The new NASA Administrator, Charles Bolden showed a passionate side in his radio interview with Patt Morrison today.

He gets teary-eyes about the retirement of the Space Shuttle but then turns his eyes toward the future. Bolden, a retired U.S. Marine Corps major general, is a former astronaut who flew on 4 shuttle missions. But despite his feelings, Bolden seems content with the notion that it is time to retire the shuttle and move on by limiting NASA’s role in Earth-orbit launch operations. Which must happen by default anyway, since NASA has no shuttle successor anywhere near the launchpad at this time.

Taking a big step, Bolden conceded that future NASA astronauts will be flying on spacecraft mostly developed and built by private firms.

You can listen to the interview below:

To download the entire audio file, click on Download.

Reinhard Kargl

Journalist and media professional currently based in Los Angeles, California. Focusing on science and technology.