Chris Kemp on Astra's Comeback, Rockets and Drones from Space

**Chris Kemp** (0:00)
But that's where it's headed, rockets, AI and drones. We'll actually take the drones, we'll put them in the rocket, and then we'll deliver them to the other side of the planet in 45 minutes, and they will reenter and they will conduct a mission.

**Ashlee Vance** (0:26)
All right, here we go, friends. It's Ashlee Vance with another episode of Core Memory. I always say they're special, and this one is extra special. I swear, if you've seen the movie we made, Wild, Wild Space on HBO, or read my book, God bless you, When the Heavens Went on sale, you will know our guest, Chris Kemp. He is the co-founder and CEO of the rocket maker, Astra Space. He's the star, if not one of the stars from the movie and the book, quite a larger than life character. People have some different views on Chris. He's always happy to get into all that. When you, if you watch the movie, you know that it left off with Astra in some quite challenging financial straits. The company was in peril. We didn't even know if Astra would be around, but it is, and we have news about what Astra is doing and where it's heading. Chris, as ever, was a fantastic sport and addressed all of my difficult and head-on questions. So, you've got to enjoy the show. As ever, our plans for world domination are not yet complete, so please go to your favorite podcast app and give us a likey thing or a review. And go to our YouTube channel, Core Memory. We have new episodes of our TV show, covered all kinds of science, technology, up. People seem to really love them. I think you'll love them too. And with that, oh, last note, Al Weston, previous podcast guest makes a special appearance at the start of this one. So, you'll see Al peek in or you'll hear Al peek in. And if you haven't heard that episode, you should 100% go check that out. So, with that, let's get to the show. Here's Chris Kemp. Chris Kemp, hello. How are you?

**Chris Kemp** (2:24)
Hey, Ashlee. How's it going? Good to see you again.

**Ashlee Vance** (2:26)
It's going well. Every time I see you, I'm reminded that we're almost the same age, but you look much better than I do. I don't know what happened to me or what happened to you.

**Chris Kemp** (2:40)
I can't give Brian credit either. This is all just me staying indoors working on rockets instead of being out in the sun, I think.

**Ashlee Vance** (2:47)
Whatever you've done, I chose wrong. Thank you so much for doing this. There's a lot of stuff I want to cover. I think some of this will be a little newsier than we do on the usual podcast. So we'll get to a couple news items here in a second. But I've had a question that I wanted to ask you, which is we made this movie together, we did a book.
The movie I think did very well on HBO, but I seem to get this crazy number of e-mails for people who see it on United. I had no idea that people watch as many movies on United as they do. Have you been walking the aisles on a United flight and run into anyone that knows you?

**Chris Kemp** (3:37)
I was saying, oh, look who just walked in, actually. Did you hear we hired Al Weston? I think he's the one who had the podcast.

**Ashlee Vance** (3:43)
Special guest, Al Weston.

**Chris Kemp** (3:45)
Special guest.

**Ashlee Vance** (3:46)
He's appearing in the background. Al Weston is episode 11, I think.
Good to see you, Ashlee.

**Chris Kemp** (3:56)
We're just bringing it all together here. Cheers. Well, yeah, I was actually coming back from New York, and the guy in the security line next to me said, are you the guy in the movie from my last flight? And I've literally seen it playing while on flights. So, I think that's a bigger platform than HBO, as far as I can tell.

**Ashlee Vance** (4:16)
It's pretty nuts.
I've been shocked. Every time I'm on a United flight, I walk down the aisle to see who's watching it. Has the experience, I mean, I'm in the movie but only as like a pundit. I mean, is it weird to be in a movie? What's the experience been like?

**Chris Kemp** (4:36)
I mean, I think the thing is you guys put together a really entertaining story for what might otherwise be something that is a pretty insider thing in the space industry. And I think the team and the director did a fantastic job of making that really entertaining. And part of that, of course, is cutting out all of the really boring stuff. And I definitely, there's a lot of parts about this that are boring. And those parts aren't in there. Only the most ridiculous things are in there. So I equate it to a fun house mirror where, you're seeing this very distorted version of me, where I think a lot of the things that I was throwing in there to be funny made it appear that that's how I am all the time. And I, I'm sorry to say, I'm not quite that entertaining all the time, but it was a really great, it was a great watch.