Houston, we have a podcast. Welcome to the official podcast of the NASA Johnson Space Center,

episode 196, The Astronaut Schedulars. I'm Gary Jordan and I'll be your host today.

On this podcast we bring in the experts, scientists, engineers, astronauts all to let you know what's going on in the world of human spaceflight.

A few times on this podcast we've discussed astronaut training. Longtime listeners may know the basics. You have your training in

T38 jets. You have space walk training in the giant pool called the

neutral buoyancy laboratory. You have your systems training and space station

mock-ups at the Johnson Space Center,

Science Training, maintenance training, etc.

What we haven't really explored in depth yet

is the massive coordination it takes to get all the astronaut training

crammed in before their spaceflight, along with all

the personal items that go with such a busy schedule, and it is astounding.

We're talking the project management of everything from negotiating with the

international agencies to scheduling an astronaut's kids daycare

pickup and all of this for every astronaut and cosmonaut from partner agencies

is managed by a small team of five women at

NASA. Today we sit down with a few of those women to hear the lesser known but

critical role of what it takes to manage an astronaut schedule before their spaceflight.

Joining us is Alicia Robinson and Crystal Larson,

increment training integrators at NASA.

So let's get right into it. Mark.

It's not.

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