NASA Administrator Bill Nelson, Sen. Ben Cardin Visit Johns Hopkins APL

NASA Administrator Bill Nelson and Senator Ben Cardin of Maryland toured Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory (APL) today and received briefings on upcoming NASA missions and other space technologies in development at the Lab.

Following a meeting with APL Director Ralph Semmel and Space Exploration Sector Head Bobby Braun, Sen. Cardin, Mr. Nelson and NASA Associate Administrator for Science Nicky Fox met with Dragonfly mission principal investigator Elizabeth “Zibi” Turtle. She, along with her team, detailed elements about the innovative rotorcraft mission to the ocean world of Titan, including an engineering test drone and the “Titan Chamber,” which can simulate the atmospheric conditions of Saturn’s largest moon. The tour also featured a look at the Lunar Vertex Rover that is scheduled for delivery later this year.

Sen. Cardin and Mr. Nelson also had the chance to close the hatch on a thermal vacuum chamber as part of the Dragonfly mission’s testing program that the team was commencing today.