Will Pomerantz

@pomerantz.bsky.social

1276 Followers 1688 Following

Head of Space at AeroVironment - my team makes Mars helicopters. Co-Founder, Brooke Owens Fellowship and Patti Grace Fellowship. Former planetary scientist. Husband, Dad, and Den Leader

A photograph of Blue Origin‘s new Glenn rocket launching on second ever mission, this time carrying the escapade spacecraft for NASA. Photo credit Blue Origin.
A Patti Grace Smith Fellow poses with three of his mentors: the former head of the James Webb Space Telescope program, an astronaut who ran NASA for many years, and an astronaut who co-founded the Patti Grace Smith Fellowship.
A Patti Grace Smith Fellow smiles and poses in front a mural at her university that reads: "To most people, the sky is the limit. To those who love aviation, the sky is home."
Patti Grace Smith, then the head of the FAA's Office of Commercial Space Transportation, awards the first ever set of private astronaut wings to Mike Melvill, the pilot of SpaceShipOne.
Promotional flyer for the Patti Grace smith Fellowship, which is currently accepting applications for its Class of 2026. The flyer includes many images of past Fellows, a QR code pointing to pgsfellowship.org/apply, and the following text. "Space is an Attitude" - Patti Grace Smith An Award-winning, not-for-profit education program providing internships, mentorship, scholarships, and community for undergraduates seeking aerospace careers. What Fellows Receive: * 1-on-1 Mentorship from Executives and Alumni * 2500 Cash Grant + Scholarship Opportunities * Growing Network + Community of over 170 Alumni * Paid Summer Internship at leading Aviation, Space, and Defense Companies Apply at www.pgsfellowship.org
Ed White floats in space on the first US Spacewalk. Photo taken June 3, 1965. White is tethered to his Gemini IV capsule; the capsule is out of frame, but the tether extends like an umbilical cord from the torso of White’s spacesuit. The Earth is a brilliant blue in the background of the bottom right corner of the image, contrasted with the black of space in the upper left and the his contrast lighting on the spacesuit, illuminated from the left hand side.
Me, in front of my poster at the Lunar and Planetary Science Conference. The poster is titled “Going Where No Rover Has Gone Before: Observing and Exploring Mars by Air”
Photographs of the 35 incredible undergraduates honored with a Patti Grace Smith Fellowship in 2025
The covers of all of the books I read in 2024. (Includes a mix of physical books, electronic books, and audiobooks). Owls and Other Fantasies The Creative Act: A Way of Being The Stench of Honolulu: A Tropical Adventure Life on Mars The Days of Afrekete Devolution: A Firsthand Account of the Rainier Sasquatch Massacre Kelly: More Than My Share of It All The Stardust Thief The Nickel Boys LastRock How to Avoid a Climate Disaster: The Solutions We Have and the Breakthroughs We Need I'll Never Get Out of This World Alive Upstream: Selected Essays Hidden Potential: The Science of Achieving Greater Things This Time Tomorrow Demon Copperhead Use of Weapons An Economist Gets Lunch: New Rules for Everyday Foodies Gallowglass The Eye of the World Airframe Transcendent Kingdom The Great Hunt New Spring The Dragon Reborn The Wake A Deadly Education The Shadow Rising The Last Graduate The Fires of Heaven The Golden Enclaves Stony the Road: Reconstruction, White Supremacy, and the Rise of Jim Red Mars James Lord of Chaos Throne Hunters 1 Crown of Swords Man's Search for Meaning Path of Daggers The Book Eaters Red Moon Rising: How America Will Beat China on the Final Frontier Winter's Heart Crossroads of Twilight Throne Hunters 2 Knife of Dreams Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow House of Leaves All We Can Save: Truth, Courage, and Solutions for the Climate Crisis Sharing Space: An Astronaut's Guide to Mission, Wonder, and Making Change Reentry: SpaceX, Elon Musk, and the Reusable Rockets that Launched a Second Space Age
A photograph of Firefly's Blue Ghost lunar lander, which is scheduled to launch as one of two commercially lunar missions aboard a Falcon 9 rocket not long after this post. Photo credit: Firefly Aerospace / NASA
A screenshot from the livestream of the 2025 Tournament of Roses Parade. The image shows the La Cañada Flintridge float, the winner of the annual Innovation Award. The float depicts offensive whole scene on Mars, complete with astronauts, aliens, a large Mars Rover, and a flying drone decorated to look like the Ingenuity Mars helicopter.
Another screenshot from Open Lunar Foundation's 2024 Annual Report. This one gives summaries and updates of three of Open Lunar's projects: the Breaking Ground Trust, the Lunar Policy Platform, and the Lunar Registry.
Screen shot of the opening pages of the Open Lunar Foundation 2024 report, containing too much text to reproduce here! The full document, including this two-page spread, can be found at: https://www.openlunar.org/annual-report-2025
AI-generated image meant just just give the vague impression of a bunch of helicopters exploring Mars after being delivered by a Starship
NASA's Mars Chopper concept, shown in a design software rendering, is a more capable proposed follow-on to the agency's Ingenuity Mars Helicopter, which arrived at the Red Planet in the belly of the Perseverance rover in February 2021. Chopper would be about the size of an SUV, with six rotors, each with six blades. It could be used to carry science payloads as large as 11 pounds (5 kilograms) distances of up to 1.9 miles (3 kilometers) each Martian day (or sol). Scientists could use Chopper to study large swaths of terrain in detail, quickly – including areas where rovers cannot safely travel. Chopper remains in early conceptual and design stages. The proposed design is the product of collaboration between NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Southern California, the agency's Ames Research Center in California's Silicon Valley, and AeroVironment Inc.
A screenshot of a e-poster presented at the 2024 American Geophysical Union conference. The poster is titled "Aerial Science on Mars: Capabilities of Future Mars Helicopters." The poster is available online at https://agu24.ipostersessions.com/Default.aspx?s=54-88-62-58-56-97-C3-34-63-FE-30-C5-B8-84-43-D8
This graphic, created by NASA/JPL – Caltech, depicts the most likely scenario for the hard landing of the Ingenuity Mars helicopter during its 72nd and final flight on January 18, 2024. According to an accident investigation conducted by JPL and Ingenuity co-designer Aerovironment, high horizontal velocities at touchdown likely resulted in a hard impact on a sand ripple, which caused Ingenuity to pitch and roll, damaging its rotor blades.
Alvin Drew, co-founder of the Patti Grace Smith Fellowship and former NASA Astronaut, on a spacewalk during one of his flights
Emily Calandrelli – the aerospace engineer/children’s author/Science communicator/former Brooke Owens Fellowship executive – waves with a joyful expression as she steps out of the capsule that she just flew to space.
“I voted” sticker selfie. Wearing my Patti Grace Smith Fellowship and Brooke Owens Fellowship swag, standing in front of pictures of a few spacecraft I’ve worked on.
An illustration of Patti Grace Smith, created by the wonderful folks at Supercluster. The illustration shows Patti in front of several sketches of SpaceShipOne (the world's first privately operated human-rated spacecraft, which Patti's office licensed to fly) with one of Patti's many titles (Chief of Staff at the Office of Commercial Space Transportation)
A text based poster promoting the Patti Grace Smith Fellowship’s résumé writing workshop, taking place on Wednesday, September 25, at 8 PM Eastern
Photos a biographical information about Patti Grace Smith, the namesake of the PGS Fellowship. Born in Tuskegee, Alabama in 1947 Integrated the public school system. She and her sister were plaintiffs in Lee vs. Macon, which found discrimination against Black students in gifted and talented education, and which remains relevant well into the 21st century Associate Administrator of the FAA’s Office of Commercial Space Transportation Oversaw creation of the commercial space licensing regime now used and emulated around the world Patti “helped lay the foundations for a new era in American spaceflight. We are closer to becoming a multi-planet species because of her efforts.” - Elon Musk
A table showing some of the key traits of program similar to the Patti Grace Smith Fellowship. Check out these sites for more brookeowensfellowship.org zedfactorfellowship.org zenithpathways.ca sallyridefellowship.org swf2030.org/national-space-interns/
A slide showing what students must submit to apply for the Patti Grace Smith Fellowship. In summary, students must submit. a resume, a transcript, two letters of recommendation, a written essay, and a multimedia essay. More details available at pgsfellowship.org/apply
A slide listing some of the key accomplishments of the Patti Grace Smith Fellowship thus far. 141 Fellows, coming from 68 colleges and universities across the USA. $390,000 in scholarship paid out. 65% of Fellows are in early undergrad (community college, freshman year, or sophomore year) when selected -- these are the years when so many students fall off the trajectory of seeking aerospace jobs. 90% of our alumni are still in aerospace or a closely related field (e.g. robotics). We were honored with a prestigious Space News award in 2021.
Portraits of four Patti Grace Smith Fellows from the class of 2024, along with a list of the eligibility requirements for the PGS Fellowship: Black or African-American students In a Bachelors or Associates program (any year, any major) US Citizens, US Nationals, US Permanent Residents, and lawfully admitted refugees and asylum seekers able to work in the US Seeking their first ever paid summer internship in aerospace As the slide notes, Patti Grace Smith Fellows are selected through a three-phase selection process that includes multiple interviews.
A chart laying out why the Patti Grace Smith Fellowship is needed. It contains text and a chart. The chart shows that African-Americans make up 15% of Higher-Education students, but only 6% of Aerospace workers, and only 3% of Aerospace Executives. The text of the slide reads: Inherent aerospace interest and talent are not unique to any one demographic. While the concept of race itself may have little or no scientific validity, discrimination based on race is undeniable. Systemic discrimination in recruiting, selection, training, promotion, and recognition is still prevalent in aerospace. Abundant talent pools have gone untapped by the aerospace community. Many students who could succeed in aerospace choose different careers instead because the aerospace has not sufficiently addressed its pattern of discrimination. Many students depart the field early in their college experience due to the lack of role models, lack of access to professional mentors, and the lack of ...
An image containing the goals of the Patti Grace Smith Fellowship: Provide a meaningful, effective pathway into successful aerospace careers and future aerospace industry leadership to people whose race and ethnicity has made them the subject of systemic bias. Counter-attack many of the leading factors contributing to systemic underrepresentation of Black professionals in aerospace: too few job offers, too low wages, too few industry peers, and too little executive representation. Drive meaningful improvement to the aerospace industry itself in terms of how it acknowledges and addresses matters of racial and ethnic equality and inclusion.
A slide showing images of several past Patti Grace Smith Fellows at work. The images have very brief captions: "Test Rockets. Design lunar landers. Fly airplanes. Analyze prop systems. Work in security ops. Write software. Manufacture hardware. Develop optics. Educate the public. Perform hardware tests. And more!"
A slide laying out what Patti Grace Smith Fellows receive. It contains six points, each illustrated with a photo a Patti Grace Smith Fellow participating in that sort of activity. Text: Paid summer internships at one of the world’s leading aerospace companies – specifically matched to the Fellow’s skills and career interests Dedicated mentors who devote two hours per month to guide and advise their Fellow $2,500 scholarships that can be used for tuition, text books, computers, professional attire, or other educational or professional needs Connections and inspiration from the leaders shaping the national aerospace industry of today Lifelong support and community from our growing community of Black aerospace professionals and allies Career-altering opportunities available to our alumni, including parabolic flights, speaking roles at conferences, and more pgsfellowship.org
Brooke Owens performing an original spoken word piece at Busboys and Poets in Washington, DC. Photo from Brooke's personal collection.
Brooke Owens, the namesake of the Brooke Owens Fellowship, and colleagues work in the Mission Control for the XPRIZE Cup, a first-of-its-kind air and space show held in southern New Mexico in the mid-to-late 00's. Photo from my personal collection.
Brooke Owens, the namesake of the Brooke Owens Fellowship, floats in microgravity aboard Zero Gravity Corp's parabolic flights. Brooke worked as a coach on these flights, helping others enjoy the experience and to conduct experiments safely. Photo credit to Zero Gravity Corp
Brooke Owens, the namesake of the Brooke Owens Fellowship, scaling a bit of architecture in Copenhagen, with a bit of a personal assist from yours truly. Photo from my personal collection.
Brooke Owens pops her head out of the window of a full scale replica of SpaceShipOne. While working at X PRIZE Foundation, Brooke led a program that built several full scale replicas of the historic spacecraft, using the original tooling.
Brooke Owens, the namesake for the Brooke Owens Fellowship, works at a laptop in a candid photo taken in 2006.
Image of text from a page in Mary Oliver’s “Upstream.” It reads: How wonderful that the universe is beautiful in so many places and in so many ways. But also the universe is brisk and businesslike, and no doubt does not give its delicate landscapes or its thunderous displays of power, and perhaps perception, too, for our sakes or our improvement. Nevertheless, its intonations are our best tonics, if we would take them. For the universe is full of radiant suggestion. For whatever reason, the heart cannot separate the world's appearance and actions from morality and valor, and the power of every idea is intensified, if not actually created, by its expression in substance. Over and over in the butterfly we see the idea of transcendence. In the forest we see not the inert but the aspiring. In water that departs forever and forever returns, we experience eternity.
A photograph of AJ Bekoe, a Patti Grace Smith Fellow in the Class of 2022 and now the newest member of the Patti Grace Smith Fellowship Executive Board.
A photo collage of the twenty-nine students who were selected as Patti Grace Smith Fellows in the Class of 2024
A photograph of Diana Trujillo’s “Somos Flight” mission patch being displayed on the main screen of Mission Control at NASA’s Johnson Space Center. The patch is the shape of an emerald, one of the national symbols of her native Colombia. The color of the rim of the patch evokes the red planet, Mars. The center is the black of space. The rim of three patch has five icons and two Morse Code phrases. On the left hand side are icons representing three Mars missions Diana worked on: Curiosity (top), Perseverance (middle), and Ingenuity (bottom). From top to bottom, the Morse code in the left hand side reads “Juntos en la búsqueda” (together in the search)—since a big part of the purpose of those three missions was the search for life. On the right hand side, the icons represent the International Space Station (bottom) and the Artemis program (top). The Morse code reads “dare mighty things.” In the center of the patch, semicircles represent Earth, the Moon, and Mars.
In a photograph taken on the floor of Mission Control at NASA's Johnson Space Center, Diana Trujillo smiles while speaking on the telephone. She stands at the desk labelled "Flight Director". In the background, screens show live views and telemetry from the International Space Station, as well as Diana's "Somos Flight" mission patch. The photograph was taken on February 2, 2024, immediately after the conclusion of Diana's "pinning ceremony," marking the moment when she completed her training and officially became the 108th Flight Director in NASA history. Her mission patch is in the shape of an emerald. At the center, a star leaves a trail composed of the colors of the USA and Colombian flags that shoots past representations of the Earth, the Moon, and Mars. Around the perimeter of the patch, it says her callsign ("Somos Flight") and has icons representing Diana's past and present space missions: Mars Curiosity, Perseverance, Ingenuity, the International Space Station, and Artemis.
ULA’s Vulcan rocket stands at its launch pad, about four hours before its first launch attempt. The rocket is while with a bright red design on it, and with a large American flag and company logos on the rocket’s interstate and payload fairing. The rocket is lit from below, and the photo is taken at and upwards angle showing the nighttime Florida sky. Photo Credit: ULA
The covers of the books I read in 2023, in chronological order. The books were: In the Dream House by Carmen Maria Machado Corrections in Ink: A Memoir by Keri Blakinger Old Man's War by John Scalzi Collected Fictions by Jorge Luis Borges Remarkably Bright Creatures by Shelby Van Pelt The Diamond Eye by Kate Quinn How Far the Light Reaches by Sabrina Imbler David Copperfield by Charles Dickens Other Birds by Sarah Addison Allen Cryptonomicon by Neal Stephenson Liberation Day by George Saunders Nature's Fortune: How Business and Society Thrive by Investing in Nature by Mark R Tercekand Jonathan S Adams Face-Time by Erik Tarloff Napoleon of Notting Hill by G. K. Chesterton And Then There Were None by Agatha Christie Bastion by Phil Tucker The Terraformers by Annalee Newitz Rascor Plains by Phil Tucker There Is Nothing For You Here: Finding Opportunity in the Twenty-First Century by Fiona Hill The Call of the Wild by Jack London Kaikeyi by Vaishnavi Patel Endless Endless: A Lo-Fi Hist
The "Phase Three" prototype of the Mars Ingenuity Helicopter, on display under the tail of the Space Shuttle Discovery at the Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum's Udvar-Hazy Center. Fully built by AeroVironment under contract to NASA JPL, this prototype was the first vehicle to ever achieved controlled flight in Mars atmospheric conditions -- a critical step on the path to mission success. As of the time this prototype was inducted into the Smithsonian, its 'ancestor' Ingenuity had achieved 67 successful powered flights on Mars.
Screenshot of a tweet from Dr. Laurie Leshin, the Director of JPL. It includes a photo of Dr. Leshin and several JPL and AeroVironment colleagues smiling at a long table during a happy hour that followed the conclusion of the Preliminary Design Review for the Mars Sample Retrieval Helicopters. The text Dr. Leshin included in the tweet reads: “Daring Mighty Things Together starts with amazing teams, adds in creativity, hard work, and overcoming obstacles along the way. The MSR Sample Retrieval Helicopter team passed their PDR today — they exemplify the very best of @NASAJPL — so great to celebrate them tonight!”
A photograph of Dr. Gerald “Jerry” Soffen, from the NASA Archives (via Wikipedia). Soffen is wearing a black or dark gray suit with a white shirt and a red tie. He is seen in side profile, and appears to be speaking. He has a provinces goatee beard, and his hair is pulled back and streaked with gray.
Researchers Alan Stern and Kellie Gerardy smile in front of the vehicle scheduled to take them to space later today. This will be the first spaceflight for each of them. Each will be working to conduct novel scientific experiments over the course of their suborbital spaceflight. Each astronaut where is a big smile that shows their excitement for this opportunity, which comes as a result of years of preparation and dedication. They wear black suits with a thin, purple stripe, and have one arm around each other, with the other arm extended. They are standing inside of the hangar at Spaceport America in New Mexico.
A color photo taken by the Ingenuity Mars Helicopter shows the Red Planet's surface during it 64th flight. Toward the far end of the image is the horizon, where some small hills are shown and the Martian sky. In the foreground, with a light vignette effect, is the beige-colored Martian surface. Toward the far left, in a very small part, is the silver footpad of the helicopter. Ingenuity, the first vehicle every to really fly on another world, was designed and built by NASA JPL and AeroVironment
NASA graphic showing future helicopters — the Sample Recovery Helicopter currently in active development in the foreground, and a larger Mars Science Helicopter in the background
Image of Sojourner, the first rover on Mars.
GIF of the initial deployment of Ingenuity from below the belly of the Perseverance rover.
Black and white photo of Ingenuity’s shadow on the Martian surface, taken from a downward facing camera mid-flight. NASA’s Ingenuity Mars Helicopter took this shot while hovering over the Martian surface on April 19, 2021, during the first instance of powered, controlled flight on another planet. It used its navigation camera, which autonomously tracks the ground during flight.
NASA’s Ingenuity Mars Helicopter achieves powered, controlled flight for the first time on another planet, hovering for several seconds before touching back down on April 19, 2021. The image was taken by the left Navigation Camera, or Navcam, aboard the agency’s Perseverance Mars rover from a distance of 210 feet (64 meters). The Ingenuity Mars Helicopter was co-designed and co-built by AeroVironment and JPL. It is supported by NASA’s Science Mission Directorate, Aeronautics Research Mission Directorate, and Space Technology Mission Directorate. NASA’s Ames Research Center and Langley Research Center provided significant flight performance analysis and technical assistance during Ingenuity’s development.
Graphic showing the logos of the Brooke Owens and Patti Grace Smith Fellowships, over an image of a recent rocket launch. The text on the image reads: "Internships. Mentorship. Community. Everything you need to start your aerospace career." It also lists the deadlines to apply to join each program's Class of 2024 (Oct 8th for Brooke Owens, Oct 15th for Patti Grace Smith), and provides the URL https://aerospacefellowships.smapply.us Graphic design is my passion, clearly. In other words, this is not a super attractive poster but hey, I tried!
Group photo taken at the end of the 2023 Patti Grace Smith Fellowship Summit. The photo includes most of the members of the Class of 2023, as well as all of the current members of the Fellowship's volunteer Executive Team.
Former NASA Administrator and astronaut Maj. Gen. Charlie Bolden talks with 2022 Patti Grace Smith Fellow Chancellor Charles-Halbert