From Dot-Com to Capcom: “Huntsville, We’re on a Mission”

[WesL]

From Dot-Com to Capcom: “Huntsville, We’re on a Mission”

March 11, 2003 -- If Space Camp® is a household name in many parts of the world, then Corporate Space Camp® could be one of the nation’s best-kept secrets. Patterned after the famous U.S. Space Camp® program, where kids of all ages spend a week training like an astronaut, and located in the city that gave birth to the nation’s space program, Corporate Space Camp transforms CEO’s into shuttle commanders and vice-presidents into mission specialists.

During the first week in March, many of the nation’s top guns in the e-commerce industry took a break from the boardroom to try their hand at building and launching rockets, plus flying simulated space shuttle missions.

The list of attendees reads like a who’s who list of the most successful in the world of “e”. They include Sergey Brin and Larry Page, co-founders of Google; James Joaquin, CEO of Kodak’s Ofoto; Megan Smith, CEO of PlanetOut; and Elon Musk and wife Justine, Chairman and CEO of X.Com; GuruNet CEO Eric Tilenius, co-founder of ExciteAtHome Joe Kraus; and Steve Jarrett, founder of Steve Jarrett Mobile Computing, and others.

“When we got here, most of us didn’t know each other,” according to Elon Musk. “What am I taking home from this experience? A lot of new friends,” he adds.

"This exceptional group of industry leaders are forward-thinking, space and technology enthusiasts, and entrepreneurs in this high-tech world, according to Corporate Space Camp Program Director Michele Leahy. "To have them here for a full week, taking them away from their busy schedules, immersing them in simulated astronaut training has been quite a treat. They learned about each other and the space program and we learned from their ideas and innovative philosophies".

Megan J. Smith, has a mechanical engineering degree from MIT and was part of a team that designed an engineering construction experiment that flew on the space shuttle. She says participating in a school science fair proved to be the turning point in her life.

“I don’t think you can ignite the sort of passion in kids for science and engineering unless you give them a hands-on experience with the knowledge, and that’s what you do so well here at Space Camp” Smith says.

After flying 3 simulated shuttle missions, their land survival training, SCUBA training and working in the Underwater Astronaut Trainer, building and launching their own model rockets, surviving the centrifuge and flying the F/A-18 Hornet fighter jet simulators at Aviation Challenge®, their experiences at Space Camp could only be described as hands-on.

“We’re in a software world, and to come out of that and see the scale of the hardware that everybody works with is really something,” says Joe Kraus. “There’s something amazing about large scale hardware that people who deal with computer code all day, like ourselves, you don’t appreciate it until you get around it. This is amazing, it’s been a blast.”

[sts205cdr]

Is corporate camp still the only program using Intrepid?

--John

[Vincent]

That's quite a distinguished list of names there!

...Intrepid is used most by Corporate Camp, but does get used by a few other programs (Educator, Parent/Child, et. al., I think) when things get very busy and the other sims are in use.

[Boomerang]

Your right that is an impressive list of names. Can anyone tell me what programs use what sims now? i know ASA uses Enterprise but i remember someone saying Endeavour and Discovery were now going to be used for Deep Space missions does that mean Atlantis is now the only academy sim? And i thought someone had said Intrepid was used for camp now but i'm not sure of that.

[stargazer0105]

When I was at ASA we used Atlantis for our 3 1-hour missions b/c an educator camp was using Enterprise for their missions.

[Boomerang]

Well from what i've seen in pictures and first hand experiance Atlantis always seemed to be a more complete cockpit that enterprise anyway.