Astrobotic space museum planned for Pittsburgh
Share this post:
Museums are generally known as places where historic objects are stored and displayed. But a new museum dedicated exclusively to space is as much about the future as it is the past.
Space robotics company Astrobotic announced Tuesday it is opening the Moonshot Museum, which it says is Pennsylvania’s first museum focused entirely on space.
“There are a lot of museums in Pennsylvania that talk about space, including our neighbors at the Carnegie Science Center, Franklin Institute in Philadelphia and some others,” said Sam Moore, executive director of the Moonshot Museum. “But in terms of space being the sole, exclusive focus, we are pretty sure we’re the only one in the state.”
Astrobotic is a partner in the new museum, which is under construction and scheduled to open in summer 2022. It will be a nonprofit organization located inside Astrobotic’s North Side headquarters at 1016 N. Lincoln Ave., a few blocks north of Heinz Field.
The centerpiece of the museum is a “clean room” window, a viewing window that looks into the assembly area where genuine spacecrafts are being built and prepared for moon missions. The Astrobotic workers wear full body suits in this room, which serves as the primary workshop where lunar landers and rovers are assembled.
Organizers say the Moonshot Museum’s mission is to make outer space more accessible, particularly to young people, by inspiring a diverse audience to get involved with space exploration.
“I think space, in a lot people’s minds, is this far-off place that is hard to get to and not super relevant to their everyday lives,” Moore said. “What we really want to do is show people it’s easier than ever to get to space, and that the space economy is growing by leaps and bounds. It’s a $425 billion industry.
”We want to inspire people to find their place in the new space sector.”
Moore said digital and on-site educational workshops will simulate real space missions and create tech-career awareness and readiness in Western Pennsylvania.
“We really want to inspire as diverse an audience as possible to consider space as an opportunity,” Moore said. “When we open next summer (2022), the doors will be open to students, families, and visitors from all over to come in and look at how many opportunities there are to participate in space and then find their place in that.”
Moore added that the programs will inform people of all backgrounds interested in pursuing space careers across a variety of disciplines, ranging from science and engineering to medicine, business, law, and the arts and humanities.
John Thornton, Astrobotic CEO and chairman of the Moonshot Museum’s board of directors, said space is more than just rocket science.
“We want to provide the spark — that moment when an individual is inspired to pursue a space or tech career who may not have otherwise done so,” Thornton said.
Officials are still contemplating whether the museum will feature artifacts from historic missions like the Command Module Columbia from Apollo 11 that was displayed at the Senator John Heinz History Center in 2018.
“We’re still working through the final designs for the museum and the final content list,” Moore said. “You will be up close and behind the scenes of contemporary space work and have a lot of interactive opportunities. We’re also exploring how we feature historical artifacts. But we don’t have specifics yet.”
While Astrobotic is providing the museum with its space and utilities, other funders include the Richard King Mellon Foundation, which is putting up the seed money and covering the cost of startup operations for the Moonshot Museum.