[00:36:24] Chris "Hanks" Sembroski: Oh, that was. Kind of a surprise. I think it took a little bit to understand Jared and pull his, uh, pull his sense of humor out a little bit for a little while. But, um, I think the, the four of us all together, um, really did mesh really well as a crew. Um, uh, we even did some personality assessments to understand each other a little bit more, to know what our strengths are.

And, um, it was, One of those quizzes that you start to understand, okay, are you more in this quadrant or that quadrant? and somehow or another, each one of us managed to be placed in one of the four quadrants. So we really had a well rounded and balanced group of people, which is incredible. We had people from different age Ages and corners of the country.

Um, and you know, I was, I'm from Washington state. Jared's from Pennsylvania. Haley's in Tennessee. Dr. Proctor's from Arizona. And, you know, Haley was in her 30s and, um, Jared's in was, Haley was in her 20s, actually. And Jared was in his 30s. I was in my 40s. And Sian was in her 50s when we went to space. So it was a lot of different perspectives coming into this crew.

But, yeah, All complemented each other pretty well. And that was very, very, as Jared would say, like the stars aligned putting this crew together. we all came to the mission in very different ways. So how it happened, we could detail out and show how it happened, but it all happened and how we as individuals ended up with the personalities and strengths that we brought to this mission. That was just an alignment of the stars in some mystical, magical way. 

[00:38:13] Markus: truly, it truly is because you weren't selected because of your personalities. There was no. So, this was, as you mentioned, pure coincidence or alignment of stars. That's, that's really interesting.

[00:38:31] Chris "Hanks" Sembroski: that when the opportunity came, you know, it's not just about being lucky to get onto this flight. It's, it's about being, what is it, luck, people describe luck as, you know, being ready for when opportunities come, come your way. And think that goes a lot. Um, goes along with the lines of being prepared in those moments.

You know, Dr Proctor had tried to become a NASA astronaut for years and made it down to the final selection question and was eliminated. And then, um, You know, I just always stayed close with space and just made it known that my passion for space is incredibly high. And so people maybe would think of me when they wanted to talk about going to space or what human spaceflight was all about.

And, um, and then Haley had always been a great ambassador for the hospital, um, and sharing her story and a great spokesperson and love to connect with people and, um, love to share the story of St. Jude. And so when people started thinking about, Who do they want to put on this mission? Somehow or another, they, in different ways, and from different groups and different selection committees, they, they picked us.

[00:39:42] Markus: inspiring. Are you still in touch?

[00:39:46] Chris "Hanks" Sembroski: in fact, it's the holiday season right now, and uh, we've been sharing messages back and forth, and um, Merry Christmas, and um, it's been a lot of fun. Yeah, we, we stay in touch regularly. We have a, a group text thread that is, you know, pretty active.

[00:40:04] Markus: Say, um, this is, was a SpaceX mission. And by the way, full disclosure, um, you've been in countless, um, PowerPoint presentations, um, I, I made for whatever, for whatever reason, um, I have the, the photo of the four of you in this presentation to just demonstrate that this mission Um, is essentially the onset of very becomes clear that commercial space travel and a non experimental space travel, um, is or has become a reality.

And so it's, you know. This is, this is why it's, it's an extreme, uh, it's a real honor for me to, to be speaking with you today because you've, you've been traveling with me now for a couple of years now through that presentation on PowerPoint. Do you think, do you think this was a publicity stunt also by, by Elon Musk, by SpaceX to demonstrate something, to do marketing for, for themselves or was there more to it?

What do you think?

[00:41:18] Chris "Hanks" Sembroski: a lot of commercial space happened rapidly, right? We, we saw Virgin Galactic and we saw Blue Origin and then Inspiration4 all flew in the same year with the first civilians essentially flying to space, suborbital flights, and then our orbital flight. Um, Never once did I really feel like it was a publicity stunt, uh, and the engineers and the technicians that worked on our spacecraft, they treated us no differently than the NASA astronauts that come through. They took it very seriously, and I, you start to realize that there was SpaceX's mission is to, um, send people to Mars and this, uh, opportunity of sending people to Mars. Non government astronauts to space is a step in that direction, and I really do believe that their at SpaceX is to make space more accessible. And if we're not sending different people into space, if we're not trying to expand who we can include in this, then You're not going to reach those goals. You can't have millions of people living and working in space or living on Mars. If you're only going to take, you know, the top 0. 01 percent of people up into space. so being able to send lots of other people into space, it was, is I think just a logical step in their minds and maybe it felt rapid, maybe it felt quick to a lot of folks, but, uh, um, was the right moment at the right time in their development cycle to say, Hey, this is this vehicle we have, it's ready to accommodate these people that don't need to be expert stick jockeys that don't need to fly by the seat of pants, that we're going to fly this thing autonomously, uh, for most of the flight.

And, uh, and we're ready to do this and this is What we believe in. And this is where we're heading towards.

[00:43:14] Markus: What was it like to work with SpaceX, um, with the SpaceX engineers, with the, yeah, what, what is that like? 

[00:43:24] Chris "Hanks" Sembroski: and they're super passionate about their work. Um, anybody I've met in the space industry, um, has been drawn to it because of something that brought them there in, in their childhood or in their school years that makes the magic of space real to them. And so, we would walk around the Hawthorne facility there of, uh, where SpaceX, uh, Builds the dragons and the Falcon 9 rockets and, and we would see, they would, they would put posters up, um, little placards saying, Hey, this, this hardware is being built for these four individuals.

And so we would, we would see a picture of the four of us sitting next to some of this hardware so that The people that are working on it could connect with the folks that they are, taking care of while they're doing their day to day mission. And so, um, they took it very seriously. They're very passionate about it. Uh, they were very excited to see us fly. Um, they were in a constant state of paranoia, like, well, what if this, or did I think about that? And double checking each other. Um, they're, but man, they were, they were great, absolute wonderful professionals, took their job seriously. And, uh, it was fun to kind of poke at the teacher a little bit every now and then, you know, Sarah Gillis was our primary, primary instructor and, um, try and get her to smile, but almost became a mission of, of both Jared and me, it felt like, and more, more often than not, it looked like we were just giving her a headache with some of the jokes we would say, but, uh, it was great.

Um, It was, of course, she flew on the Polaris Dawn mission and got to do one of the very first spacewalks in a commercial suit. And so she got a bit of a taste of her own medicine coming in later. So, but, uh, it was, they were wonderful people and very driven for their mission of sending people to space.

[00:45:20] Markus: Have you ever watched, uh, For All Mankind? How does that, I mean, like, how does that feel to, I mean, like, not be one of them, but be also sort of on that trajectory? Do you see yourself in, in some of those scenes? 

[00:45:39] Chris "Hanks" Sembroski: right? It's, um, a, you know, in the work I was doing before Inspiration4, it always felt as if I was the person in the background enabling others to take the spotlight, to be center stage and, you know, In college, that was literally the, the opportunity that I was presenting, uh, because I was doing stage crew work and, uh, helping hang lights and, uh, run spotlights and run sound equipment and so that others could be on center stage. Um, I would be the technician in the background, making some of that stuff happen for them. And, um, so, uh, really flips it on its head when you start to realize that, okay, the technicians in the background can now be put center seat and, um, have this opportunity to go to space. yeah, it, it, being able to, to, to be a part of that and I, you can see it on their faces too, all the workers and technicians that they're excited to show you their work is whether it's the, their carbon fiber, um, lab where they're laying up new parts for the new fairing or the folks that are building the spacesuits.

They're, they're proud of the work they're doing. They're excited to show you and tell you their story because it's, it's impactful. And they're a part of the mission, um, can make or break, um, The entire mission. So it's, they're really excited to show you and get your input and you how much they have invested in our experience, which humbling too. Starting to look around, I remember visiting Kennedy Space Center and where they were preparing Resilience, which is the name of our Dragon capsule. And was an army of a couple dozen people at that moment when we were visiting. This, refurbishment facility, um, you know, cleaning things up, patching things in, uh, getting everything put back together, ready for flight and realizing in that moment, for me, it was, um, over overwhelming that hundreds of people, thousands of people are working diligently months so that just four individuals can have a safe experience in space.

[00:47:55] Markus: I'm really asking myself, um, what it is that assembles. Hundreds, thousands of people behind a project where each individual identifies with the project because this is, this is a rare breed of projects or endeavors. And this is the make or break moment. If you really want to lead the pack and pioneer something, I think this is the essential ingredient that you need.

You need to have each and every one at the table, non hierarchical at the table. It's like the. The story they tell about the janitor and, and President Kennedy back in the day, um, when he asked him what he does at the Apollo, Apollo Center, he says he's helping bring people to the moon with his broomstick and his bucket.

And this is absolutely true. So he identifies with the mission so much, and he's absolutely right. He's sweeping the floor. He's keeping everything clean and tidy. And he's also part of that mission. So I'm just asking myself, what is it that makes the difference here? Why are people behind the project as a group or as a team?

And why aren't others? Do you have any insights? 

[00:49:30] Chris "Hanks" Sembroski: on to something here. I think about aerospace companies out there and some seem to be attracting people and some seem to be losing people. And it's, it's about being willing to have a vision that's big enough and inspiring enough draws people in, that excites them.

For SpaceX, it's the idea of sending people to Mars. And People truly believe that this is an exciting thing to do, and it is an incredibly exciting thing to do, and at Blue Origin, it's the idea that we're going to have millions of people living and working in space for the benefit of Earth, and that's an inspiring goal that is what we're both of those goals are bigger than any one project, right?

So you, whether it's one vehicle or developing a spacecraft or a space station, that goal, that drive, can't be, um, all right, our goal as a company is to build a rocket that's going to lift 100 tons to space. Okay, great. And then, but if your mission is, and it's bigger than that, and you, and you believe in something that is going to benefit humanity, that becomes your goal. And if you can find a way to make it profitable, obviously, that's, that, that's a benefit. Um, you know, eventually some of these companies. Will turn a profit. SpaceX is turning a profit. They found ways along the way of getting their goal to space of using starlink to bring in extra funds. Um, obviously the government contracts are hugely important, especially with the Department of Defense satellites and science research satellites with nasa. Um, those are things that allow, uh, companies to build incredible space, infrastructure, uh, to build a space economy. So that we can drive towards those bigger visions of, you know, uh, developing Mars and having a society that lives, uh, in space, uh, which is bigger goal and the bigger mission that drives people forward. Um, and I think a lot of science fiction plays into that too. It's, we look back towards the fifties and sixties

seeing, you know, the Gosh, Flash Gordon and then Star Trek, Star Wars, well then Battlestar Galactica. Hopefully we don't have as many Cylons or lasers or rockets firing across the stars. But idea of traveling and

[00:52:00] Markus: It's the story and it's the stories you would tell one another. I think this is, this is critical. And back, I don't know, a couple of years ago I was with a company and at some point, I think in his annual presentation, um, the CEO said, um, we need to save a hundred million in the next five years. And of course, it's, If you leave it like this, um, you're frustrating the entire, um, team, um, because the entire team exactly knows what that means.

But if he just turned the story a little different and said, we need to save a hundred million because we want to become the best in the universe, in order to blah, blah, blah. Immediately you would have the entire crew on your side because they may. Be more or the more maybe leaning into your vision or identify with your vision and then do the over the extra work and, and invest the extra work to, to make that happen.

And it's, it's sometimes it's very simple just to find the right words and the right story for the same outcome. 

[00:53:18] Chris "Hanks" Sembroski: towards the negative, right? Towards the absence of something. You can't work towards not spending something, but you can work towards a vision of a goal that allows you to do that sort of thing. And it's, you could tell me you could say, well, I don't want to spend money on this. What do you want to do? Well, I don't want to do that. Well, tell me what you want to do so that I know where I can direct my energies. Well, I want to accomplish this task, or I want to send people into space, or I want to watch 10 rockets per month, or I want to send, um, I want to try to re fly a rocket, um, every day or twice a day so that I can make the cost so much cheaper so that these ideas that this other inventor has come up with, have an opportunity to fly. that is something you can work towards. Now, saying something, I just want to make the cost of flight cheaper so that I can, you know, save some money, is not something to drive towards. Uh, 

[00:54:20] Markus: so what? 

[00:54:21] Chris "Hanks" Sembroski: Very difficult. like, so it's, it's harder to drive towards a negative to an absence of something than it is to inspire people to say, I want to reduce the cost of launch to space.

I want to use space resources. I want to inspire the next generation. I want to see millions of people living and working in space. I want to see people living and working on Mars, um, and beyond. That's what draws, I think, people to space because those, those companies that have that vision. That's, that's what keeps them, they're late at night or willing to come in on the weekends or move across the country to uproot their lives to start working a new place. 

[00:55:03] Markus: Exactly. 

[00:55:03] Chris "Hanks" Sembroski: and keep in mind that it's

about it too, but are a resource, right? And we tell each other these stories, but we need to treat people in a way That, that we are in this as a, for the long haul that we just don't want to burn people out. We've got people that want to do more with their lives than just come in and solder a few things together on a circuit board. 

[00:55:26] Markus: Exactly. 

[00:55:27] Chris "Hanks" Sembroski: They're going to be willing to do

all hours, but I mean, you're going to want to make sure that you, you do this in a way that keep that talent for a long time and keep driving that inspiration. And it's those big missions that, and big goals that we're talking about now that That keeps people there.

[00:55:46] Markus: Chris, uh, take us to, to the days before launch, um, now with Inspiration4 coming up. Um, tell us about the last couple of days.

[00:55:59] Chris "Hanks" Sembroski: launch, we finally get certified by the SpaceX training crews that we are now officially certified for flight. We travel down to Florida and get placed into quarantine. And, uh, we're going through our checklists. We're going through all the things we want to do in space.

We're going over the schedule again. We're, uh, as the four of us, as a crew, we spend times chair flying, where we sit down and go through the first, you know, 12 hours of flight. As we're reading a script, so that we almost build a muscle memory as to what we need to do. Very similar to what, you know, air show performers do before they take to the sky. Um, do our final blood draws and samples, uh, for the biomedical team and research. we, uh, Do some exercise. We, there were, we were going through sleep shifting so that, uh, we're awake in the middle of the night, uh, because our flight takes off at 8 PM. and so we want to sleep in till noon and not go to bed till 5 AM. so there we're 

[00:57:13] Markus: Is this, is this all super stressful? I mean, like, are you naturally anxious, um, during those moments? 

[00:57:22] Chris "Hanks" Sembroski: we're just excited at this point. I mean, it's

in a way that's negative. It may be stressful in a way that it's just exciting. And we're finding ways. I mean, I know we went around and did some late night jogging around pad around the rocket on the perimeter of the fence there.

And, so, uh, you know, we're getting exercise in, uh, we're finding ways to, to, to, uh, To do activities with our family, um, that are encouraging with us, uh, we did some late night kayaking, um, on a, on a bioluminescence tour. So you could see all the algae and different glow, um, in the middle of the Florida swamp. Uh, we did some flying in some of the jets to kind of stay sharp and to do some photo opportunities. The launch tower in the background, you know, to keep working on our communication with one another, and for us as a crew, it wasn't stressful. Our families were there to support us and celebrate these moments as well. Uh, I think the ones that had small children like my wife and, you know, Jared's wife, Monica, that we were trying to help support the little ones along with us as well. That, Can't go everywhere we normally would, um, or bring in all the extra help we thought we would normally have around us, uh, in quarantine because we're trying to keep the astronauts healthy before flight. so it's, you know, it's, it's not stressful in that way, but. At the same time, just gone through six months of the most incredible experiences, you know, we've ever had from climbing Mount Rainier to centrifuge training to aerobatic flights in fighter jets to, gosh, lots of other incredible experiences together as a crew. And we see this to, to a peak and Start to think about, okay, so what comes after? What happens after the flight? Because we are so on this incredible high of training every day, going to SpaceX and hopping into the simulator or trying on spacesuits. And this is all going to come to an end after this incredible experience in space. Um, maybe so that those thoughts start to come to mind about, all right, so what are we going to do next? Uh, what's the next best thing? so that a little bit of that stress comes in,

uh, We had formed a crew that was able to start talking about some of those things and start realizing, oh, now we get to share that story.

And, you know, I get to spend more time with my, my girls and make sure they understand how cool this is and how amazing space is and how beautiful a planet we are, we're living in. And they get to be good caretakers of this planet, uh, you know, and then, and Just now it's now becomes our mission of not training every day, but now telling that story to inspire the next generation of astronauts, engineers and explorers that that part becomes almost as equally as exciting.

Not quite as exciting, but almost. Yeah. 

[01:00:32] Markus: you were still with the Air Force at that moment, right? 

[01:00:36] Chris "Hanks" Sembroski: um, active duty, um, I left active duty in 2007. I left the reserves in 2010. So, um, I had been out of the Air Force for about uh, about a dozen years, about 14

years. 

[01:00:48] Markus: Okay. Okay. Because I was just going to ask how, how, how do you tell your employer that you're going to go into space and you, you're going to be missing, um, your workplace for a couple of weeks or months?

[01:01:03] Chris "Hanks" Sembroski: just taken a job with Lockheed Martin that started, that the start date was after the announcement was coming out. And so I had to figure out, I had accepted this job in late February with an early April start date and I had signed non disclosure agreements. So it was a very. Difficult email or call to make like, I know I'm just starting this new position.

I'm going to need some time off, but I can't tell you why, but it's really cool. Oh, and with no relation whatsoever, here's a website inspiration4. com to go check out. So, um, so, um, they, they, they were, for the most part, they were, they were supportive. Um, and, uh, understood and very excited for me. Um, as things got closer to launch, it got so busy.

I did end up having to take an early leave of absence so that I could at least spend some time with my family. And, um, instead of working and training and working and training and then missing out on all the things that my family was doing. So, but they welcomed me back. when I got back. College

day.

[01:02:09] Markus: Fantastic. Good. Launch day. Eight o'clock. No, not eight o'clock yet. Not eight o'clock yet. Um, evening before launch day. 

[01:02:19] Chris "Hanks" Sembroski: we load up in the Teslas, drive across, um, the highways to go to, you know, our, our last meal on earth. Um, and, uh, you know, in the car with Jared, and we're listening to weather reports and briefings, um, and I think Cyan and Haley were, were, had their music playing the whole way, and, uh, because when we pulled up, they, they got out, started dancing, and Jared and I were like, all right, cool, the weather's a go, we're good. But we get out at Hangar X there at Kennedy Space Center and, um, spend the

last 

[01:02:54] Markus: Is it, is it true? Is it really called Hangar X?

[01:03:00] Chris "Hanks" Sembroski: It really, 

[01:03:00] Markus: Nice. So anything, 

[01:03:02] Chris "Hanks" Sembroski: the 

[01:03:03] Markus: anything Elon related must come with an X. 

[01:03:09] Chris "Hanks" Sembroski: there's something to that. It's no question what the branding is, right? Yeah. Uh, but it's Hangar X and that's where they were, that's why they've been doing a lot of the refurbishment of, uh, Falcon 9s that have come back from previous missions. And they need, they needed more facilities, uh, that, uh, They just couldn't fit at pad 39A, so, uh, Hangar X is where those hang out, and so they have a conference room area there that, uh, had some coffee and pastries set up per our request.

No one wanted steak and eggs, um, um, which was good, you know, I, I think I had some about motion sickness, um, I had some space, and then it ended up having some, uh, Nausea in space. Managed to not fully get sick, so that was great, but, uh, want to load up on, on the heavy meal of tradition. Um, but yeah, it was, it was a great moment of just, uh, last few of coffee or drinks of sips of coffee and bites of some, some food before getting suited up to go to the launch pad and, know, big hugs to, to my family. Yeah, it was, it was really fun. Elon stopped by to say hi. Dr. Charlie Bolden stopped by to say hi, a former NASA administrator, an astronaut, um, and then, um, We got to walk out of the hangar and see all the SpaceX engineers and all of our friends and family there cheering us on as we walked out towards the Teslas to go get suited up, uh, for flight. That was, that was incredible. They were, they were probably more excited than we were in that moment, um,

from all the, 

[01:04:52] Markus: You're making, you're making this extremely visual. I'm, I'm seeing slow motion, um, um, hero shots. Astronauts walking down the hall. 

[01:05:05] Chris "Hanks" Sembroski: those moments that, and so, uh, they were get, we were practicing hours or days before to, to say, this is how you should do it. Start walking when the door is open, um, or start to open. And in the moment we completely fell off script and started just going any which direction we wanted to, to go say hi to people. So the hero moment shot was about half a second long. And then from there it was, oh, we're going to go say hi to our people that we love.

[01:05:35] Markus: And then autopilot. If 

[01:05:44] Chris "Hanks" Sembroski: driving out towards the suit up facility that had just been completed. They were finishing, they had literally just completed putting these rooms together for us, just on next to the launch pad. And so, we Go get our suits on, thank, uh, say thanks to the suit up team that helps us get into our suits, drive up to the launch pad, take one last look up at our rocket from the, uh, main level before climbing into the elevator, and then up the elevator we go, and across the crew access arm, sign the wall, um, on the X that's there now.

Um, and so there is a, there's a blue NASA meatball where all the NASA astronauts would sign around. And then they had just freshly put decals on the wall next to it, a big X where commercial astronauts can now sign. So we got to the wall there that, uh, I look for every time I see astronauts SpaceX now and zoom in a little bit to see if I can still see our signatures there

and count how many new signatures are there.

So,

maybe 

[01:06:56] Markus: How do those spacesuits feel like? Like, is there any comparison to, I don't know, scuba diving gear or what does it feel like? 

[01:07:06] Chris "Hanks" Sembroski: of Um, um, you know, it's, it, they feel great. It's like wearing a motorcycle helmet. Um, but they, the EVAs, excuse me, the IVAs suits, the intra vehicle assembly suits, the ones that we wore, uh, they moved great, they were a lot of fun to put on, um, I, they fit extremely well, they looked great too, I think, but uh, But there was one of our favorite parts was getting dressed up to look the part training.

And I remember for me, it felt overwhelming to see my own spacesuit that actually had my name stitched on the arm for the first time. And I had had one of those moments of, okay, well, why am I sitting here? And how did? get this opportunity when fewer than 600 people at this point their names on their sleeves of a spacesuit as they get ready to go to space.

And so the weight of history in those moments, sitting on the launch pad in my seat, down at my arm with my name on the space suit. Uh, I kept, uh, my mind was going through the two extremes of this is an incredibly overwhelming experience, uh, the weight of history is happening, um, Neil Armstrong launched from this tower to go walk on the moon.

Space shuttle astronauts have launched from this launch tower. How in the world am I here?

and then I'm also just extremely excited. We're going to

So two extremes, uh, kept. around in my mind back and forth. Yeah.

[01:08:52] Markus: Wow. And then countdown. 

[01:08:56] Chris "Hanks" Sembroski: goes slowly for a while, and then the last 10 minutes they go by really quick. Yeah. Um, Jared and Cyan were keeping us abreast of all the activity happening as Haley and I couldn't see the screens from our seats on the mission patrol, or mission specialist. Um, and so we would hear the calls over the radio and we could start to hear the sounds of the fuel flowing into the, to the rocket and the different valves clicking. Um, we could hear the arming of the launch escape system. you felt the little tug and the swaying of the rocket as the crew access arm pulls away. Uh, and, and as the, uh, The, the launch that the, uh, the transporter erector tower pulls back a couple of degrees to let go of the rocket to let it fly. And so there was a couple of moments of rocking there and just all the sounds felt very familiar yet.

There were some new ones. then, um, when T zero came, the biggest difference was we felt a lot, a lot of acceleration all at once. Um, it felt just like training, which is incredible. uh, And we hit T Zero and I could hear Cyan next to me just start hooting, hollering, saying, whoo, we're going. And it was an incredible launch.

Uh, we're laughing biggest smiles on our faces all the way through, um, to, to, to orbit. Um, I think we cracked a few jokes along the way, which is, know, obviously we're not nervous or stressed out in those moments. And letting our families on the ground be nervous for us the entire way. Yeah, it was an incredible thing, knowing you can get to orbital

and, oh, there's no other feeling like being able to accelerate for that long of a period, uh, to get to that type of incredible speed. That was, that was amazing.

[01:11:04] Markus: What does zero gravity feel like? 

[01:11:08] Chris "Hanks" Sembroski: your gravity is disorienting, you know, Jared describes it as laying on your bed with your, on your back and with your head hanging off the side and you feel that pressure of the, of the blood flowing up into your, to your face and a little bit of puffiness around your eyes and in your nose. But, getting used to it after a few hours, space feels, and microgravity feels like it's, it's very natural.

Your inner ear shuts off after a little while, um, and then it's as if you were born to work in space. And it may have taken us a couple days, maybe two, two, two days until I felt like, okay, this is, I got this figured out. And on day three, it's like, okay, let's go. We're all firing on all cylinders. Whereas we were Uh, working at our peak at this point now, and we're being told now it's time to get ready to come back home, but, uh, but it takes a couple of days to get adjusted to it, and like I said, on day three, though, we were all just, uh, felt like we were operating at peak, peak capacity.

[01:12:18] Markus: Fantastic. Again, kudos to you. This is an extremely engaging and visualizing that you're making. So it's like, it's like a movie. It's like I'm watching a movie together with you. Fantastic. 

[01:12:37] Chris "Hanks" Sembroski: of which we ended,

a strange couple of unique phone calls in space and, um, Cruise actually called up at one point and we talked for a few moments. Yeah,

they surprised us with that. And so we talked, we chatted with him for a few moments. And, uh, I was telling him a story of, when we first got into space and we were still strapped into our seats as the nose cone was deploying and, uh, We were going to do an orbit raising burn and so we were still strapped in and spacecraft was still maneuvering to get to our optimal orientation and orbit. and so as we launched into the night side of the Earth, we, we orbited for, we were flying across the, the globe for 40 minutes or so and we start to experience our very first sunrise. And, um, when that happened, The only time it happened on our mission, um, we had some direct sunlight come in through one of the side windows. and when that happened, that light that came in through my window on my side, beamed across to the opposite side of the spacecraft and just reflected inside our spacecraft with this most beautiful, pure, white light that I had ever seen or imagined. it just glowed inside the spacecraft for a little while.

It wasn't a reflected light of the earth that typically had through the cupola later, was the first direct light from the sun, beautiful, pure white light, and I described this to Tom Cruise and, uh, he said, Oh, you're making my skin tingle, which is kind of a fun thing to say. So,

[01:14:21] Markus: How spacious is the Crew Dragon capsule? I guess, of course, you cannot walk around in there, you maybe can float around, but most of those three days you would sit in your seat, right? I 

[01:14:39] Chris "Hanks" Sembroski: and re entry, and, uh, at night three of us used our seats as our, our sleeping location with our, inside our sleeping bags. But otherwise, we were floating around, and it's about the size of a small van, um, and then you open up where the cupola bubble is, and that adds another 10 percent of volume that we can move around and use, um, but, uh, It's, during those three days, it's, you're floating and using every little corner, the ceiling, the side, the floor, the cargo compartment as a, as, you know, living space and a place to do your, your experiments or record videos or pictures or, um, you name it, or do your activities, you know, scyandid painting. Um, I play the ukulele in the cupola bubble for a little while. Um, yeah, but of course we had a lot of blood draws to do and a lot of microbiome swabs, and we used a handheld ultrasound device to measure our bladders and our optic nerve, it's all along with our interjugular vein, just to see how our blood flow was flowing, making sure it still was going the right direction. Which is a thing in microgravity. Sometimes could cause problems if you don't have gravity to have your heart push against it. They wanted to understand some more of those, those things in average people to make sure that we could send more people to space. but yeah, we would use every quarter nook and cranny and shelf. Uh, for storage or for just moving around and it felt the perfect amount of space. Yeah. You bumped into your crew occasionally, but you could find ways of getting your own little bubble of space if you needed it, if you needed to own a little bubble of space for a little while. And so, you know, a small minivan might not seem like a lot, but, uh, it is in microgravity. 

[01:16:35] Markus: guess, um, there is no way you can easily like flip up, uh, flip on your smartphone and, and call home. Um, so, so how, how difficult, or is there an option to call your wife, your family from up there? 

[01:16:54] Chris "Hanks" Sembroski: where we had a chance to have audio calls with our family. I think we had two calls with them. Um, I think we were going to do three, but I think we only had time for two, um, so at that time, now they've got Starlink and they've been testing out laser communications since our mission, but on our flight, we relied on TDRS satellites that provide that Network of Communication around Low Earth Orbit back to NASA, and we also relied on ground stations that are strategically placed around the world, and whenever we were over a ground station, they could see video of us back to the ground. We could not see video of them, but, um, There was one call where, uh, with my family that they were able to patch her through along with my kids so that they could at least see me through a ground station and I could hear them over the radio. So, uh, you know, a little, there was a little bit of a delay and a lag, as you might expect with, you know, trying to relay a phone to a

to a satellite, through some radio signals and back again. Um, But they were able to see me floating in space and we were able to ask each other questions and talk to each other while we're orbiting in space. And those were some of my favorite moments. My youngest daughter had to make sure that she told me that she got to play with magnet tiles that day. It's like, all right, cool.

Awesome. Amazing. space. Cora, that's amazing.

[01:18:23] Markus: mean like, um. No one can beat your role and your being a super dad now for them being in school or kindergarten or wherever they are. Um, because I mean, like you must be talk of school, kindergarten or, or wherever, or playground. 

[01:18:44] Chris "Hanks" Sembroski: that's 

[01:18:45] Markus: ha 

[01:18:46] Chris "Hanks" Sembroski: is, right, go

know, answer questions about space to kids and I'll do STEM nights for my, my daughter's schools and whatnot. And, uh, my, my youngest will tell people like at summer camps at random and a place that has nothing to do with space that my dad has been to space.

And then 

[01:19:05] Markus: ha ha 

[01:19:05] Chris "Hanks" Sembroski: you later and like, I just need to let you

your

about you. It's like, well,

She's telling the 

[01:19:10] Markus: She's right. Great. Um, Chris, your, your, um, engagement with Your former employer with the, the Air Force, the US Air Force, um, and then being an astronaut, um, brings an extremely interesting, um, understanding of the two sides of human conduct. On the one end you worked or you helped keep the doomsday machines alive and working, on the other end.

You're riding a doomsday machine, but for a completely different outcome, maybe even for a, maybe even for a peace mission. Um, so this is, especially in your role, extremely interesting to, to discuss. That friction between the two worlds, because they, they truly encompass what makes us human. We have the dark side and we have the bright side and you bring both sides to the table. 

[01:20:30] Chris "Hanks" Sembroski: Yeah. I mean, you, you bring us some great points. Um, being around big rockets means you're being around big rockets that do good things and rockets that are meant to, you know, uh, do good things. carrying weapons of mass destruction, uh, but in a way, they, they attempt to accomplish the same mission. And what that mission is, is, is preserving families and preserving a way of life and promoting, um, in a way that seems seems disingenuous. But if you look back as to why did, why did Nobel invent dynamite? Because he thought it would, bring peace amongst the It was utterly destructive that no one would ever think to use in that way, um, and so you bring those two sides together and you realize that, that what everyone cares about at the core is having safety and security and love and wanting the best for their families.

And it doesn't, I think that's a universal concept, um, for, for everyone. I think there are a few exceptions to that. And, um, unfortunately, sometimes those people get louder voices than they should have. Um, but no matter where you're from, you really care mostly about those, those main things. And that's partly why I joined the U.

S. Air Force to begin with, is because I wanted to do something that was bigger than myself, to give back to my community, give back to the people that had, had developed my country. And, um, Made it safe. And that's what I was on doing when I was part of the Air Force, um, uh, is providing that safety and security at a, at a larger level with a group of incredible lead talented members and, um, And then flying on a vehicle meant for civilian purposes and peace purposes and scientific research, um, inspiration, it takes that another level, to another level where we're realizing that we can go to space and solve for Earth at the same time.

Um, we can look at, At trying to figure out what we are doing in space and how that relates to some of the problems we have on the ground. And we have a lot of problems here on earth, right? We know there's famine. We know there's, there's conflict or there's things that we continuously struggle with and poverty and, know. An imbalance of income or whatever it is. I mean, there are a lot of things that we struggle with on the ground that we've struggled with for millennia. and using space in a, in a new way to give us a new perspective. As we touched on at the beginning, um, it gives us another way of look, of looking at these, these problems. And space is an incredible platform to start solving some of these problems, um, in, with new, with new perspectives. Sometimes it takes a new fresh perspective and a new way of looking at things to solve some of these struggles that we've dealt with. ever since humans have walked the earth and it gives us an opportunity to take people out into space and think about at this point, okay, what do we want a spacefaring civilization to look like? an opportunity here to either trek across the universe or go and conquer. And what can we do that is now something that's more peaceful or more productive, and you know, more prosperous than it has ever been before. in doing so, I know that somewhat sounds highly idealistic, uh, but that's, those are the choices we get to make. And hopefully we get to make the right choices as we go out into space, because I really do truly believe that a lot of the problems that we, we will face in space, we can use those to solve the problems that we're facing every day here back on the ground.

[01:24:42] Markus: If only more people could make that experience that you were making that way, you, you were lucky. To be able to make, because, um, I think this could be a transformative process and I spoke with exactly, um, I spoke with Jasmine about exactly that topic. How can we make, or how can we bring space to more people?

How can we make that overview experience to cherish our planet, to cherish our home, um, available to more people on earth? Because it's quite impossible to get everyone on a ticket, um, to, to go into orbit. But I think this could be, this could be a peace mission, um, in itself to help us heal on earth.

[01:25:38] Chris "Hanks" Sembroski: I think some of the people that have been displaced around the globe, find themselves exploring new, new areas, and I, a big part of, um, what I experienced going to space was realizing that looked back at Earth and wanted to be as closely connected to the things I was seeing from space for the first time as I possibly could, and a part of that is connecting with the people from those areas and understanding them. their experiences. And, uh, in doing so, we, we find out how similar we all are, um, as astronauts or refugees or scientists or moms or dads. there, the goals that we have for ourselves and for our families are all same and exploring new worlds and traveling around and trying to put ourselves in an uncomfortable situation. so it's a challenge, but the rewards are there. And being able to, to be happy and comfortable in those moments when maybe things aren't as we have always planned them to be. That's what it's like to be an astronaut, and that's what it's like to really step into someone else's shoes to understand their experiences. When you start to hear the stories, and you start to share the stories, yeah, the subject line or the details might be a little different, but the underlying context, that overview effect, that genuine compassion towards one another and towards the planet, all the same.

[01:27:19] Markus: Chris, um, There is, um, this question I keep asking each of my guests and, um, you are very special because this question means something completely is, is, is completely different when I ask it. Um, when, when I asked the question, um, to an astronaut and the question is usually I asked my guests, um, if the call came.

And if they were ready, would, would be ready to go into space. And then, because space may, if you're traveling further than you were traveling to the moon or to Mars, at some point after the first, the initial excitement wears off, will get maybe kind of boring. If you're seven months on a spaceship, it can get boring.

So my question is, which one piece of music will you want To bring on that space mission to keep you entertained to keep you company because the thing is we have a playlist on spotify it's called the playlist for the aspiring space traveler and each guest gets to contribute one of their tunes which one is which one do you want to contribute. 

[01:28:46] Chris "Hanks" Sembroski: is incredibly important, um, and, uh, we, our mission, we actually had the opportunity to create our own Spotify playlist as well, um, but there was one song, and there is one song that It captures a lot of the thoughts and a lot of the beauty of that. And it's by the Black Pumas and it's called, uh, Colors. And it's a song that talks about seeing all my favorite colors and my sisters and my brothers and um, it captures a lot of that, um, beauty. That, that, that feeling of seeing the Earth from that new perspective and the new brightness of those colors coming in through the window, um, and then and then, of course, I

some of that on the ukulele in space, too.

So, um, it, that song resonates deeply 

[01:29:41] Markus: Great. 

[01:29:41] Chris "Hanks" Sembroski: and It's fun.

It's fun. talk about classical

classical music and when they see the

way like that, they just want to experience the awe or the closeness of being to this supernatural sometimes. And for me, it was Being close and connected to, people and to each other and, uh, experiencing all the diversity and the colors and emotions that you see flood through you when you see the earth and all the clouds and the land masses and the water, um, fly below

So yeah, Colors by the Black Pumas. 

[01:30:24] Markus: Fantastic. Um, this place, um, is called the Space Cafe Podcast. It's a coffee place. And now and then in coffee places, you have an espresso in order to energize yourself. Now I challenge you to share an espresso for the world. mind with me. Um, and pick whatever kind of topic you want to pick, uh, pick, um, um, and share something with me, with the audience where you feel like this could be, um, a shot of inspiration for the listener. 

[01:31:00] Chris "Hanks" Sembroski: Well, that's a great one. I would say that, that we've talked a lot about engineering and rockets and the experience of using technology to go to space. And maintaining vehicles that, uh, you know, those large rockets in, in the fields of Montana. but I think there's something incredible about sending more people into space that, uh, we get to start thinking about sending more of our own, uh, humanity and personalities of ourselves.

Um, and being able to do that in a concrete way is, you know is really fun too. And there are opportunities through Blue Origin and their Club for the Future where they're allowing everyone and anyone that wants to send a postcard sized piece of art to space. They'll fly them to space aboard their new Shepard rocket and you bring that back. they'll bring it back and saying it's stamped as being flown to space. What's cool about that is that you can have your own space flow in art, what has been really neat to see is so many people start to think about, okay, what, what sort of inspiring message today want to send to my future self? that I'm going to send out into space. and have come back to me months or a couple years later to say, you know, if I can go to space, what can you do today? I think that, I think that gives us a really cool opportunity to, to think about what you want to tell your future self about what's possible. What is the hope that you would have for yourself from now, from where you are now, and uh, write it down and send it out into the universe, literally, and uh, have it come back to you to remind you that this is. This is the goal that you have for yourself to keep pushing forward.

[01:33:09] Markus: Fantastic. Chris Ambroski, thank you so much for taking the time sharing your wisdom with us 

[01:33:18] Chris "Hanks" Sembroski: really enjoyed it. Thank you so much.

[01:33:20] Markus: What would you say to your loved one if they got the call? Would you be ready to let them go, support them, just like Chris family did? It's a tough call, yet we know we better get used to it, because Space isn't staying out there. It's coming closer and closer and closer to all of us. If this episode, my friends, made you think, dream, or even wonder about the sacrifices behind big leaps, don't keep it grounded.

Share it with someone who's ready to launch. Either in reality or just as a vision, as an inspiring dream they may have. And while you're at it, rate and review to help us keep reaching for the stars. Until next time, my friends, thanks for your loyalty. Thanks for listening. Keep looking up. Bye bye.