Episode 25: Rocket Science 3—Cubes in Space!
Assateague Voices
This month, Assateague Voices celebrates “NASA November,” with a three-part series on the RockOn and RockSat-C and -X education programs at NASA's Wallops Flight Facility. For the third and final episode we highlight Cubes in Space, a RockOn and RockSat partner, and the only global STEM program that gives middle and high school students the opportunity to fly experiments aboard NASA sounding rockets and balloons. I spoke with Amber Agee-DeHart, founder and director of Cubes in Space, on the eve of this year’s RockOn launch. She shared with us the extent of Cubes’s global outreach, the...
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Episode 24: Rocket Science 2—On a Mission for Good
Assateague Voices
This month, Assateague Voices celebrates NASA November, with a three-part series on the RockOn and RockSat-C and -X education programs at NASA's Wallops Flight Facility. These programs draw higher education students from around the country to Wallops every summer, to fly experiments of their own design aboard Wallops sounding rockets. In this episode, we talk with Jonathan Herberger, a double-major senior at Northern Nazarene University in Idaho. Together with his student team and faculty advisors, Jonathan is conducting Project Daedelus, which may one day make space safer and life better here...
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Episode 23: Rocket Science 1—Team Rocket (NASA's Version)
Assateague Voices
One of the most important missions undertaken by NASA’s Wallops Flight Facility is STEM engagement—delivering programs and resources that support education in science, technology, engineering, and math. And key to that mission are the RockSat and RockOn programs. These programs draw higher ed students from around the country to Wallops every summer to fly experiments of their own design into space on NASA Wallops Flight Facility sounding rockets. This month on Assateague Voices we celebrate “NASA November” with episodes focused on RockOn and RockSat-C and -X. We’ll talk with an Idaho...
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Episode 22: Pony Patrol Rides Again
Assateague Voices
If you’ve visited the Maryland side of Assateague Island over the last few years you’ve encountered the Pony Patrol. It’s the small, all-volunteer year-round force dedicated to keeping the island’s two dominant invasive species—wild horses and humans—safe from each other. This summer I spoke with two Pony Patrollers—Marcus Urioste, a retired nuclear submarine commander, and Rick Bocian, a retired Baltimore firefighter. We were joined by Liz Davis, then the national seashore’s Chief of Interpretation and head of the Pony Patrol. Our conversation ranged from best ways to get wild...
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Episode 21: Spawning Horseshoe Crabs!
Assateague Voices
In this episode, I speak with Carly Toulan of the Maryland Coastal Bays Program. Every spring, working with the Maryland Department of Natural Resources, she and her team of volunteers conduct a survey of spawning horseshoe crabs in Maryland's coastal bays. These surveys provide invaluable insights into not only horseshoe crabs but the environment around them. (They also rescue stranded spawning horseshoe crabs.) I met up with Carly at the Oceanic Motel in Ocean City, along the inlet and in the shadow of Trimper Rides. It was a surprisingly windy day, and even with a fitted windscreen my...
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Assateague Farewell
Assateague Voices
Today, August 31, 2023, marks Liz Davis's last day as Chief of Interpretation and Education for Assateague Island National Seashore. Liz is retiring from the National Park Service after a 32-year career, all of it spent on Assateague. Liz sat down with me recently and took a look back at a career that spans half the park's existence. We covered a lot of topics, from migrating birds to the pandemic, in a sometimes-emotional conversation that I'm sure barely scratched the surface of a lifetime of Assateague experiences.
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Episode 19: Mark 12
Assateague Voices
The little islands that dot the coastal bays around Assateague Island are among the world’s top spots for colonies of island-nesting birds. These include Black Skimmers — the birds that give Skimmer Island its name — as well various species of terns, from the Common to the Royal. Both Assateague Island and the adjoining Maryland coastal bays region are recognized by BirdLife International as globally Important Bird Areas. They’re two of more than seven hundred global IBAs in the United States. But erosion—from rapid sea level rise and increasingly stronger storms caused by climate...
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Episode 18: Snow Hill to Shelltown
Assateague Voices
Billy Weiland of Assateague Coastal Trust is a long-time friend of the podcast, and I’m happy to welcome him back for this third visit. We spoke in ACT’s spacious new offices, into which they had just moved. Even with unpacked boxes lining the walls it’s a very impressive space, and we can look forward to some awesome public events there in the future. In this episode, Billy updates us on a few new projects that ACT is undertaking, most importantly a three-year program to extensively monitor the Pocomoke River’s health. The results will help guide policy and practice to improve and...
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Episode 17: Meghan's Garden
Assateague Voices
Meghan Rhode, Assateague State Park's assistant manager, hadn't given much thought to pollinator habitats until she was put in charge of one. Since then, she and the habitat have blossomed. In this episode Meghan gives us a fascinating guided tour of the park's pollinator habitat, discusses COVID's impact on park operations, introduces us to a determined osprey, and much, much more. This is the third and final episode in our three-part series on Assateague State Park's shoreline resiliency and wetland enhancement project. You can hear Underwood & Associates's Chris Becraft in part one, our...
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The Biggest Little Program
Assateague Voices
In this episode we meet Sandi Smith, marketing and outreach coordinator for The Maryland Coastal Bays Program. MCBP celebrates 25 years of education, restoration, and collaboration this year, and Sandi Smith has been a key part of it for 14 of those years. She jokes that she came here on a surfing scholarship, but she has found much more here than the perfect wave. As she tells it, she found connection and community — two things often cited by people who have found a home here. She’s also made tremendous contributions to Maryland Coastal Bay’s mission. In this episode, Sandi...
info_outlineThis week, Chris & Brady of the Maryland Conservation Corps. share some surprising information about Assateague Island’s legendary wild horses. Are they ponies or horses? The answer to this burning question and more! Episode 5, “Wild Horses.” Let’s go!