We express a special "Thank you!" to Navy Captain Josh Cassada, Ph.D., International Space Station astronaut and physicist, and to NASA for the amazing Saturday Morning Physics event, live from the ISS on January 14, 2023. Thank you also to UM Engineering Professor John Foster for an informative lecture on the technology of the ISS and space travel and for answering questions. Six hundred SMP fans joined live, with over 1000 tuning in online for the live simulcast as Dr. Cassada took more than 25 preselected questions read by audience members aged three and up. Cassada was also joined by US Marine pilot Colonel Nicole Aunapu Mann to present a live demonstration of the conservation of angular momentum with rotating astronauts that is sure to be the basis of future physics homework problems. The timing of the live connection to the ISS through communication satellites and ground stations lasted 53 minutes (double check) and provided video and audio broadcast from the space station, but only audio from the ground. In response to the last question, "What would you bring back from space to earth?"

Josh responded, "What I would really like to do is bring everyone up here to kind of gain the perspective that you get from being up here. There is no portion of this planet that it isn't absolutely breathtaking we have clearly won the lottery in the Universe. We have such a fragile but perfect planet, and we can't afford to mess that up, and I think once we all realize that we – all of us, all 7 billion of us - we are on the same boat, and we need to work together. I think we learned pretty quickly that some of the things that humans don't get along about, that stuff tends to be really trivial, and we just need to focus on what's important, which is, you know, keeping this planet and everything, everybody else healthy."

We plan to have Josh join us live, in person, for a future Saturday Morning Physics Event, so please stay tuned!

Please check out our upcoming Winter 2023 Saturday Morning Physics lectures!