Oklahoma Space Alliance

OKLAHOMA SPACE ALLIANCE

A Chapter of the National Space Society

Who We Are:

        Oklahoma Space Alliance is the central Oklahoma Chapter of the National Space Society, one of the largest space advocacy groups in the country, and has existed for more than 20 years. Our purposes include promoting the exploration and development of space, educating the public to current events in space and the usefulness of an active space program, all with the intent of promoting a space-faring civilization.
        Oklahoma Space Alliance hosted the 23^rd Annual International Space Development Conference on May 27-31, 2004. We previously hosted three Regional Space Development Conferences, assisted with earlier ISDCs, put displays in malls, hosted lectures, sponsored television interviews, hosted viewing nights, worked with other space-oriented groups and maintained local contact with the Oklahoma Space Industry Development Authority.
        Oklahoma Space Alliance helped out with the 2007 International Space Development Conference which was hosted by the National Space Society of North Texas in Dallas Texas from May 24 - 28, 2007, and put together a commemorative exhibit for the 40th anniversary of Apollo 11. This exhibit ran through July of 2009. (See below for details.)
        We do a bimonthly newsletter called Outreach and a monthly e-mail newsletterUpdate to keep our members informed of current developments in space and upcoming events they might be interested in. Editor of Outreach is Syd Henderson and editor of Update is David Sheely. David also does an Update most months when Outreach is published.

Oklahoma Space Alliance is now on Facebook at Oklahoma Space Alliance

May 2025 Update (pdf format) (Information to be presented at May meeting)

May 2025 Outreach (pdf format)

Space Priorities (pdf format)

May Meeting

Oklahoma Space Alliance will meet at 2:00 p.m. on Saturday, May 10, at the location next to Norman Computers on West Main in Norman. Prospective members are welcome.
The meeting room is in the Cyber Hall and Gaming Lounge next to Norman Computers. Please enter through the Cyber Hall door. The Cyber Hall is at 914 W Main St, opposite Norman High School. The phone number is (405) 292-9501. To get to the meeting space from points north, take Highway 77 exit off I-35, and continue south until you reach Main Street. Norman Computers is about a block and a half west of this on the south (left) side of a small mall.

Saturday, May 10, 2:00 p.m. (tentative)

Introductions and review of Space events this past month
What’s Happening in Space, News, Pictures, and Videos approximately one hour. See http://osa.nss.org before the meeting for items to be discussed.
Break
Oklahoma Space Alliance Chapter Business Discussion

Review OSA treasurer’s report.
Minutes of March and April Meetings
Proposed NASA Budget
Posters
Membership Business

Video (to be announced)
Chat

Minutes of April 12 Oklahoma Space Alliance Meeting

        Oklahoma Space Alliance met April 12, 2024, at the Cyber Hall and Gaming Lounge at Norman Computers in Norman, Oklahoma. Attending in person were Clifford McMurray, Adam Hemphill, Tom Koszoru, Tim Scott, Dave Sheely, and Syd Henderson. OSA President Clifford McMurray presided over the meeting. Clifford did an Update discussing links to material covered in the meeting and this is online at https://osa.nss.org/Update2504.pdf, so I’ll cover the details that aren’t covered there.
        Tom Koszoru renewed his membership.
        SpaceX recoveries will now be done on the West Coast.
        All the astronauts aboard the Polaris Dawn mission were non-American. Seventeen days between SpaceX manned launches is a new record.
        Andøya is actually the name of a spaceport and company. Their spacecraft is Spectrum.
        Blue Ghost lasted for five hours after lunar sunset (and a full lunar daytime -- 14 Earth days -- in sunlight).
        CLPS will end in 2028, so what will be CLPS-2. [CLPS=Commercial Lunar Payload Services.]
        OSIDA [Oklahoma Space Industrial Development Authority] has finally signed a contract with a commercial space company to come to Oklahoma. They will start operations in two years.
        The turnaround for the three-in-twenty-three-days launches would have been seven days for two of them if not for bad weather.
        Space Thermal Power can provide thrust for longer.
        HR8799 planets have carbon dioxide in their atmospheres. Light blocker (to hide the star) allowed us to see the colors of the planets.
        51 Eridani showed one planet which is red.
        We looked at a Space News chart on China’s military capabilities in space.
        ULA wants to do twelve launches this year.
        Space Force wants an “aircraft carrier” [spacecraft carrier?] in space, so made contracts with Gravitics.
        Fran2 was the first spacecraft to go farther north than 65° N and farther south than 65° S while orbiting Earth, passing the Arctic and Antarctic Circles while doing so. We watched a video of Earth’s south polar regions as taken from Fram. (The North Pole was still in night.) We watched an interview with the Fran2 astronauts which followed the mission.
        We watched a video of dolphins swimming around the Crew 9 return capsule and its retrieval by recovery ship.

--Minutes by OSA Secretary Syd Henderson

Outreach & Update

Outreach and Update are the newsletters of Oklahoma Space Alliance. Outreach is published in odd-numbered months and is sent both by post and by e-mail.Update is published in even-number months and is sent by e-mail. The December Update is often replaced by a meeting announcement election ballot, in which case the November minutes will be published in the January Outreach. You must be a member of Oklahoma Space Alliance to receive Outreach by post unless you are on our courtesy list. To receive newsletters by e-mail, contact Syd Henderson at the address at the bottom of the page. The newsletters listed below are slightly edited to turn them into web pages.
Outreach is edited by Syd Henderson, and Update by Clifford McMurray (except the June 2024 was by Adam Hemphill)

--Minutes By OSA Secretary Syd Henderson

May 2025 Update (pdf format) (Information to be presented at May meeting)

May 2025 Outreach (pdf format)

Contact person for Oklahoma Space Alliance is Clifford McMurray
PO Box 1003
Norman, OK 73070
Webmaster is Syd Henderson.
Copyright 2025 Oklahoma Space Alliance.