From Earth orbit to the Moon and Mars, explore the world of human spaceflight with NASA each week on the official podcast of the Johnson Space Center in Houston, Texas. Listen to in-depth conversations with the astronauts, scientists and engineers who make it possible.
On episode 374, four communications experts from NASA’s Mission Control Center discuss their roles in connecting astronauts in space to partners, control centers, and the general public. This episode was recorded on December 16, 2024.
Transcript
Host (Joseph Zakrzewski): Houston, we have a podcast. Welcome to the official podcast of the NASA Johnson Space Center, episode 374, mission Control, The Voices and Visuals Of The Mission. I’m Joseph Zakrzewski, and I’ll be your host today. And on this podcast, we bring in the experts, scientists, engineers, and astronauts, all to let you know what’s going on in the world of human space flight and more. The Mission Control Center, or MCC, is the iconic epicenter of human space flight operations. A place synonymous with innovation, precision, and teamwork. It is where history unfolds. Decisions are made in real time, and missions are supported 24/7 to ensure the safety of the astronauts and the success of their objectives, whether supporting the International Space Station, enabling commercial missions, or preparing for journeys to the moon and beyond. MCC is the heart of NASA’s space flight operations. You’ve likely seen depictions of mission control center in movies and television or clips during live NASA broadcasts, but what you see is just the tip of the iceberg. Behind every mission is a talented and dedicated team. Each member sitting at a console with a specific role to play. These consoles work in perfect synchrony to monitor, communicate, and coordinate every aspect of space flight. This is the second episode in a series we’re dedicating to exploring these roles within MCC and the International Space Station Flight Control Room. We’ll break down what each position does and how they all come together to keep operations running smoothly. Today we’re diving into four key roles that drive communications for human space flight with the Communication Radio Frequency Onboard Network Utilization specialist or CRONUS, Matthew Johns. Ground Control, or GC with Abe Blanco. Russian Interface Operator with Steve Quenneville, and Public Affairs Officer Rob Navias. These positions ensure seamless data transfer, international coordination, public engagement, and ground systems management. Together they form the backbone of communication linking astronauts, engineers, international partners, and the world. We’ll uncover what makes each role unique, how they interact during missions, and the expertise required to sit at these critical consoles. It’s a story of collaboration, technology, and problem solving at the highest level. Recorders to flight speed. CRONUS,
Matthew Johns: go
Host: GC,
Abe Blanco: Go,
Host: RIO,
Steve Quenneville: Go,
Host: PAO,
Rob Navias: Go.
Host: We are go for Houston. We have a podcast
<Intro Music>
Host: Well, I’m incredibly excited to have all of us in the same room here discussing these positions together, especially when it comes to communications for Mission Control Center. So let’s start with introductions around the room and, and what your role is at Mission Control Center. And we’ll start with you, CRONUS.
Matthew Johns: Hey, good morning. Yeah, my name is Matthew Johns. I’m a CRONUS flight controller. CRONUS stands for Communication Radio Frequency Onboard Network Utilization Specialist. Been at NASA for seven years. Um, was never really my dream to be a CRONUS flight controller, but love what I’m doing here and love this organization that I’m in.
Host: And take us through the training and certification process for that, for that console that you occup, you mentioned that that wasn’t what you had your site set on. So how did you get from starting at NASA to where you are now?
Matthew Johns: Yeah, so you come in as a CRONUS, um, trainee. Uh, you’ve got about a one year worth of, uh, of, uh, classroom lessons, basically, uh, where you go through, you know, you do a class and then you take a test at the end, sort of like school. Um, after that, you’ll go through one year of sims to get a backroom certification. Uh, we’ll talk more about tha, that’s a console name Raptor, which is our backroom. Um, after that, it’s an additional one year to get to the front room. Um, this will be be where you’re working, sort of the nominal operations, day-to-day operations, and then another six months to become, um, a specialist where you can work EVAs, um, Visiting Vehicle Operations, things like that. Um, so it’s, it’s quite a bit of training for our console and I know for, for the rest of the folks here too, um, to get to where you are. And it’s certainly a, um, a big accomplishment once you once you get there.
Host: CRONUS, thank you very much. Excited to have you with us here today. And we wanna move on over to GC. Tell us a little bit about your position in on, on console.
Abe Blanco: Yeah, so my name is Abe Blanco. I’ve been around NASA for about seven years as well. I work at the Ground Control or GC, uh, specialist role. Um, and so I started out, honestly the same thing with Matt right here, where it’s, I wasn’t quite the dream of coming to NASA, honestly. I grew up in a really sheltered life. And so knowing about this, I’m very honored to be here, being in this room with all you all, you fine gentlemen here. I applied for an opening, um, at the NOC as our network operations controller. That’s one of, uh, many of GCs backgrounds or back rooms. And so that was originally the, the plan of where I started, and then eventually I became a GC.
Host: And with that too, kind of similar story to what we just spoke with with CRONUS. You said that wasn’t your initial vision to even come to NASA, let alone begin with GC. What was that training process like? Was it similar to what CRONUS in these other positions might go through, or was it something more unique?
Abe Blanco: It, it’s similar and different in this, in, in, in multiple ways where it’s like, it’s a shorter turnaround. It’s roughly two years in order to get a certifier, be a, a specialist certification for with GC. Um, we start off with kind of just reading, um, criteria and reading our local operating procedures and kind of learning that when a more classroom oriented or self-study actually oriented way, um, from there we start into immediately into an operations operator back room, what we know it as teeter scheduler. We can talk about more about that, um, later on as well. Um, and then from after, that’s about eight week program. Um, we usually go two people at a time, so it’s alternating weeks, maybe about 16, 16 weeks in total. And then we’d go run into, uh, SIM training and from there, um, simulation training, we have about 18 sims for a GC in order for them to get certified. And then from there, once they get the go from a flight director, uh, they go into the front room specialist and they work their ways in that. And that’s a couple months, uh, probably two, two, maybe three months in general. Um, but from there, that’s more of an internal certification. We believe that they’re good. And, uh, from my personal experience, once I got into that front room and got my specialist certification, there was still a lot more to learn. Uh, GC has a plethora of items that we deal with, and so a lot of it, a lot of the, the real time is, uh, real time training. That’s, that’s what’s helpful for that. And then after that, we go for, uh, if you, uh, feel a little curious, you go into your instructor certification, and so that’s from there we go. If it’s CTO and they check off the boxes there and you start training the, the next generation of GC,
Host: It’s amazing to hear these opportunities that come from a blank slate and just an opportunity present itself to you to where you are now. And, and with that, I’m excited to learn more about RIO.
Steve Quenneville: Yeah. My name is Steve Quenneville. I’m a with the RIO Console. The RIO stands for a Russian Interface Operator. Um, I’ve been here at NASA for 32 years. I’ll be coming up on 32 years here in March. Uh, I started out, uh, a little differently. I was an intern at NASA, uh, back in the early nineties. Um, my first intern tour, co-op tour was in engineering and I enjoyed it, but I wanted something more big picture, something more flight control-ish. And so they suggested I go over to the flight planning group and shuttle. And so I started working in a flight planning group and shuttle during my subsequent co-op tours. And when they hired me on full time, um, I stayed in the operations division. I’ve been there ever since.
Host: And with your training and certifications too, how did your path begin to being a, a flight controller? It sounds like a lot of, a lot of us start from, you know, grassroots levels and an opportunity presents itself. Where do those humble beginnings?
Steve Quenneville: Yeah. I started as a flight controller when I was a co-op student. Um, and they were able to work us in the back room, uh, as an OJT, which means on the job training, you sit next to a certified flight controller and during the shuttle emissions. So you learn about what the job is. And I’ve actually got certified, uh, for the very lowest of the shuttle, uh, flight plan backroom, uh, during a shuttle mission, uh, while I was still a co-op. And so that’s how it all started.
Host: Wow, that’s incredible. And then batting cleanup here for us today and to learn his humble beginnings with the PAO office. Rob?
Rob Navias: Yeah, Joseph, uh, Rob Navias Public Affairs Officer. That’s the PAO acronym. Unlike my distinguished colleagues here, I can barely count from one to 10. They’re, they’re tremendous engineers, first and foremost, Steve’s career. And I have, uh, basically paralleled one another in terms of longevity. I’ve been with NASA for 32 years also this coming February. Uh, I started as a radio network correspondent back in the early seventies for Associated Press, UPI Radio Network. And then CBS most of what I did was coverage of the space program. I started covering the approach and landing tests of the shuttle enterprise out at Edwards Air Force Base in 1977. Covered almost every shuttle mission until the time I got hired by NASA and made what I thought was a pretty seamless transition into what I continued to do today, which is mission operations, commentary, television planning, downlink TV from the station for media clients, those types of things. But, um, uh, on console we are responsible essentially for broadcasting, if you will, all of the activities operationally, spacewalks, launches, landings, uh, departures and arrivals of visiting vehicles. And I’ve done quite a bit of Russian operations, as Steve will knows as well, traveling, uh, to Moscow and then to Baikonur to the launch site for Soyuz missions.
Host: Well, it’s incredible, again, to have all you gentlemen here with us to join us and talk about the communications roles within Mission Control center and, and then for me personally, a little anecdote is working with the PAO office to walk into Mission control center. And if you ever take a tour here at Johnson Space Center, you’ll see these consoles almost in a column with each other. You have PAO in the back left, and then you have CRONUS right in front of them, and then you have GC and RIO right in front. So it’s almost that communications corridor, if you will, of mission control center, or I’ll call it that for now. And that’s in the International Space Station Flight Control Room. So that’s where I wanna dive into now is, is how do your roles and your console impact the International Space Station and its operations? And, and CRONUS, I’d like to go back with you.
Matthew Johns: Yeah, so more specifically what the CRONUS Console manages, we actually have two, uh, fully independent systems. Um, they’re related to one another, but we have two full systems that we manage on board. Um, we’ve got the command and data handling system, and we’ve got the, uh, communications and tracking system. The command and data handling system is basically, uh, computers, your avionics computers that are running, uh, the flight software on board. Um, we’ve got a plethora of computers on board that we manage. Um, within that, we also manage a caution warning system for the crew. This gives, uh, alerts, um, visual alerts as well as audible alerts to the crew in case something goes wrong. Um, we manage that system as well, um, for the communication and tracking system. We manage things like audio to the crew, um, our, um, radios and antennas that communicate with the station. We have two different sets of them. Uh, one’s a high rate link and one’s more of a, a low rate, uh, critical link that we have. Um, we also manage video on board, which is, uh, critically important for obviously the complex operations getting, um, video out to the public via the PAO office. And so that’s a critical role that we have as well, both internal and external video.
Host: And it’s impressive to watch you work too, especially when you get a chance to see the views from the International Space Station. If you ever watch those streams live on YouTube or anything live from the station, that kind of directly ties into your role and, and, and you’re the one punching the buttons and making sure that people can see those beautiful views of Earth.
Matthew Johns: Exactly. Yeah. So, um, obviously during visiting vehicle dockings, uh, spacewalks, things like that, we’re always trying to track the crew, track, the vehicle. Um, that’s one of our most important and critical jobs, uh, during those operations, is to make sure that the public, um, can see what their taxpayer money is going towards and these awesome operations that we get to do. Um, so we definitely recognize that and we, when we love doing it, it’s really the, the best part of the job for us.
Host: And that’s the International Space Station going to the earth, or looking back to the Earth now, the other way around for ground control. GC, what’s your role in, in occupying and, and helping out with the International Space Station and its mission?
Abe Blanco: Yeah so I’ll, I’ll take a stab. The best I can explain it is more of as a, it’s the focal point between the flight control team and the rest of the ground network, um, including the hardware, software, and the rest of the engineering personnel who support us day to day. Um, that, that allows us to communicate with the station and external partners. And so we have a variety of hats for the GC console. Um, I’m trying to read it here, make sure I, I, I make sure I say it all so I don’t miss every little detail of it. So we work with an extensive amount of teams, uh, here in the MCC and including external, uh, over at White Sand Mex and over in Las Cruces, New Mexico. Um, other than that, and there’s extensive ground network that works with us. Uh, we work, uh, troubleshooting, loss of comm, um, any kind of workstation issues that any, any of the flight control team, uh, deal with, as long as we’re, as well as we report any kind of facility, issues. So anything from, you know, light flickers, uh, we, we call in, we know the people, the personnel to call in to support that. We don’t physically do that ourselves, right? We’re no, we’re no certified electricians. Um, but we have, we know the people who, who support that. one of our biggest duties that we do is, um, the schedule SEDRIS comm. So we schedule satellite comm for not just the ISS, but other, but our other visiting vehicles for their comm sports, excluding the, um, Russian Soyuz, Progress. So we, we don’t schedule their comm. But other than that, anyone else, anyone else who comes to the station, we schedule their satellite communication. Um, and as, as well, we work with, we work with the, um, privatized audio and video to support any kind of private medical conferences, uh, for the, for the crew.
Host: That’s incredible to learn. And now transitioning to RIO where you talk about working with the International Space Station station to ground, ground to station, and then did international working as the, the RIO officer you take up, it sounds like a lot of those other areas that are required.
Steve Quenneville: Yeah. Um, we are also kind of a communication sub, but our, um, and communicator is with Russia. Um, so, you know, the ISS has the US segment and the Russian segment. Um, it’s very important that the flight controllers here in Houston understand what’s happening in the Russian segment. And so it’s the RIO’s responsibility to make sure that they understand what’s happening in the Russian segment and communicate that back to the rest of the flight control team here in Houston. For example, um, we have common atmosphere, right? So if, um, there’s equipment on the Russian segment that cleans the atmosphere, that produces oxygen, and that, um, takes away the CO2. And so if some of that equipment breaks, it’s up to our group to go and find out what the problem was, how long it’s gonna take to fix it, uh, and any forward plans that the Russians may have for that equipment. Um, you know, the RIO is what we’re called when we’re in here in Houston. But our, our group actually has two jobs. We we’re also called the Houston Support Group, HSG, and that’s the folks in our group who are over in Moscow. So a main part of our job is actually working in Moscow. Um, and I’ve been traveling over there for 20 years. I’ve spent over eight, eight and a half years there, combined on my trips. And when we’re there in Moscow, um, it’s our job to interface with the Russian flight control team and to report back to Houston. So, um, when there’s communication going on, the crew’s working, and there’s, you know, six or more crew on board, the Russian crew are talking on one of the space to ground channels. The US crew’s talking on the other ones. The folks here in Houston are mainly concentrating on the US crew. It’s our job over in Moscow to listen to the Russian crew, see what they’re saying, something may happen, uh, that we have that’s very important to the rest to the US team. So we have to listen in and then report to the Houston team what’s going on in the Russian segment. And that’s our, our main primary focus.
Host: And I’m already starting to see it, but I’m seeing where that the intermingling of the roles are starting to come to be, and we’ll talk about it a little bit later on, but to tell the story and to really share that story with the public is with all these positions, is PAO.
Rob Navias: Yeah. Well, these guys, uh, without them, we really don’t have the ability to do what we do. You know, Abe, I, I sort of call GC as the air traffic controller for mission control. ’cause everything comes through that console, including keeping the lights on and the coffee pots clean, you know, I mean, it’s, it’s all encompassing. <laugh> CRONUS is kind of the original TV producer without whom we don’t get the signals in our production control room to put out to the world. Steve, he’s the diplomat, he’s the Secretary General of the United Nations that keeps peace between the two sides and makes everything smooth, uh, between the two segments, the Russian segment and the US segment. We’re just the beneficiaries of all of this expertise. So what we wind up doing is we will, we’ll use all of the inputs that come in. Mostly, uh, what the RIO and the Houston Support Group will wind up doing is I’ll be listening in on consult conversations they’re having on the loops. Um, listen in, eavesdrop, if you will, on internal conversations with, uh, other flight control positions, sort it all out, have an understanding of what I can say publicly and what I just internalized, uh, because it’s not, uh, for dissemination publicly. But, um, what I wind up doing is we take in all of these inputs and, um, we listen to the communications between the crew and the Flight Director and, um, other flight control positions. And it’s, it’s, it’s kind of a strange compilation of doing radio broadcasting, but you’re on tv. Our production team is in a different building than Mission Control. So we are not face to face with them. We talk to them on the loops, but what we’re doing is basically radio play by play of all these dynamic activities all possible because of the inputs from all of these flight control positions.
Host: And Rob, you summed it up perfectly of how everybody plays that role and how it all affects PAO. And that’s, I teased it earlier, but that’s exactly what I wanna dive into now is, is the mission, how we all inter work and intermingle with each other and how each role, each console affects the others. Um, going back to you CRONUS, can you walk us through, uh, maybe a scenario in which, or whether it be a launch, a docking, a space walk, or, or a Russian mission in which, you know, you work closely with Ground Control with RIO and then, you know, anything PAO may need. Is there a, a typical scenario that you could walk us through that all four of these communications positions help each other?
Matthew Johns: Yeah, certainly. So, um, I mean, with GC and I specifically, you know, he, he mentioned that he is one end of the communication link. So, um, you know, I, I’ve got signals that leave the ISS and once they leave, I don’t know what happens to ’em after that. GC manages that end of the link. He has signals that leave the TDRS, and then he doesn’t know where they lead or where they go or how they get there, uh, until they get to me. So constantly, GC and I are talking on a day-to-day basis about, um, uh, any issues with the communication link, any, um, you know, packets that are lost, things like that work in constant communication for, um, about communication, constant communication about communication with the Space Station. So that’s just on a day-to-day basis. But certainly during Russian vehicle, dockings, dockings, um, either Soyuz or Progress, um, all four of us are in constant communication with one another. The CRONUS console has a lot of, um, configuration items that we need to put in place for vehicle dockings, and that takes joint communication between our Russian colleagues and us to make sure that the Russian segment is ready for that. And then we are ready for that. So then of course, I talk to RIO, who talks to our Russian colleagues, uh, and, and, and allows for that communication to happen. Um, and then certainly everyone, not only the US uh, personnel, but the Russian personnel want video of the dynamic event like we discussed. Um, so GC plays a, a role in getting that video over to Moscow, the US originated video. Um, and then we set up that video for our Russian colleagues as well, so that we can get, uh, as many views as possible. Um, so certainly during Russian events, um, we are all communicating, uh, frequently, I would say. And then of course, day-to-day ops, you know, we have minor things that we will handle.
Host: For you personally, has there been a mission or a dynamic operation, which I know can be exciting from all factors, um, that you recall that you really needed to lean on your colleagues here that are in the room with us, GC, RIO and PAO, to kind of, whether it help you out or, or have the answers that you were looking for?
Matthew Johns: Yeah, certainly. So, uh, I’ll go and I’ll bring up a little story here. Hopefully I don’t take up too much of our time. Um, I’m blinking now on the Progress that it was, maybe one of you guys can help me. We had a Progress, uh, docking, uh, maybe three years ago or so where we lost command capability from Houston. Um, God, I can’t remember the number, what it was, but we lost command capability from Houston during Russian Progress docking. And, uh, obviously we need commanding, uh, we like having commanding to be able to set up the ISS systems for docking. Also, the Russians would like to use our command assets to set up their systems for docking. Um, and there’s no crew on board the Progress vehicle, obviously cargo vehicle. Um, so was in the middle of the night. We ended up, uh, GC troubleshooting, back rooms troubleshooting, trying to figure out what the problem was, couldn’t, uh, eventually figured it out, but couldn’t resolve the problem in time for docking. Um, and the vehicle was coming in, couldn’t, you know, didn’t, didn’t slow it down. Uh, it, it was, it was coming. So, uh, woke up, the crew, uh, started having the crew configure systems for us. We still had an audio link with them, so was able to, uh, have them send commands from their interface with the ISS. Um, and of course, throughout this entire time that, my point being is that, you know, GC and I were in constant communication about the command link. RIO and I were in constant communication about RIO and the entire team were in constant communication about, uh, setting up our systems, what we did want to have the crew do, what, what we didn’t need the crew to do. Um, and then, uh, the, the cherry on top of the whole situation was we didn’t wanna send the crew to sleep because, um, but even though we had systems configured for docking, because we wanted to make sure if anything went wrong, we had someone available. Um, so we were like, okay, well what, what can the crew do now? So we had them, uh, pan tilt, uh, one of our external cameras. Usually what CRONUS would do to set up the video for PAO, we had them pan tilt one of our external cameras to, um, get views of docking. So that was kind of a, an awesome moment where we had worked through this entire shift of, of, uh, complex op without commanding. And on the cherry on the top was we got to see that vehicle come in, and the public got to see that vehicle come in because the crew helped us out. So it’s a pretty special moment for us, but
Host: That’s an incredible story, and it is great to see just that open dialogue that you have with the other consoles that are, you know, only feet away and you can troubleshoot in real time what happens. You mentioned something too that I would love to dive in with, with each roles as we go around the room and as you share your stories, you talk about the back room and leaning on the back room to help troubleshoot what is the back room to start, and then who, who in that room helps you organize your thoughts, come up with procedures, and have a plan moving forward?
Matthew Johns: I’m gonna defer over to GC here because he’s the, the guy with the back rooms. He’s really got a plethora of back rooms that I think he can talk a lot about. Yeah.
Abe Blanco: And if, if you don’t mind,
Host: No, Please. That was a perfect transition.
Abe Blanco: Yeah I Was trying, I was trying to figure out when I can jump in to
Host: do it. Yeah
Abe Blanco: Matt’s stories. I was, so we can vibe off each other. No, <laugh> please. So, since I’m coming in now just to, I’ll come back to that point, but as when you were talking about the, was it the Progress, uh, coming in, it’s like, I still remember the GC who was on console. Um, we share our stories, right? It’s, I think that’s also another thing that we, we do as flight controllers. Uh, we, I, at least for the GC console, I think we share our stories and what instances, what issues we, we go through and we, from there, I think we all learn something from those instances. So that one happened to be some major ground issue, um, you know, fall on that sword. Um, but it was, it was amazing to see the rest of the team recover from that. and from you’re talking the standpoint, um, of how we work together, um, you know, like you said, we work with comm, um, we also work with RIO from there. And then of course I lost PAO to do all that to work all, all the information that we have, it all situated for them, but, okay. Sorry. I’ll come back to my, the back rooms. So talking in back rooms, and I’ll list them all, um, hopefully it doesn’t get too jarbled up here. So we have what we call the NOC our network operations controller. Uh, they’re the ones who, uh, manage activity, our activities for each of the, our tests, our simulations, and including the mission itself. They’re the, what we call the heart of the MCC local network. Um, from there we have our Comtech and our Voice, um, positions. Um, Comtech works with our space to grounds that allows us to communicate with the, the crew on onboard the station. And voice allows for the voice loop interface with our external partners. So everyone outside of MC, all of our, our Russians, um, Japanese, we all work together. That’s how, that’s our voice communication. They manage that. Um, from there we have our Atlas support center. Um, they’re kind of IT specialists. So anything from workstations to your, um, to your, um, login issues or any kind of additional servers that NOC can’t handle, they’ll, they’ll perform that action and help us out there. And then we come with Johnson TV and Mission Video. Uh, PAO works with a lot with Johnson TV and Mission Video. Mission Video does the more archival of our MCC video. Everything that down, every video that down links private or to public, um, goes into Mission Video and they record, they record it. Um, and that goes, gets released to the respective parties who, who, uh, have the clearance to have them. Um, and then Johnson TV, they’re ones who also route video to external partners other than GC. We have our own system that we can directly route to international partners and external partners. Uh, but Johnson TV does the rest of it. And then we have, uh, SO, um, our security officer, um, they’re the ones who do all the cybersecurity encryption. And those guys, they work really hard. Um, the best days for GC is to never hear from them on the loops, right? We never, we never wanna hear from ’em. That’s, that’s, that’s it. Like, if they’re doing their job, they’re quiet. Um, and then we have a personal GC, um, our TDRS scheduler. So that one is an actual GC who has the operator. They’re not specialists yet, but they’re usually operators. Sometimes they do have a specialist certification. Um, they’re the ones who actually do the scheduling, uh, of our TDRS com. Um, that’s only from the day shift hours. So after that, it’s just the GC on console who is scheduling communication with, for the, uh, station and other visiting vehicles.
Host: That’s an incredible example of, it takes a village, right? When, when, when we watch NASA Plus and we see, you know, views of Mission Control and the team that’s in that room, there’s, you know, 3, 4, 5 people for each person on that desk, and then 3, 4, 5 people behind there and it just branches out and pyramids out to that support group. It’s incredible to hear these stories. And GC before I let you go too, I mean, we talked about a very dynamic operation with that Progress launch with RIO. I’m excited to hear your take on that and how you had to decipher between, you know, your, your position and everyone else. But at the same time, for you, what is a, a normal operation look like for you when it comes to a mission and, and whether it be a dynamic launch docking and so forth, hopefully, unlike that operation, what, you know, what is your role play in a, in a mission like that?
Abe Blanco: Um, I mean, just day to day, um, scheduling TDRS come, um, kind of just waiting or working with the team to see if there’s any kind of issues that that transpired for that. So a progress dock, something like that. There’s not much for my position to do other than troubleshoot any kind of comm issues that we, we go with. I will route video to RIO, which we already have, are pre-established. So the video is pretty, pretty set for straight right there. Um, but other than that really, although work with the other teams, uh, RIO, I sometimes, or for the rest of the Flight Control team, we have what we call, uh, m uh, MCC work plan items. So sometimes we do day-to-day, we have to, you know, update our hardware and software in the MCC and that, that takes sometimes some, um, was it back and forth communication and coordination with the international partners, and especially if they impact them. So a lot of it was with RIO. And RIO will come back to me and they’ll explain to me, Hey, Moscow has some, um, dynamic operations that they wanna perform. And so we have to either push back or court or negotiate what, what we can do with MCC. Usually we just push, we just push back, right? We’re not gonna, we’re not gonna get into the way of, of our, our, um, one of our best current parts, <laugh>, um, and PAO you know, we just work with Johnson tv. Um, not much. Uh, I hands off or my, my position, my console, um, PAO might be able to explain more about that with their, with their interface with Johnson TV. Uh, but I, I was gonna pull back a little bit
Host: please.
Abe Blanco: With the, the MCC, so I was just talking about my MCC counterparts. There are loads more people. So outside MC we have our White Sands, White Sands over there in Las Cruces, New Mexico. And I won’t talk about every position there, but that’s a, a whole other team and sitting on consoles, um, working to have customer support for the TDRS Network, for the, the space network that we, we work with. And so with them, you know, we are just one of many customers, uh, with that work with the TDRS satellites,
Host: That’s impressive to see that team behind the team behind the team. And transitioning now over to RIO. And, and we hear these amazing stories from, from CRONUS and GC and, and maybe even that dynamic op if you remember it. But for you, what does, what does the scenario look like for you when it comes to Russian operations and, and Soyuz and, and Progress launches, dockings and so forth?
Steve Quenneville: I wasn’t on council for that particular docking, which is unusual ’cause I’m usually on console quite a few events. Um, but I can imagine what it was like for the RIO on console, uh, having to coordinate with the Russians in real time and saying, “Hey, we don’t have any Com capability with ISS right now.” And them asking us, um, you know, when are you gonna fix it? <laugh>, are you gonna fix it before Progress docks? Are we gonna, are we still go to dock Progress? Um, one of the things to keep in mind is the Russians have their own ability to send commands to the Russian segment. They don’t have, uh, and they do that through the US segment most, uh, most often. And so, um, if our command capability to ISS is down, it may also take down commanding for the Russians to configure their systems, unless they just happen to be over one of the Russian ground sites, which is maybe 10, 15 minutes, uh, a few orbits a day. Uh, they do have some new con system com systems just in the last few years that, that expand that coverage, uh, for them to send their own commands to ISS. But, um, they are also and traditionally have been reliant on the US comm systems to be able to send up their commands and get configured for these dynamic events. So I imagine it was a very interesting day for the RIO on console. Um, I’ve had many interesting days. I’m not sure this would even have come to the, into the top 10 of my interesting days over the last 30 years. Uh, but, um, uh, I’m sure that, that, that was an interesting day for that RIO and console. So, um, I, I, and again, our goal is to to be that communicator between the Russian Flight Control Team and the, the US Flight Control Team. And typically the flight director would do that if we’re not on console. If it’s just a regular day, if it’s a dynamic cop, we’re there, we make sure we’re on console. So we can offload that flight director, uh, and do that communication with the Russian flight flight director in Moscow.
Host: Well, you teased it. And now I’m curious, you said the top 10 of your experiences, and you and Rob have some of the, some great stories to tell of your experiences on, uh, but for you and your position at RIO has, was there a dynamic operation that you was memorable to you to where you had to lean on your, your colleagues and that communications wing of mission control center, if you will?
Steve Quenneville: So, um, when I was RIO, yes, but when I was HSG, even more so, um, ’cause I’ve spent a lot to more time in Moscow. You know, when we’re in Moscow, we’re on console every day. It’s not just coming in for a dynamic op, it’s, it’s more like CRONUS and GC we’re there every day, um, five days a week, uh, for three months at a time. And so that’s a lot of console time. So things are gonna happen while you’re there. Um, two of the main things I remember was Hurricane Rita. Um, and so we transitioned from, uh, back then. Um, we had the ability to command to the US segment from Moscow, from our, from HSG, HG had that command capability. But there’s a whole process where you go into your backup controls. It’s called BCC Backup Control Center. And so they would, Houston would transition command of the US segment to our little HSG team in Moscow. And I remember that very well. That was a very long day. Um, I think I got there at eight in the morning and I didn’t leave till one in the morning. Uh, so it was a 16, 17 hour day. Um, and that’s because we had to do all that transition. We heard a hurricane was coming to Houston. They were doing all the transition from, from Houston to HSG to command the US segment. And then we were in control of the US segment for five or six days. And so that was, that was obviously a big deal. Um, another one was during one of the shuttle missions, uh, 13A, uh, the Russian command and control computers. There are three of three lanes. They have three lanes, and they were all failing. They were going off and we were losing control of the ISS ’cause uh, the Russian thrusters helped control the attitude of the ISS. Now we had a shuttle dock, so we were actually using the shuttle, um, thrusters to control the attitude of the space station. So it didn’t spin outta control. Uh, but you can only do that for so long, right? The shuttles gotta undock and go back. So it was very critical that we figured out why these Russian computers weren’t functioning. And it was actually one of the guys in our group pulled out the schematics. This is what our group is supposed to do, pull out the schematics, look at ’em, try to understand what the potential problems can be. One of the guys in our group understood that there is one common place where all three of the lanes go through to condition their power to call, called the power conditioner unit. And so he went and told the Russians and, and say, “Hey, have your guy go look at that thing.” Like the, and the Russians called up to the Russian crew and they had him go open the, the, the locker. And um, there was, um, coolant fluid all over the place. This unit had shorted out. And so there was a coolant leak back in that, um, area, uh, behind in that locker that was shorting out this piece of equipment. So they just kind of wired around it and got all the computers back up and running. So that was probably the most exciting. That was actually two or three days worth of activities. ’cause it took two or three days to figure out what was going on.
Host: Wow. And then before I go to PAO, who, who has to decipher all this information and what they can put out on, on NASA Plus and NASA TV at the time, for you, how challenging is it to, to listen to CRONUS and listen to GC and have that conversation in one ear and then on the other side, you’re listening to your colleagues in Moscow and working with the Russian operations there and trying to decipher where these conversations connect. I need to answer this question. I need to address this issue. And, and I get that’s a lot of voices that can probably come through your headset.
Steve Quenneville: It is. Um, so it’s kind of a skill. You acquire through all the simulations that you do all the time on console is trying to, trying to figure out, okay, this is a, this is a conversation that I need to pay attention to. This is more important right now. So you kind of tune out the other stuff. Um, and it helps that, you know, if it’s a dynamic operation, we have a RIO here in Houston, and then we have two people at HSG listening at a time. So you can say, okay, HSG, you listen to that loop, you listen to the Russians, I need to pay attention to the flight loop, what flight’s talking about, what CRONUS is talking about on the flight loop. And so we’ll kind of divide and conquer in that sense. So that’s why having a back room, HSG is kind of considered the back backroom for RIO. Um, helps a lot. And CRONUS can probably attest to that where he, his backroom may listen to his one conversation and while he’s listened to another one or GC might have the same thing. So that’s, that’s why having more than one person there instead of in charge of a just more than one person, is important to control the specific system.
Host: That’s absolutely incredible to hear how, again, how everybody works together and, and support of the, uh, International Space Station, its mission. And now onto PAO who listens to all three of you and has to decipher, okay, what information is important for one and what information can I share? Rob, how do you transcribe all this information that we’re hearing, especially with some of these dynamic operations examples they’ve been sharing?
Rob Navias: Yeah, not easily <laugh>. Um, I, I will also piggyback on something Abe said. What he didn’t mention modestly is that whatever he does in the International Space Station flight control room, which is FCR1 flight control room number one, there may be three flight control rooms in mission control that are operating for varying purposes at the same time. So whatever he said, triple it at any given time. The White Flight Control Room, which is the old space shuttle flight control room, could be an Artemis Sim going on, if not a real time operation. Uh, there’s a Blue Flight Control Room that was the original ISS flight control room back in the initial assembly days of space station. So you could have GC the ground controller, uh, and his team and the back rooms worrying about three things at the same time as well as CRONUS at any given time. So it’s, it’s a big load. Now as far as we’re concerned, uh, we, even though public affairs can be pushy at times, we don’t really dictate operational TV. Uh, we piggyback on operational TV, even though we will ask CRONUS from time to time if it’s on a non interference basis to give us an aesthetic look at something if we think we need to look at a particular module up close or something of that nature. You know, what we do is an extension of the Space Act of 1958. President Eisenhower signed the Space Act of 1958, which requires NASA to publicly disseminate information, uh, on a practical basis to the public of all of its activities. That’s our charter, that’s what we do. I don’t wanna pick on the Russian operations, but the thing that I recall, uh, very vividly was a couple of years ago, uh, Frank Rubio was on the station and we were getting ready for a Russian spacewalk that day. If I recall, two cosmonauts in an airlock on the Russian segment suited up, ready to go out to do whatever that spacewalk, uh, required them to do. And the Soyuz vehicle, one of the Soyuz crew spacecraft attached to the station sprung a coolant leak, and suddenly the spacewalk was called off and we had to turn our attention to the cooling leak.
Steve Quenneville: Yeah, that was one of my top 10 days
Rob Navias: Yeah, That was one of my bottom 10 days. But in a, in a different context, but listening to the loops pertinent to Russian operations to understand impacts CRONUS being directed by the flight director to zoom in on particular areas that we then piggybacked and of course GC providing the communications interface to allow everything to be disseminated properly for our production team to put out. And, uh, our coverage that day took on a very different flavor. Ultimately, that Soyuz had to come home, Uncrewed, and it extended Frank Rubio’s time on orbit to just over a year in space. But that was, uh, a good example of the synergy between my position and other flight control positions in trying to produce a product that would be understandable for the public without, without alarm. The crew was not in any jeopardy at that point. Very important point that we always try to make if it’s pertinent, is that the crew is safe, uh, and we’re working the issue. And so all of that activity that took place in the other flight control positions were critical to being able to calmly and accurately disseminate the information, uh, on a timely fashion.
Host: In your position with PAO, you’re receiving a lot of this information you’re listening in on, on these conversations with CRONUS, GC and RIO. Is there a time when it’s the other way around when PAO is the one sharing information with these positions and you’re the leader of the communications call
Rob Navias: Mostly through the flight director. If flight director may from time to time ask us, uh, what is being seen publicly, uh, what are we saying? And we in turn, uh, if there’s an issue that, uh, I personally believe while I’m on console may be sensitive in nature, uh, I will consult with the flight director to make sure that it’s okay to explain it publicly, uh, during commentary. Uh, you know, the days that we’re talking about where these contingencies come up and these unexpected activities, I call ’em a five Excedrin day, because by the end of the day, you’re listening to so many loops for so many hours, your brain can explode. And so it’s, I described GC as an air traffic controller. It’s sort of what we do as well in siphoning out loops that are not pertinent to that moment in time. You can’t turn loops off. You don’t want to turn loops off because you may miss something, but you have to absorb, dissect, and interpret. Uh, what we do is a lot of interpretation of techno babble into common English and, uh, to try to make it understandable for the media and for the public. So it, uh, it can be challenging at times, especially in a contingency as to what you need to listen to as what you must listen to.
Host: That’s incredible insight to learn. And, and before we go onto to our next topic, I kinda wanna go back to, to CRONUS and GC to get your take on, on how you decipher that communications in your headset too. ’cause again, there could be, during dynamic operations, there’s a lot coming at you and there could be a lot asked of you, and then you need to ask of others. How do you, whether it be through your training or just through just repetition and on the job experience, how do you decipher that information? Like what Rob and, uh, what pa and RIO have just described of, of what you should listen to and what you need to listen to? And I’ll start with you CRONUS.
Matthew Johns: 00:43:36 Yeah, certainly. So, um, we all listen to a lot of voice loops on a day-to-day basis. Um, you’re completely correct in that during complex ops, those voice loops can get very busy. Um, training is really what it comes down to. I mean, you train to listen to multiple conversations at a time or hear multiple conversations at a time, I would say, because you can only really listen to one. Um, but you all, everyone knows what their call sign is. So as soon as I get called somewhere else, then I can immediately, make an assessment on what I need to listen to. What’s more important, usually someone will give you a, you know, a, a two word, um, brief of what they want to talk about. You know, I’ll say RIO CRONUS for, um, station mode transition. So he knows what I’m calling about, helps him prioritize. If he’s listening to something else that’s way more important, um, that the Russians are talking about or someone else is talking about, he can, can say, standby one second, CRONUS, I’ll stand by. If I have something that I think is then more important, then we can negotiate, so to speak. So we certainly, uh, lean on our training to, um, make sure that we are listening to the correct things, um, paying attention to the correct things. Um, but a lot of times too, uh, we were talking about backroom. So it takes, uh, a team at a console to perform the console’s duties during a VV operation. Video is obviously very important. Um, crew safety is obviously of utmost importance. And then vehicle safety, um, below that, and then mission success below that. So, um, during a visiting vehicle operation for the CRONUS console, we’re doing things like setting up the vehicle so that it’s, um, a safe operation, uh, so that we’re maintaining a safe operation during the visiting vehicle operation. But video is a huge bandwidth, um, allocation for us. It, it takes a lot of bandwidth to manage video and to make sure that we have the vehicle in view and all that sort of thing. Um, so we split up duties between our back room and our front room to manage different aspects of the console so that the person in the front room maybe can pay attention to what, uh, conversations are going on, what the team’s talking about, and maintain situational awareness in the front. And then the back room can be more focused on making sure that we have good video views for PAO or for our Russian colleagues, et cetera. So it’s a team effort, um, when things get busy to manage communication. Um, but really it, it all comes back to training.
Rob Navias: And you know, I’ll jump in here. ’cause Matthew, he, he talked about training a, most of the training, most of the critical training is done during simulations. Rarely is there a simulation that is a quote, good day that they’ll throw everything, everything in the book at you during a simulation, and that’s done deliberately so that you are pushed to the limit in what you need to decipher, uh, to be able to do your job properly. Uh, during real time operations, I would say 90, 95% of real time operations, knock on wood, it’s, it’s more benign than that. And, but you’re always prepared for the worst because of the training involved. You know, during shuttle days before a crew would fly down to the Kennedy Space Center for launch, the final assent simulations that they would do, they’d do two or three runs. They would throw the book at the crew for the first two runs. Everything would break, everything would fail. You’re listening to a million different loops at the same time. But FOD, the Flight Operations Director had always had the final run of an asset perfect. Just as if nothing happened during the shuttles climb to orbit. And they did that deliberately, not only so the, the team in Mission Control could be reminded of what a normal day would be like, but it was also a psychological tool for the crew before they would pack up their training and go down to the cape for launch.
Host: It’s like a positive boost to send you off on when things go right.
Abe Blanco: Yes we call them, Milk Runs.
Host: Milk runs?
Abe Blanco: Yes, in the instructor world we call them Milk Runs.
Host: May I ask why they’re called milk runs?
Abe Blanco: Oh its just interesting, just running down and getting milk. I don’t, honestly I don’t know the whole terminology
Host: Oh, just it’s easy. <laugh>, it’s easy. A milk run. It’s there and back. Yes. Easy enough. Well then the GC to piggyback on, on all these conversations you have, you talked about the back rooms, your teams that are not just here in Houston, but scattered across the country. How do you decipher those conversations during these operations that you’re relying on RIO CRONUS as PAO to, to, to work with, whether it be a dynamic operation or a day-to-day situation?
Abe Blanco: Yeah, so putting on my instructor hat about this is like, so we don’t get to simulate with all of our back rooms, right? The MCC, the those folks, unless it’s a real issue that’s going on with the simulator or going on real time. We, we, as the instructor, we, uh, pretend, right? We role play, we, I put on different voice and I work with my, my, uh, trainee. Um, but we, like I said, we hit ’em with so many different things. It goes from any kind of ground system in MC or a network ground issue over at White Sands or Guam or, you know, one for one of our additional TDRS networks there. Um, but also good stuff to weather as well. Sometimes weather, you can’t do anything about that, but the, like Matt was saying, like we work them to multiple issues to figure out how to prioritize between, um, which issues to deal with. And at the same time, we get additional calls from the rest of flight control team and it could be anything from putting up a clock or their workstation, um, goes down and it’s, it’s up to us as the GC or the, we try to train them to prioritize if, if they have an issue speak up, right? Speak up and say, Hey, we’re at work in this issue, I’ll put you clock later. Right? That’s like, that’s the last thing you think about as a GC, if there’s any additional issues, right? And no one wants to think about that and come, Rob is like, yeah, we hit them with so many issues on SIM simulations and it gets that where you’re just, your ears are drained with so many voices, right? The voices in your head. You have to be able to distinguish the between two, you can’t multitask, right? It’s not a real thing. Um, but getting a trainee to, to figure out what to prioritize, that’s the, the main objective there. And it reminded me actually kind of going steering away again, um, what our, our favorite operation, what’s, what’s gone down where, um, we rely on someone else or, uh, someone was relying on GC. So last year, um, I’m sure people we’ve, we’ve, we’ve been going through MCC power work. Um, so last year we had a, an exciting major power outage, uh, due to some work. It was just miscommunication and GC you know, we had to get to our back, back, back of control center capability. So we, we, you know, we work with our disaster preparedness. You don’t simulate that. You can’t simulate that. And so I, not to put, I’d like to be modest about it, I’ll be as modest as possible, Rob here, but I was the GC called in. Um, I was on, I was in building five. Um, I noticed issues. And then Flight Director called, we went in and everyone was just relying on GC uh, figuring out, talking to me over the air because we had no voice loop capability. Uh, we couldn’t contact our external partners other than a, a black, uh, black phone calls. Um, so we had to just reestablish communication with the station and, uh, transition from MCC to our BCC, which is located over in Huntsville, Alabama over there, Marshall Control Center. So not just coordinating with the rest of the flight control team here in Houston. We had to work with our Marshall counterparts. And so that was a really exciting time for me personally. I, I really enjoyed that coordination and just working with the rest of the team in order to reestablish comm. And I think we were coming up to like, some kind of SpaceX operation. I think they were docking or I forgot what exactly what was going on, uh, later on. But we ended up remaining on BCC and performing that operation. And it was an exciting time.
Rob Navias: Yeah, this was the stimulus for me to get a 26 kilowatt home generator for myself. Uh,
Abe Blanco: <laugh>. I got a UPS battery myself from my computer.
Host: <laugh>. Well, it’s amazing. And it is amazing what you can plan for through simulations, through training. And then, you know, mother nature just sometimes likes to throw you a curve ball and, and operations just have to work around it. And I mean, these are incredible stories. And again, it, it almost seems like it, it kind of goes back to that, you know, rule number one of communication is to communicate. And whether it’s deciphering voices in your head and figuring out what you need to focus in on, or if it’s just sharing that information with your colleague next to you, whether they have heard it already or they need to hear it again, or they need reminders, or you have spotters to help support you as well. I kinda wanna go back around the room now and, and really talk about the, the study, the expertise. We’ve lean, we’ve talked a lot about simulations and, and training and exercises, needing to, to learn how to communicate and how to communicate effectively and poignantly and CRONUS. Going back to you when it comes to your study and expertise and, and especially you guys that came in into, uh, UNGC, you know, not knowing a console, not knowing that that’s where you wanted to start or where you’re gonna begin, what expertise did you find most beneficial? What training did you find most beneficial to, to help shape where you are today in, in that role?
Matthew Johns: Yeah, that’s a good question. Um, I think really something that’s, uh, absolutely important, um, that maybe people don’t bring up a lot. Um, uh, I’ll talk about, well, let me say this before I say that. Um, most of the skills that we’re talking about, uh, communication situational and awareness leadership are things that we train and teach in this organization. And we do a really good job of that. Um, so certainly you can be, you can be good at those qualities before you come here, and that will help you, of course. Um, but we treat or we train a lot of those qualities in people, and we do a really good job at that. Something that we don’t necessarily train. But I think that is critical, um, is critical thinking, um, being able to assess a situation and think critically about it. Um, not even just technically, but, um, but just at a higher level than, um, than what may be expected. So I think critical thinking, being able to critically think about a subject, um, is essential to, to what we do here. And a lot of it, a lot of the other things that are also essential leadership, communication, um, situational awareness, we can teach and, uh, and in people. Um, and then through practice with simulations, you can get really good at. So critical thinking, I think is a, a huge aspect to the job.
Host: And GC, what’s made an impact for you and, and your development as, as a GC um, member?
Abe Blanco: Yeah, honestly piggyback home, again, um, you know, just soft skills. It’s really just communication. Um, be able to take, um, criticism, right? Be get feedback and deliver feedback. It’s, it’s all, it’s all it is is communication. We talk to each other, learn how to lead, lead, and it’s something we can teach. We teach each other, um, during our simulations. And so not other than that. That’s the soft skills, that’s what’s important. Just being able to say, admit if you’re wrong, if you’re wrong, if you’re right, you know, work with your team. Just
Matthew Johns: Communicate. Yeah, that’s a good point, Abe, because a lot of times I’ll say whenever we’re training folks is that feelings don’t matter in the FCR. Um, and what I mean by that is that, uh, we all have jobs to do in the FCR and, uh, in the, in the Flight Control Room. Um, and it oftentimes, um, normal communication that you and I had would have cordially, uh, has a lot of filler words in it, has a lot of smiling, a lot of laughing, maybe intentional or, uh, you know, just to fill gaps in conversation. We have a lot of tools that we use as humans to communicate with one another to make the conversation flow and, and things like that. On console, Um, you know, we cut all of that out. Everything is just to the point, exactly what you need to say when you need to say it. If RIO tells me if RIO’s busy and he tells me, standby very firm, or the flight director tells me standby or tells me something very firmly, um, you know, that that’s, you don’t, an effective way to communicate the urgency of that sys, uh, of that, uh, situation, um, or whatever it may be. And so you can adjust. A lot of what we teach is adjusting that communication, um, depending on the phase of flight. So if you’re in an asset, like we were talking about a vehicle assent, whether it’s, uh, maybe the Boeing Star liner assent vehicle, which we, uh, FOD flight operations directorate operates, or the shuttle missions, um, all of a sudden your communication is very concise, very short, um, and a lot less informative, let’s say, than if you are on a, on an evening shift and just communicating a minor problem, um, that doesn’t affect the crew, that doesn’t affect, um, any, any ops that are going on. You have a lot more time at that, at that point to communicate that. So I just wanted to piggyback off of what Abe said, and, um, and that we not only, not only just listening communication is not only just listening to what somebody’s saying, but it’s, we change how we speak to one another and it’s really important. So
Abe Blanco: I agree
Host: And then seems like that the training and the on the job exposure, NASA creates that, that environment to support that, that ideal, because if you’re new to the aerospace industry coming in, that might seem very sharp and abrupt and, and very stern at times. But knowing that it’s, you know, this is dynamic operations and we need to, you know, get to the point and get to it quickly, and then if we have time later, we can walk through and, and get together on a podcast and I’ll talk about it. So, but for RIO, in your experience, what’s been beneficial in your years coming from shuttle to now, your RIO position and, and moving forward, what have you really leaned on that you continue to use as your foundation in, in your, your console position?
Steve Quenneville: So we’re talking about different kinds of communication skills, and, and Rob called me a diplomat. Um, I would more refer myself as a, a glorified liaison <laugh>, um, with a fancy flight controller name. Um, for us, it’s, it’s about, you know, it’s, it’s more about the communication than it’s about the technical skills. Uh, some of the guys in our group have incredible technical skills, and that’s absolutely required to understand, uh, the Russian systems and how they’re operating. But you have to have at least a basic understanding of the technical issues to understand them and then explain them to Houston in such a way that it’s clear and concise and understandable. And so that’s a big part of our job, is parsing all this information, all this data that we get, and boiling it down to what’s the bottom line, right? So we have to communicate that bottom line back to Houston. Um, one of the important, most important jobs we have in Moscow is we send out an email twice a week, you know, with an update on the Russian status, all the issues that are going on the Russian status, and we kind of sum, briefly summarize each one. And so what words you put in that email, which goes out to all of the program managers, all of the flight controller positions, everyone who wants to be included in email, get that email, and we have to boil down each issue into a one or two sentences, and then we put a link to where they can find out more information if they wanna get into all the technical details. So it’s really about boiling down information, finding out what’s important, and then communicating that important information in a clear and concise manner.
Host: And how have you, can, how have you seen that evolve as, as communications have grown, especially with your experience in, in, in 30 plus years with NASA and the agency? Has, have you seen that change, a a as missions evolve as communications evolve as technology, uh, evolves?
Steve Quenneville: I don’t think so. You know, uh, it’s kind of, um, you know, it’s flight controller speak, right? You, once you get into that flight control room, even when I was a co-op and I was wide-eyed, you know, and, and you know, kind of intimidated by the whole process of getting on the loops and speaking, uh, and, and hearing everyone else talk, they were all talking the same way. It’s clear, concise language. There’s no feelings involved. Nobody gets upset or offended how people are talking to each other. That’s just how it’s always been. And, and that tradition, I think, think is continuing today.
Rob Navias: I would tell you that, uh, from public affairs standpoint, uh, we are the only console position that does not affect the life or death of a crew on orbit. What we do, however, we don’t push buttons, we don’t send commands, we don’t technically solve problems, but what we do affects the success or failure of the agency in being able to portray the programs, whatever they may be, ISS or Artemis, uh, accurately without bias, without spin to the public. And they’re the ones who are paying the bills, and they’re the ones that will decide for themselves what the success or failure is all about. But the only way that you do that in my years with NASA and before that as a broadcast correspondent, is to portray the information accurately. Let the public make its, make up its own mind as to how to decipher the information for itself. If you’re doing your job properly, you do it because you’ve understood the vehicles that you’re dealing with for a particular operation impeccably. You have to understand that. But you also have to understand the culture within the room. And Matthew touched on this, being able to understand the tone of a flight controller’s voice, the decibel level of a flight controller’s voice the urgency of a particular moment of communications. Uh, there are certain moments in time when instinctively, if you’ve done this long enough, you will know to keep your mouth shut unless it’s absolutely necessary to talk on the flight loop, for example, to talk to the flight director or another consult operator. So as not to interrupt them while they’re in the middle of something critical, all you’re doing is distracting them from doing something that’s, frankly, more important than anything that public affairs officer might say to them at that moment in time. So it’s instinct, it’s experience, it’s judgment, but the only way you do that is through a lot of experience. And that’s why every time I walk into the flight control room, and I’ve been doing this for a long time, I, the first thing I think to myself, and I’m not being patronizing here to my colleagues, but the first thing I think about is there’s probably no place on earth that has more brain power in, in a particular room than in that room. I mean, forget PhDs, forget Bachelor of Arts degrees, forget all that. It’s just collective brain power. And I am pretty intimidated by that. Like I said at the beginning, I can’t add from one to 10, most of the time, <laugh>, but I can open up a microphone and communicate, you know? So it’s a, it’s an interesting dynamic when you walk in that room and very, very impressive.
Steve Quenneville: Yeah. And Rob mentioned tone of voice, and I very clearly remember a couple instances when I’ve heard flight controllers with that tone of voice, and they turned out to be very serious situations. One of ’em was, uh, when the EVA officer said, um, we need to get them in right now, it was in Luca Parmitano had water in his helmet and almost passed away. ’cause he almost drowned, uh, with the water in his helmet. So yeah, I remember the tone of voice is a very key thing. It’s something that everyone, there’s certain things you hear on console and your heart rate goes up. Like break, break, flight, break, break. It was like, this is an important call. Whoever’s making this call, you gotta pay attention. So, yeah.
Abe Blanco: Yeah. And talk, talk about brain power. You’re talking about how we we operate the station. I was like, a lot of people, some have engineers. Me, my personally was mechanical engineering, uh, <laugh>. And this is a, a different wheelhouse. This
Host: Is the called the humbling moment, right?
Abe Blanco: This is, yeah, yeah, yeah. So it’s like, this is the wheelhouse where it’s like everyone else, some people have master degrees, some have PhDs, um, and from there, like my back rooms, some of ’em don’t, don’t have degrees. Some of them, they come from different backgrounds, you know, military and, you know, I mean, they do smart things back the back in the military. And to be able to support us a day-to-day basis and troubleshoot issues, I think it’s, it’s amazing. Remarkable. Yeah.
Matthew Johns: It’s a different aspect, Dave, because what we have to do in the flight control room is assess a situation, assess a failure, assess the impacts of the team based off of that failure. Have I lost, uh, audio voice? Have I lost commanding? Have I lost both? Um, what is the team, uh, at a loss of functionality wise? Um, and then how do I quickly recover that functionality? Uh, and then sometimes I can wait until later on to actually figure out what happened. Right? And, uh, so, you know, you may, we obviously have, maybe not, obviously we have support rooms, um, um, that do a deeper analysis into what may have happened, into what it may have failed. Um, but for us in the flight control room, we have to understand the technical of, of what’s going on and then resolve it in a timely manner usually. And so that’s a special skill that we have in the flight control room that, you know, we don’t, we oftentimes don’t have days to figure something out before we recover. We need to recover something quickly.
Abe Blanco: Yeah. And I agree. It was like FIW it was like failure, impact, workaround, like you said, flight control room. We, when we have an issue with the ground anywhere in the network, yeah, we try to resolve it as soon as possible. And then, you know, you get a, a discrepancy report or you get an instant report, and then the, I call ’em, we, we call ’em in the room, the smart people, the engineers mm-hmm. They investigate it and later on come up with the what’s the solution, what happened?
Host: Yeah. And again, it’s, it’s, it’s incredible to hear the communications needed, but it, you know, we mentioned earlier, you know, rule one enough communications, communicate, but seems like one B one A and whatever you wanna call it, is also to effectively listen and being on, on the receiving end of information and knowing when to jump in. We’re, we’re cutting. I mean, I feel like we’re just barely scratching the surface, and I feel like we’re really starting to start humming here on conversations and staring stories and how we impact each other. But unfortunately, we’re coming up on time, but I wanna ask you one last question. We’ll go around the room starting with CRONUS again. Um, just hearing your backstories and hearing, you know, how you made that impact and how you got to where you are in your console positions, especially with communications. Uh, there’s a lot of people, myself included, that did not start in the aerospace industry and always wanted to work for NASA. That was always a, a childhood dream, but I just didn’t know where to start. And I wanted to do something like a lot of your positions. I wanted to be in a position of, of impact. How can I make the biggest difference? So CRONUS, starting with you, for someone that’s listening to this podcast that loves space, or might even just be mildly interested in space, but might see a path for them within the agency with a lot of exciting human space light going around, how can they get involved? Where’s that first step for them to, to reach out and, and begin that path?
Matthew Johns: Yeah. I’ll start by saying, you know, we’ve talked a lot, a lot obviously about mission control, um, and us having maybe engineering backgrounds, but there’s so many opportunities at NASA. Um, like you mentioned with your background yourself, Joseph, um, that don’t need a STEM background. You know, I think a lot of people think, oh, you work at NASA, you’re automatically an engineer or something, right? But there is it, it really takes, uh, a whole plethora of folks to do what we do here. Um, and we have a whole spectrum of, of talent from all over, um, the world, really, the United States obviously, and, um, and from different backgrounds and different, um, um, you know, educational backgrounds as well. So, um, obviously you can get a STEM degree, I think that’ll help you out, um, and in pursuing a career here in that fashion. Um, but even without that, I mean, that’s not a prerequisite to find a position here. Um, and then of course, I think, uh, you know, I’ll say that a lot of people think that if you work at NASA, you have to work, uh, directly for the federal government, which is not the case. We have so many support contractors that work, uh, here at JSC on site, um, and offsite. And so, uh, the space industry is large these days, and obviously the flight operations directorate is a great place to work, in my opinion. Um, and you know, we’d love to have more people work here, so I’ll put a plug in for FOD and Mission Control. Um, but at NASA as a whole, there’s plenty of opportunities both in, in the federal workforce and, uh, with contracting workforce.
Abe Blanco: Yeah, and going off of that is, so we work with the MSOC with mission support operations contract, and that’s, you know, all the grounds i’ll, the ground things we work, work with, right? The servers, the commanding capability, and there’s so many opportunities from that. It’s, you don’t have to have a STEM degree for all, all those. Um, it helps. Sure, it does. Um, but I think for my personal advice, it would be, you know, be able to work with the team, you know, be cooperative, uh, supportive. Especially people are gonna have bad days. Some people already have good days, uh, be able to shake that off, right? Like we were talking about earlier is like, accept the feedback. Um, don’t, don’t get too down in the dumps about what Flight Director said to you or what another position told you. Um, just persevere. And the end of the day, you know, you can maybe share a beer or something. Yeah. I dunno. Maybe it’s a good
Host: RIO. How do you get, how do you get started?
Steve Quenneville: Well, I got started as a co-op, so, um, wait, what we have now are called interns, NASA Pathway interns. So if, uh, folks wanna just look up on the internet and Google, NASA pathway interns, uh, that’ll be a great way for them to get their foot in the door, um, while they’re still studying and still in college. Um, so what that usually means that you’re, you drive down here for a semester, you’ll work instead of study, and you’ll go back to your college, um, and come back and forth until you finish your degree. And, uh, after I fi uh, finished my master’s, I had hired me on full time. I’ve been here ever since. So, uh, co-oping interning is the best way to get started.
Rob Navias: I was a little bit different in that I came from a broadcasting background, so I went from broadcasting to broadcasting basically. And it was a, it was a natural segue for me, I would say, um, if you are interested in space, immerse yourself in the subject. Learn as much as you can about the subject. All of the rest of the technical details will come in time. But there’s a lot of people in our office who have great talents but don’t necessarily wind up behind a microphone. They may have great talents and writing skills to our television production team is second to none in terms of being able to put out to the world what we do for a living. Uh, so there’s a number of ways to do it, but you really have to commit yourself to understanding the subject material first and foremost, and the rest will come in time, whether it’s in front of the microphone, in back of the microphone, in front of a camera, behind the camera. It’s all part of what we do in communicating the story to the world.
Host: Well, again, thank you all for sharing your roles, your, your mission control center console positions and your experiences with us. And it’s, it’s been a, been a fascinating world to look into the communications and, and the teams that go behind, uh, CRONUS Ground Control, RIO and PAO. Thank you so much for joining us on Houston have podcast.
Abe Blanco: Thank you.
Steve Quenneville: Thank you.
Matthew Johns Thank you
Rob Navias: Thank you,
<Outro Music>
Host: Thanks for sticking around. I hope you learned something new today. This is the second in a series of podcasts we are doing, highlighting the roles of all the different consoles inside Mission Control Center and the International Space Station Flight Control Room. Check out our previous episodes to learn more about ISS controls and you can look forward to more topics in the coming months.
Our full collection of episodes is on NASA.gov/podcasts. You can also find many other wonderful podcasts we have across the agency. On social media we’re the NASA Johnson Space Center, pages of Facebook, X and Instagram use hashtag #AskNASA on your favorite platform to submit your idea or ask a question, just make sure to mention it’s for Houston We Have a Podcast.
These discussions were recorded on December 16th, 2024. Thanks to Dane Turner, Will Flato, Daniel Tohill, Courtney Beasley, and Dominique Crespo. And special thanks to Chelsey Ballarte, Jaden Jennings and flight Director Paul Konyha for helping us plan and set up these interviews. And of course, thanks again to Matthew Johns, Abe Blanco, Steve Quenneville, and Rob Navias for taking the time to come on the show. Give us a rating and feedback on whatever platform you’re listening to us on. And tell us what you think of our podcast. We’ll be back next week.