It’s all hands on deck for the Talking Space Team as we examine the Nancy Grace Roman Telescope which began its three month journey to its permanent station-keeping point at Lagrange Point 2. Once there and fully commissioned, Roman will begin it’s initial 5 year mission, surveying billions galaxies to track how galactic structures change over time, hunting super novae to measure how the universe is expanding, and measuring weak gravitational lensing which tracks how the gravity of invisible dark matter warps the light of distant galaxies.

Roman is expected to locate up to 100,000 new exoplanets or more by monitoring millons of stars, using a process called gravitational microlensing which enables Roman to find even the smallest of planets around an observable star and will watch for any star tranists or dimming of stars which occurs when a planet blocks a fraction of light a star emits.

And as with all NASA missions, there is a tech demo planned. A new instrument, the Chronograph will act as a deep space “umbrella” of sorts, blocking the light of a star so that a planet that might be on orbit can be observed and recorded.

Our Kennedy Space Center chief correspondent Mark Ratterman was on site to document the launch day minus one activity and launch day itself that brought us the sound of five million pounds of thrust from the 27 Merlin engines of the SpaceX Falcon Heavy launch vehicle. Mark also interviewed Jeff Hanke, President of Space Systems and Mission Systems and Wendy Minotti, Program Manager, Exquisite Imaging, Space and Imaging Systems at L3-Harris, a critical member of the Roman Telescope team about their role in preparing the telescope’s mirror.

Roman carries the names of 1,350,144 people on a commemorative placard on board the spacecraft. If you missed your opportunity to get your name on the Nancy Grace Roman Telescope, you still have an opportunity to put your mark on the mission by adopting a pixel on Roman’s “First Light” image. Click here to go to the NASA page to reserve your pixel.

Use the following links to learn more about the Roman Telescope, Nancy Grace Roman the mother of the Hubble Space telescope and her legacy or current Roman Mission status.

Links to other resources and recorded events:

ROMAN L-1 Science Briefing (Video)

https://images.nasa.gov/details/KSC-20260829-VP-FMX01-0001-Roman_Space_Telescope_Science_Briefing-1080p-M26244

ROMAN L-1 Prelaunch News Conference (Video)

https://images.nasa.gov/details/KSC-20260829-VP-FMX02-0001-Roman_Space_Telescope_Prelaunch_News_Conference-1080p-M26243

Roman Postlaunch News Conference (Video)

https://images.nasa.gov/details/KSC-20260830-VP-FMX02-0001-Roman_Space_Telescope_Postlaunch_News_Conference_4K-M26245

NASA's ROMAN Blog

https://science.nasa.gov/blogs/roman/

NASA ROMAN Instrument Details

https://science.nasa.gov/mission/roman-space-telescope/roman-observatory/

Adopt a Pixel on the Roman First Light Image

https://science.nasa.gov/mission/roman-space-telescope/adopt-a-pixel/

About Nancy Grace Roman ( Via American Association of University Women )

https://www.aauw.org/resources/faces-of-aauw/nancy-grace-roman-the-life-and-legacy-of-a-nasa-star/

Team Members This Week:

Gene Mikulka, Mark Ratterman, Dr. Kat Robison, Heather Smith.

Hosts Gene Mikulka, Mark Ratterman, and Heather Smith review ISS crew transitions, wildfire threats to NASA's Deep Space Network, growing criticisms of the Artemis program architecture, and a 1960s navigation satellite still transmitting signals today on episode 1805 of Talking Space.

ISS Crew Rotations & Soyuz History

* Soyuz MS-28 Departure: The crew prepared to wrap up a 241-day stay aboard the International Space Station, with undocking scheduled for 3:03 AM and a landing in Kazakhstan at 6:25 AM.
 * Soyuz MS-29 Arrival: A fresh crew arrived following an 8-hour fast-track rendezvous, bringing NASA astronaut Dr. Anil Menon alongside Cosmonaut Anna Kikina and Commander Pyotr Dubrov.
 * Historic Visit: The launch marked the first visit by a NASA Administrator to the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan in eight years.
 * Soyuz Legacy: Continuously refined since its ill-fated 1967 debut, the Soyuz vehicle remains the longest-operating human-rated spacecraft design in spaceflight history.


Madrid Deep Space Network Wildfire

* Evacuation: Severe wildfires in Spain forced the emergency evacuation of the Madrid Deep Space Communications Complex (37 miles / 65 km west of Madrid) on July 24.
 * Damage Assessment: Onsite inspections on July 25 confirmed that fire damage was restricted to surrounding vegetation and pavement, leaving the primary antenna dishes and buildings structurally intact.
 * Redundant Operations: Spacecraft communications were seamlessly rerouted to sister stations in Goldstone, California, and Canberra, Australia, ensuring no loss of deep-space science data. See link to Deep Space Network Now for real time status.

Artemis Program Concerns & Starship Testing

* Bridenstine Criticisms: Former NASA Administrator Jim Bridenstine publicly warned that Artemis's complex architecture—potentially requiring up to 15 orbital refueling launches per mission—lacks Apollo's single-launch simplicity and risks long-term delays.
 * Lander & Suit Delays: The hosts highlighted that Artemis III lacks a flight-ready, flyable lunar lander and fully integrated spacesuits, creating bottlenecks for upcoming landing schedules.
 * Starship Test Flight: SpaceX’s Ship 40 achieved a successful soft splashdown and satellite payload deployment, though its Super Heavy booster experienced engine anomalies during the backburn phase.
 * Dismantled Oversight: Key advisory bodies like the NASA Advisory Council (NAC) and various science analysis groups have been defunded or disbanded, limiting independent technical feedback.


Transit 5B5 "Zombie" Satellite

* Mission Background: Launched on December 28, 1964, via a Thor-Able rocket from Vandenberg Air Force Base, Transit 5B5 provided pre-GPS Doppler navigation for U.S. Navy ballistic missile submarines.
 * Nuclear Power: Powered by a SNAP-3 Radioisotope Thermoelectric Generator (RTG) fueled by Plutonium-238, the microwave-sized satellite continues transmitting its navigation signal at 136.658 MHz after more than 60 years in polar orbit.

* 5B5 Links: See Space Daily for their article about 5B5 and SIGIDWIKI for audio samples of several 5B5 signals

Host: Gene Mikulka

Panelists/Editors: Mark Ratterman, Heather Smith

When the Russian crew on board the ISS decided to perform an unusual procedure on the station’s Zvezda module, it caused quite an agreeable break in the routine of the day on board the orbiting laboratory. The crew on the US segment entered an emergency evacuation posture aboard their Crew Dragon, but all returned to normal after a few hours. The team discusses what happened and why.

The astronauts for the Artemis III mission were introduced to the world at NASA’s Johnson Space Center in Houston, TX, with much fanfare and some controversy: No female astronauts were named to the crew. Was this just a normal crew rotation, or was politics at play? The panel looks at the points of contention and weighs in on the Artemis III mission itself.

NASA’s X59 Quesst aircraft, built by Lockheed Martin, is an incredible experiment aimed at reducing a sonic boom to a barely audible thump. If successful, the project has far-reaching implications for the future of civil aviation. Our Mark Ratterman reports on this unique aircraft's first flight tests and its implications.

SpaceX launched something its CEO, Elon Musk, said he would never do: turn SpaceX into a public company and, in the process, turn Musk into the world’s first trillionaire. Heather Smith has been watching this story for us for a while now and delivers some insight into what happens next.

On the heels of the SpaceX IPO, environmental groups in and around Cameron County, Texas, are fighting a plan by the US Fish and Wildlife Service to reallocate land inside the Lower Rio Grande Valley National Wildlife Refuge to SpaceX to support Starship Operations.

Want to send your name to the stars on board NASA's Nancy Grace Roman Telescope launching no earlier than August 30th? Use this NASA link to find out how!

Team Members for this Episode:

Gene Mikulka, Mark Ratterman and Heather Smith