#185 Scott "Kidd" Poteet - SpaceX Polaris Dawn Astronaut on Spacewalk, Moon Landing and Mars

Summary

Shawn Ryan Show – Episode #185: Scott "Kidd" Poteet on SpaceX Polaris Dawn Astronaut, Spacewalk, Moon Landing, and Mars

Release Date: March 24, 2025

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1. Introduction

In Episode #185 of the Shawn Ryan Show, host Shawn Ryan welcomes Scott Poteet, a retired U.S. Air Force Lieutenant Colonel, former F16 pilot, and astronaut involved in pioneering space missions. Scott shares his extensive experience in both military aviation and cutting-edge space exploration programs, offering listeners an in-depth look into his remarkable journey from combat missions to orbiting the Earth.

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2. Early Life and Military Career

Sean Ryan (00:34): “Scott Poteet, welcome to the show.”

Scott Poteet (00:37): “Thanks for having me. This is, this is quite an experience. So thank you.”

Born in Chattanooga, Tennessee, and raised in New Hampshire, Scott earned a bachelor's degree in Outdoor Education from the University of New Hampshire. His competitive nature led him to a distinguished career in the U.S. Air Force, where he logged over 3,200 flight hours in aircraft such as F16s, A4s, and T38s. Scott's commitment saw him supporting various combat operations, including Northern Watch, Southern Watch, Joint Guardian, Freedom Sentinel, and Resolute Support.

He commanded the 64th Aggressor Squadron, graduated from the elite USAF Weapons School (akin to Top Gun), and flew as the number four demonstration pilot with the Thunderbirds.

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3. Transition to the Civilian Sector

After retiring from the Air Force, Scott transitioned to the private sector, taking on roles such as Director of Business Development at Draken International and Vice President of Strategy at Shift4 Payments. His leadership skills and strategic insight facilitated his involvement in high-profile civilian space missions, bridging military precision with commercial innovation.

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4. Involvement in Space Missions

a. Inspiration4

Scott served as the Mission Director for Inspiration4, the world's first all-civilian spaceflight in 2021. This mission marked a significant milestone in democratizing access to space, setting the stage for future commercial endeavors.

b. Polaris Dawn

As the Mission Pilot for Polaris Dawn in 2024, Scott embarked on a SpaceX mission that propelled him nearly 900 miles above Earth—the farthest humans have traveled since the Apollo missions. Polaris Dawn included the first-ever commercial spacewalk and aimed to push the boundaries of human space exploration further than ever before.

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5. Discussing Space Exploration

a. Moon Landing and Future Missions

Scott and Shawn delve into the reasons behind the hiatus in moon landings since 1969. Scott attributes this to NASA's shift in focus towards low Earth orbit and the establishment of the International Space Station, which prioritized scientific research over lunar exploration. However, with the advent of commercial space companies like SpaceX rekindling ambitions to return to the moon and eventually reach Mars, Scott remains optimistic about the future of lunar missions.

Scott Poteet (05:24): “I think we just shifted our focus as a country. NASA had different priorities once we went to the moon, which I do believe we have.”

b. Commercial Space vs NASA

The conversation highlights the synergetic relationship between NASA and commercial space entities. Scott emphasizes that while NASA laid the foundational achievements in space exploration, commercial companies bring innovation and agility, enabling more ambitious projects.

Scott Poteet (10:53): “We’re standing on the shoulders of giants of what they've been able to accomplish. And moving forward, it is definitely a partnership.”

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6. Challenges and Innovations in Space Missions

a. Developing EVA Suits

One of the critical challenges discussed is the development of new Extravehicular Activity (EVA) suits for commercial spacewalks. Unlike NASA's multi-layered EMU suits, the Polaris Dawn mission required a more streamlined and cost-effective solution. Scott details the innovative approach taken to design a versatile suit capable of withstanding extreme temperatures and facilitating mobility during spacewalks.

Scott Poteet (203:12): “They came up with these new funky joints, certain bearings on all these joints to have mobility because you want it pliable when you’re not pressurized.”

b. Communication Technology with Starlink

Effective communication is paramount for long-duration space missions. Scott explains how integrating SpaceX’s Starlink technology ensures robust and low-latency communication between spacecraft and Earth, a vital component for missions targeting the moon and Mars.

Scott Poteet (217:19): “Starlink is the future of communication with it being laser based. Let’s see if we can get it to work from space for the very first time.”

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7. Personal Experiences and Family Life

Scott shares heartfelt anecdotes about meeting his wife, Kristen, during his first assignment in Korea, and the challenges they faced, including Kristen’s battle with cancer. Their journey underscores the importance of family support amidst the demands of military and space missions.

Scott Poteet (90:36): “She was absolutely beautiful. She's caring. She's fun. We just knew right off the bat.”

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8. Reflecting on Combat and Faith

The discussion takes a profound turn as Scott reflects on the emotional toll of combat missions and how his experiences shaped his faith. He touches on the moral dilemmas faced during missions, the burden of making life-and-death decisions, and how these experiences led him to find solace and guidance in his Christian faith.

Scott Poteet (140:34): “I'm trying to focus my life on making the decisions that put God first and that, you know, it's kind of why I want to speak more at this point in my life, is to share my stories and hopefully God can use me as a voice to get his message out.”

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9. Polaris Dawn Mission Details

Scott provides an inside look into the Polaris Dawn mission, detailing the rigorous training involved, the development of the EVA suits, and the mission's objectives. He describes the mission's altitude achievements, the first commercial spacewalk, and the integration of scientific experiments aimed at understanding the challenges of long-duration spaceflight.

Scott Poteet (190:22): “We took these dishes, we actually took some to the Ukraine in the beginning of the war to drop off. So St. Jude could set up their hospitals and have telecommunications or telemedicine capability with doctors back at Memphis.”

The mission not only set new records for altitude but also tested critical technologies like Starlink in space, enhancing global communication and supporting humanitarian efforts on Earth.

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10. Conclusion

The episode concludes with Scott expressing gratitude for the opportunity to share his experiences and insights. He emphasizes the importance of combining military discipline with commercial innovation to advance space exploration. Scott’s journey from the cockpit of an F16 to the vast expanse of space serves as an inspiring testament to human resilience and the relentless pursuit of knowledge.

Sean Ryan (257:34): “Scott, what a hell of a journey, man. That is a hell of a journey.”

Scott Poteet (263:07): “Thank you. Honor's mine, man. I just appreciate the opportunity. What you're doing is absolutely amazing and all the power to you.”

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Notable Quotes

• Sean Ryan (05:24): “We have not been back to the moon since 1969. Why haven't we gone back?”

• Scott Poteet (10:53): “We’re standing on the shoulders of giants of what they've been able to accomplish. And moving forward, it is definitely a partnership.”

• Scott Poteet (140:34): “I'm trying to focus my life on making the decisions that put God first... to share my stories and hopefully God can use me as a voice to get his message out.”

• Sean Ryan (257:34): “Scott, what a hell of a journey, man. That is a hell of a journey.”

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Final Thoughts

Scott Poteet's narrative weaves together themes of duty, innovation, personal struggle, and faith, providing listeners with a comprehensive understanding of what it takes to transition from a decorated military pilot to a trailblazing astronaut. His reflections offer valuable lessons on leadership, resilience, and the profound impact of exploring the unknown.

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Note: This summary excludes advertisements, sponsorship segments, and non-content sections to maintain focus on the substantive discussions between Shawn Ryan and Scott Poteet.

Transcript

[Scott Poteet]

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[Sean Ryan]

Scott Poteet, welcome to the show.

[Scott Poteet]

Thanks for having me. This is, this is quite a, quite an experience. So thank you.

[Sean Ryan]

Yeah, you know, we been looking forward to this. We met at inauguration and had a quick, I don't know, maybe 15 minute conversation there and I've always wanted to have an astronaut on the show. So, so yeah, thank you for coming.

[Scott Poteet]

Absolutely. There's only, there's only like 6, 6 or 7 or 650 astronauts have gone into space. So blessed to have that opportunity and just excited to talk about it.

[Sean Ryan]

Yeah, me too, me too. But so I want to do a life story on you and talk about your time in the Air Force, your childhood, get into space and then who knows what kind of rabbit holes we'll go down here. But yeah, like I said, thank you for coming and I'm looking forward to this. So everybody starts off with an introduction here. So Scott Kid Poteet, born in Chattanooga, Tennessee. You grew up in New Hampshire, earning a bachelor's in outdoor education from the University of New Hampshire before diving headfirst into the Air Force. You're a retired US Air Force lieutenant colonel with over 20 years service where you logged more than 3200 flight hours in aircraft like F16s, A4s and T38s. Over 400 of those hours were in combat supporting operations like Northern Watch, Southern Watch, Joint Guardian, Freedom's Sentinel and Resolute Support. You commanded the 64th aggressor squadron, graduated from the elite USAF weapons school, basically the Air Force's version of Top Gun, and even flew is the number four demonstration pilot with the Thunderbirds. You then went into the private sector, serving as Director of Business Development at Draken International and later as Vice President of strategic at Shift4 Payments. You are the mission director for Inspiration4, the world's first all civilian space flight in 2021. You also suited up as the mission pilot for Polaris dawn in 2024, a SpaceX mission that took you nearly 900 miles above Earth, the farthest humans have traveled since Apollo, and included the first ever commercial spacewalk. You're a triathlete who has completed, who has competed in 15 Ironman races, including four World Championships in Kona. Now you live in New Hampshire with your wife Kristen and your three children. And most importantly, out of everything we mentioned, you're a Christian.

[Scott Poteet]

Amen.

[Sean Ryan]

So welcome to the show once again. If you watch, you know, everybody gets a gift. Use these on your next Iron Man.

[Scott Poteet]

I will. I appreciate that.

[Sean Ryan]

Vigilance Elite Gummy Bears. I'll give you a couple more of those to take home. Yeah, those are hard to come by hand. They're made in the USA.

[Scott Poteet]

Still legal in all 50.

[Sean Ryan]

They're still legal. We haven't made any changes yet, but I don't think we're going to either. But then, so I have just one more thing before we really get. We get going here. So I have a Patreon account. Patreon is. It's a subscription online community. They have been with us here since the beginning when I was doing this in my attic when we couldn't get any advertisers any way to make money. And they were the ones that like, they're the ones that supported us, that got us everything from the cameras to the employees to moving into this to everything. And so one of the things I do in that community is I offer them the opportunity to ask each and every guest a question. And they had some good questions.

[Scott Poteet]

I know, it's the most nerve wracking question, I'm sure.

[Sean Ryan]

So this one's from me.

[Scott Poteet]

Oh, no. Is that legal?

[Sean Ryan]

I'm part of the community too, and so this one's for me.

[Scott Poteet]

Is that because no one asked a question?

[Sean Ryan]

Oh, no, no. The original question. I'll ask you two.

[Scott Poteet]

Okay.

[Sean Ryan]

But I'm gonna ask mine first because I've been dying to talk to an astronaut about this because we do dive into some conspiracies here, as you know. Did we go to the moon or what? I've been wanting to talk to an astronaut about this for. There it is. We have not been back to the moon since 1969. Why haven't we gone back?

[Scott Poteet]

Why? Oh, man, I think we just shifted our focus as a country. NASA had different priorities once we went to the moon, which I do believe we have.

[Sean Ryan]

You do think we did?

[Scott Poteet]

I do, I do. I don't know. I mean, I would imagine there would been a lot more leaks out there.

[Sean Ryan]

Yeah, I'm with you. I think about that. It's really hard to keep that big of a secret. Yeah, but why haven't we gone back? I mean, we don't just go anywhere and then like, yeah, fuck it, there's nothing here. I don't think we need to come back to the Boom. We walked on it for five minutes and we're out. There's nothing to see here. Like, really, give me a break.

[Scott Poteet]

It's not easy. There's a sequence of miracles that happen. I mean, think about the computer power of what they had back in the Apollo program. We have more in our iPhones these days. So it wasn't an easy task. And then once it was accomplished, in my opinion, the focus shift to low Earth orbit. You know, building a station accomplish the science and research that has been the focus for the last few decades. Amazing things have come out of that. You can do a lot more at zero gravity and with the science and research. And we experienced that on our mission with our 40 experiments that we had lined up. And that's just, you know, let's build out the station, let's explore low Earth orbit. And now that we've kind of made this new shift with opening up a new chapter in commercial space exploration, you know, allowing these companies and organizations to kind of go off on these new tangents and explore. We're not only going to address low Earth orbit over the next, you know, coming years, it's all about, okay, let's go back to the moon, to lunar surface and let's go to Mars. Because it's human nature to explore in Curiosity. And oh, by the way, we can benefit life on Earth. So bottom line, I think it's just a focus. And now that we kind of shift and let's do more because we can reusability and technology is improving, but it's a, it's a heavy lift. It's, it's not easy. Otherwise we would have, you know, knocked it out in a couple years. It's, we're still a couple years away.

[Sean Ryan]

Yeah. You know, I don't know what to think. It's just. What is that, 1969 to the.

[Scott Poteet]

What is that, 50, 51 at 73. So that's an extra. 4 is 55.

[Sean Ryan]

Yeah. Like 56 years. Yeah, 56 years we have not gone back. That's just odd to me. That's really odd. But whatever. So you think we did all right?

[Scott Poteet]

All right, all right.

[Sean Ryan]

When do you think we'll be back? Are we going back? Well, yeah, Elon wants to go to Mars.

[Scott Poteet]

We're the, the plan is two back to the lunar surface in two and Mars in four.

[Sean Ryan]

Back in two and two years.

[Scott Poteet]

Yep. I do think that's, you know, that's realistic. Like I said, there's a lot of things that need to be solved and NASA's doing amazing work to get us there with the partnerships and collaborations with SpaceX and other organizations. But we got to figure out how it's going to be done and done safely because it's like with our mission it was a no fail. Otherwise we're going to set back these programs years if something catastrophic happens.

[Sean Ryan]

Yeah.

[Scott Poteet]

And the public's not willing. You know, the risk we took back in the day, you know, the 50s and 60s was a lot more significant than we're willing to accept these days. And you know, we're kind of risk averse and it can be a positive and a negative, you know, to some extent because it can be paralysis through analysis. At some point we got to put up, shut up and go.

[Sean Ryan]

It seems like civilian space exploration is like really going, becoming a lot more advanced than NASA. It almost seems like it's, it's well beyond what NASA can do. Am I off on that? I mean isn't SpaceX going up to rescue the NASA guys that have been stuck in space for like eight months?

[Scott Poteet]

You're starting off with the tricky ones. It's a partnership for sure. NASA's, they do this for 11, they've been doing it for decades, 60 plus years, whatever it's been. And we typically always want to make sure that we never lose sight of these accomplishments. We're standing on the shoulders of giants of what they've been able to accomplish. And we, meaning commercial space collectively would not be where we're at without everything they've been able to accomplish. And moving forward, it is definitely a partnership.

[Sean Ryan]

Is it a one way partnership or is it a two way? I mean the government isn't great at sharing. I'm just, is it really.

[Scott Poteet]

I think it's two way. I mean just look at our program. We did the first commercial spacewalk to do that. SpaceX wanted to develop a brand new EVA suit, extravehicular activity, do a spacewalk. And that's never been done in over 40 years. NASA has the EMU suit that they currently use. SpaceX is going to figure it out on their own. So they took their baseline suit, the IVA suit, the one they currently wear to and from the space station in a very less than three years, two and a half year time span, took that suit and developed the, what we wore, which is more or less the prototype EVA suit. Now to do that on a very streamlined budget, not a, you know, a multi billion dollar program, you know, they, they monster garage this thing to develop a suit that is extremely viable and, and will be, you know, the, the baseline going forward. As far as what they're going to develop regarding a suit with humans bouncing on the, the surface of the moon and, and Mars in, in capacity, not a handful of suits like, like NASA has. This is, the concept is, you know, these starships are going to launch hundreds of passengers. You know, in Elon's vision he stated in the past three of these a day with full of passengers going either to the low Earth orbit, to a station, to the moon, to Mars. You know, it's sci fi but, but that's what we're accomplishing and that's what SpaceX is accomplishing and other organizations are accomplishing. Because I, you know, when I got involved with this program years ago, I didn't really understand the concept of boosters landing on their own, chopsticks catching boosters, reusability. I'm like, there's no way this is like, this is far fetched. But look at us. I mean tonight Test 8 is launching in starship and each time they launch they're learning new things. You know, it might not land successfully in the ocean, Indian Ocean, but it certainly well could. And they're going to catch the booster with the chopsticks. And this is just a next step to achieve that ultimate goal of multiple launches daily. Going to the moon, going to Mars.

[Sean Ryan]

Why do you think the, why do we want to bring hundreds of passengers into space?

[Scott Poteet]

Why not? I mean it depends on who you ask, on what you believe and justifying these significant projects and programs. But we certainly aren't good stewards of our planet. We haven't been. Whether you want to call this an insurance policy or you want to go down the curiosity route of let's explore because who knows what's out there and are those resources that we could capitalize on, the population issues, the climate issues, when is it going to make a turn for the worst? And asteroid, you know, they're talking about 2024, whatever asteroid name they have, it's supposed to, you know, a probability of 5, 6% and by 2032, don't quote me on these numbers, but that's catastrophic to certain parts of the, of the planet. So again, it's like if we have the opportunity and the resources and the intellectual to pursue some of these goals, why not?

[Sean Ryan]

Hey, I'm not against it, I'm just, I'm just, I'm just, I don't have anybody to talk to this stuff about that's been up there. So I think it's, it's just a fascinating subject. I mean we haven't, we haven't found any water or anything on Mars, have we? Or frozen. We found frozen water or anything on Mars?

[Scott Poteet]

I don't know. Yeah.

[Sean Ryan]

Yeah. I mean it's just, it's interesting. I mean how would we sustain there with no nothing? We don't know and we don't really know anything. Do we know anything? Want to help optimize your life? Bon Charge is a holistic wellness brand with a huge range of evidence based products designed to help you perform better and they've got your wellness covered. My wife tried their red light face mask and it has been a game changer. It's now part of her nightly routine and it could help you with reducing wrinkles and wound healing. Just use it 10 to 20 minutes a day while you're winding down. Their mask can help remove sleep disturbing Blue and Green Light offers both near infrared and red light in one device and has zero EMF radiation or flicker. Plus it's lightweight and comes with a one year warranty. Bon Charge ships worldwide and has incredible products like EMF protection gear and infrared sauna blankets. The there's a 12 month warranty on the red light therapy devices. Ready to feel better? Go to boncharge.com SRS and use code SRS to save 15%. That's B O N C-H-A-R-G-E.com SRS and use the coupon code SRS to save 15%. These statements and products have not been evaluated by the Food and Drug Administration. These products are not intended to diagnose, treat, cure or prevent any disease or condition. Part of the reason I do what I do is for my family. I want to leave them a better country than the one I was born into. I also want to make sure they are taken care of financially and that's why I make it a priority to help protect the money I've worked so hard to earn and save. And one of the ways I do that is by diversifying into gold and silver. Precious metals have been a store of value for thousands of years and they are known as a hedge against market risk and inflation. If you're interested in learning about how precious metals can help you, you should reach out to my partners at Gold Co. They're an amazing company. They support this show and I trust them. Right now they're offering a free gold and silver kit. All you have to do is go to SeanLikesGold.com you'll also learn about a special offer to get up to a 10% instant match and bonus silver for qualified orders so go to SeanLikesGold.com that's SeanLikesGold.com S H A W N likesGold.com make sure you do everything in your power to help protect what's yours. Got a couple of robots running around there, but I mean just landed on.

[Scott Poteet]

The moon with another robot company. So they're trying, I mean it's all about exploration. We did it decades ago with exploring countries and across oceans. So yeah, too much far off that.

[Sean Ryan]

Have we found anything significant that would help sustain human life on the moon or Mars that you're aware of?

[Scott Poteet]

Not that I'm aware of. I mean it's going to rely upon innovative technologies to figure out how we, you know, because it can't be a one in my opinion. This can't be a one way mission to Mars.

[Sean Ryan]

Yeah.

[Scott Poteet]

And it's eight months to get there and it's eight months home and however long you need to do the mission on the surface.

[Sean Ryan]

Eight months. It's eight months.

[Scott Poteet]

Yeah, I think that's.

[Sean Ryan]

It's a long car ride, buddy.

[Scott Poteet]

Long car ride. Well, the volume of these vehicles are pretty big. It's a lot bigger than what we lived in, which is a lot bigger than, you know, what they went to the moon in.

[Sean Ryan]

How long did it take them to get to the moon?

[Scott Poteet]

I think it was two and a half days. A couple days. Traveling 25,000 miles an hour to escape gravitational pull.

[Sean Ryan]

Damn. Damn. All right, we'll move on. This is from Brian. How did you get your call sign? When you got named at your first squadron and during your time flying the F16, did you ever fly any CAS missions supporting Jtax on the ground?

[Scott Poteet]

Love the Jtechs. That was my favorite mission, was working with you guys. Seals, three letter identifiers, those were the best missions because you're supporting your brothers and sisters on the ground doing the mission. So to answer the second question, yes, I did a lot of casts. I flew the F16 for 20 years and it's a multi role platform. So you do air to air and you know, it's the jack of all trades, master of none. So you're constantly dabbling all these different modalities and mission sets. But the reason why I chose the F16 was for the air to ground missions and specifically the cas. In fact, my last assignment was Aviano Air Base in Italy. We deployed to Afghanistan doing resolute support and Freedom Sentinel doing counterterrorism missions, dropping bombs and working with you guys and other agencies. And that was by far the highlight of my career.

[Sean Ryan]

What year was that?

[Scott Poteet]

That was 15. So it was kind of the height of ISIS. There wasn't much of that presence. It was more Al Qaeda. But we were just working our way up the chain looking for high value targets, trying to beat out the predators. Because that was when the Predator was kind of making its big push on unemployment. Very, very accurate platform. In fact, when I went through weapon school, top gun school, that was the focus of my thesis was integrating CAS missions with F16s and Predator. That's a long story. But to answer his question, yeah, a lot of missions with JTACS controllers doing casts.

[Sean Ryan]

Call sign.

[Scott Poteet]

Call sign. So it's Kid, it's K I d d, two Ds. When you go through your career, it's usually something you F up, you screw up or play off your name. So I got call signs like Pooter, which kind of play off Poteet. I had Biff for a while. Then I had Money, the movie Swingers back in the 90s. And then I ended up getting married. So I was no longer Money. I was kind of a small change.

[Sean Ryan]

You weren't a swinger anymore?

[Scott Poteet]

Was never a swinger.

[Sean Ryan]

Just messing with you.

[Scott Poteet]

Clarification. But I lost the call sign money. And then I got named Kid. And every fighter squadron, how you get your call sign. The naming ceremony is always different. And I was in the triple nickel 555th fighter squad. Very historic Robin Oles from the Vietnam War. Best fighter squad in the Air Force. How we did the ceremony is you're kicked out so they can talk about you. Just usually it's a drink fest. So you don't really hear the reasons why you get named until you get brought back into the ceremony. And they've selected a couple different stories of why there's usually one that's pg, that's releasable. And then there's another reason why. So the releasable story is that Kid. I looked young back in the day. My first name is actually William. So Billy the Kid. There was already a Kid in the sister squadron, the 5 10th, the buzzards, but he was Kid, so they added an extra D. And there's other reasons why it ended up being Kid that unfortunately. Come on.

[Sean Ryan]

Come on.

[Scott Poteet]

If this was J.D. jack Daniels, I might be able to.

[Sean Ryan]

Well, we got plenty. All right, all right. I won't press you, but all right, so let's move into the life story here. So I know you were born here in Chattanooga, Tennessee.

[Scott Poteet]

Chattanooga.

[Sean Ryan]

When did you move to New Hampshire?

[Scott Poteet]

So I was born in 73. 51 we were born in Chattanooga, but I was actually. I lived five years just across the border north, deep woods, Georgia, middle to low income fam. A lot of connections with Fort Oglethorpe, Chickamauga park, kind of the. My uncle had a, a double wide and half the trailer was a private collection. I think he had one of the largest private collections of Civil War artifacts. I just remember as a kid rumaging into, you know, his collection. There's really cool stuff like bullets with teeth marks, ceramic bullets from amputations, biting the bullet, the whole concept. So those are some of my memories as a, as a kid. But when I was five, we, we moved. My dad was worked for a company called Combustion Engineering. He worked there for 50 years. Worked up from janitor all the way up to a manager. But he got transferred up to New Hampshire Seacoast. So we moved to a town called Durham and pretty much started grade school in the town of Durham. Actually went grade school, elementary, middle school, high school and college all in the same town really, but stayed there all the way.

[Sean Ryan]

What were you into as a kid?

[Scott Poteet]

What's that?

[Sean Ryan]

What were you into?

[Scott Poteet]

Sports.

[Sean Ryan]

Sports.

[Scott Poteet]

I was very competitive, obsessively competitive. 80s so I was big into like the Celtics, the Red Sox. We would always go to games, Patriots as well as the Bruins. But it was obsessive to the point of, you know, I would sacrifice all my friends and foes to get to the front of the line for whatever, you know, lining up for class. And it ended up, you know, parent teacher conferences, trying to figure out ways to kind of channel that gladiator attitude. I had little bit of bribery. I kind of was able to figure out how to channel it to something a little more productive, which became sports. So sun up to sundown, I'm back in the day when you actually could stay out past sunset as a kid riding your bike and just looking for my next contest of how to compete. And that was my childhood. And it became. You have siblings, older brother, year and a half older, great relationship. Family was a little bit, I would say maybe unemotional, kind of kept to ourselves, but I would spend my time just roaming, looking for, looking for trouble.

[Sean Ryan]

What sports?

[Scott Poteet]

I played everything. Baseball, soccer, basketball. Was big throughout my life. I got a job at the golf course. So I picked up golf. Started was a good golfer. I played on the high school team as a middle schooler. But then they cut the team. So I had to figure out another sport, which became running. So I actually got involved in running pretty early on and that became my focus. I Wanted basketball to be it. You know, Larry Bird back in the Celtics era in the 80s was a big deal, so. But I was a realist, you know, 5 foot 9 inches tall. I knew it wasn't, you know, a likelihood of. It wasn't in the cards. Playing at the next level in college. Terrible. Terrible. Student C's and D's across the board, really. Yeah. I couldn't. I couldn't focus before all the diagnosis, but I just couldn't pay attention. I was really good at setting athletic goals and succeeding on the, you know, pitch the field, the diamond, the track, but I could not apply those same strategies in the classroom. And it was. By the time I got to high school, I'm like, all right, I'm not going to college if I don't figure out a path. And for me, it was like, okay, I'm okay at sports. Let me see if I can leverage those talents and use that as a path, you know, to getting to college. So that's when I focused on running. Ended up winning the state championship race my junior year. And it was kind of that performance and my dedication to the sport that got me recruited to run Division 1 at University of New Hampshire. I applied to UNH that school in University of Tennessee at Knoxville, and that was it. And. And I got recruited, and. And I only got in because of the coach.

[Sean Ryan]

So plan worked.

[Scott Poteet]

So plan worked, thankfully. But even in college, man, academics was. It's just. The traditional education method is not my. My jam.

[Sean Ryan]

Yeah.

[Scott Poteet]

You know, sit through class, pay attention, take notes, memorize, regurgitate it in an exam that you may or may not use this information in your life. So that's kind of where I found a different option.

[Sean Ryan]

What was your major? What did you.

[Scott Poteet]

It's called outdoor education.

[Sean Ryan]

What is that?

[Scott Poteet]

So it's education through experiential learning. So how that is different is that you're taught a basic skill set. So all my classes were like scuba diving, rock climbing, winter mountaineering, whitewater rafting, Nordic skiing.

[Sean Ryan]

You can get it.

[Scott Poteet]

Advanced backpacking. I actually had an advanced backpacking class.

[Sean Ryan]

Damn.

[Scott Poteet]

And you would go and you would be taught some basic skills, but you immediately go out into the field and you apply these and you learn in the field. And it was only by happenstance that I came across. My buddy of mine brought me to class one day. In fact, I remember it was, I signed up for rotc. Another kind of a serendipitous moment that I had, joining rotc. But I was already signed up, and I'm in full Service dress. And it's middle of the winter, three feet of snow on the ground. And he's like, hey, come with me to one of my outdoor education classes. I'm like, okay. I'm very impulsive, so I'm like, all right, let's do this. So go to class. And it's in a gymnasium. It's not in a normal classroom. And there's students in, in the back of the class in the storage lockers, going through all this gear. And I'm in my full services, hand me down polyester uniform, a big trench coat, you know, cheap patent leather shoes, and stand out like a sore thumb. And I, we walk up to the class and the teacher starts talking, and he's like, all right, this is advanced winter backpacking, and we're going to build a Quincy in the snow for the next three hours. And I'm like, I'm not dressed for this. And I don't know if this is going to work out well, come to find out, my. My teacher is a Navy SEAL. He was. He was a Navy SEAL for 20 years. And he takes us out back and we start building this Quincy. And for those who are unfamiliar, Quincy is like an igloo, but instead of blocks, you know, you. You build. You dig down to the surface. You pile a bunch of snow up, you let it set. Once it's set into a big old dome, you kind of dig a little entrance. Once you get inside, you dig all around. You leave about 4 to 6 inches for a wall. Take a little pro. Once you dug it all out, you take a little propane stove, you light it, you glaze, heat up the inside, it glaze over. And now you have this impenetrable structure, this winter shelter. And you get, you know, 12, 15 people to stand on top of the structure. It's only 4 to 6 inches, and it's. It holds the weight. And now it's like 20, 30 degrees warmer inside this igloo, this Quincy. And, man, I have a blast. I am soaking wet. I'm just on my hands and knees digging this structure. And he's giving all these life lessons, talking about combat, and because he's, you know, I'm wearing this uniform, and it was just like this profound experience, and I'm like, this is the way I can get an education, earn a degree so I can go in the military. Because I didn't think, you know, I've got three and a half years left to get a degree in order to go into the military, because I'm the rotc program. And I'm like, my grades aren't cutting it right now, but, you know, this is something.

[Sean Ryan]

Why did you pick rotc? What caught your interest in that?

[Scott Poteet]

Anyways, so I was walking to class, freshman year, fall semester one day and. And this flyer on a bulletin board caught my eye. And it was a picture of a fighter jet. It was just an advertisement encouraging students to come experience the Air Force way of life. Sign up to be a Passenger aboard a KC135 air refueling aircraft at the local Air National Guard unit out of Portsmouth, New Hampshire. Pease used to be an Air Force base. StratCom. They launched F111s on alert there. It was actually an alternate landing site for the space shuttle back in the shuttle program. Heated Runway, 13,000 foot long. Anyways, they have a guard unit there, KC135s. Now it's the KC46, the replacement refueler in the Air Force. And I'm impulsive. I sign up. And when I signed up, I didn't fully grasp the consequences of my actions. Because here's a couple secrets about myself. It's probably going to jeopardize credibility. Extremely prone to motion sickness. Always have been, always will be. You stick me an Uber 15 minutes long, I'm done.

[Sean Ryan]

Are you kidding me?

[Scott Poteet]

I still get nauseous. Scared of heights. I hate heights. Me too, actually. Afghanistan. They took us up in a helicopter. I was a command position and the PJs took me up in a helicopter. They knew I was scared of heights. And doors open up at like 14,000ft, man. It freaked the shit out of me anyways, so. And I'd never flown an aircraft before in my life. At 18 years old, we didn't have the money to go anywhere. But here's my chance. I'm going to sign up and I'm going to go. So I command, I sign up and. Bus takes us. Big old school bus drops us off at the plane and we board this aircraft and I take my seat and again, I've never been in an aircraft. And it's hot, it's dark, there's no windows in this gutted plane. A couple seats up front and I start to panic. I'm like. I start sweating. I get, you know, I get. Heart rate goes up, breathing shallow. And I'm like, I don't want to do this. How do I get out? And. But there's a couple cute girls next to me. I mean, I can't back out now. I gotta. I gotta man up. And so aircrew Comes out and briefs us on what we can anticipate. And they're like, all right, we're gonna start off with some low approaches, do some training. I'm like, I have no idea what that is, but let's do this. And we're go out to the airspace and refuel some F16s and so close the door and take off. And they immediately level off and they come back around and they land and take off again. 20 minutes into this flight, I just lose my lunch. I'm puking. It's like a cnet alien. It's just. It's bad. And I pass out. Two hours later, crew chief wakes me up, says, hey, son, come with me. Walks me back to the observation where they do the refueling. The boom operator sits back there. I'm like working my way up there, just trying not to puke on anyone or anything. And he takes a seat and starts doing his pre fueling checks and trying to distract me. And I take the observation seat next to him and he's like, all right, there's two fighters on the horizon. They're about to reform. And I pull up to within a couple feet of our window, and, man, it's like a scene out of Top Gun. There's a fighter pilot. He's wearing his helmet, his mask. He's, you know, he's giving me the little shot, guys, and he boom plugs the aircraft and we start communicating. He's asking questions, he's telling us about his mission. And I'm just like, that is awesome. You know, I. That was the little spark. Everyone's got their motivation, but that was the. The fire that was lit within me. And I completely forgot about the last two hours. I just. I wanted to be a fighter pilot. I didn't care what it took. I knew I had a lot of challenges in front of me, but I had to figure out how to. How to get in that cockpit.

[Sean Ryan]

Nice.

[Scott Poteet]

And then I figured out the education piece with outdoor education.

[Sean Ryan]

Wow. Wow. So, I mean, but there's got to be a lot of studying to be a pilot and an astronaut. And so, I mean, I would imagine there's a lot. So. So let's, let's move on. So you graduated college, then what?

[Scott Poteet]

I did pretty well in rotc. Anything active I do pretty good at. So I was. Or if I have interest in it. So I was pretty good cadet. I graduate, distinguished graduate, and I get selected for a program called Euronato Joint Jet Pilot Training in Jepped. And it's a specified pilot training program out of Shepherd Air Force Base, Wichita Falls. And it's all the NATO countries participate. They send instructors and students who are going to be flying fighter jets. So it's specific to flying a fighter aircraft. Whereas the other pilot training bases, there's two tracks. Well, there's three if you count helos. Everyone starts off on the same platform. It's a T6. Now I flew a T37. Just a side by side little dog whistle loud jet trainer, fully aerobatic. The G onset rate in those aircrafts are. I get chills every time I think about my first year of pilot training because I would puke almost every single flight. And at the six year or the six month point for those other bases, you split, you go, if you go the heavy track, you're going to go fly a C17, C130, C5, you're going to go to the T1 Learjet looking aircraft. If you're going to go fly fighters or bombers, you go to the T38. Well, this program that I went to, there's only one track. You go from T37 to T38s and you go in the fighter. What you end up with after pilot training, which is, you know, that's a whole other story as far as what is required. But it's somewhere around two to two and a half years to get through the training process. It's needs of the Air Force, everything's stratified. Probably seals, very similar stratifications. So you're performing number 1, 2, 3, 4, all the way down to whatever your class has. And when it comes time for your assignment night, it's like, all right, the air force needs two F16 pilots, four F15 Cs, this many F15Es, A10s and you just go down the list and you, you pick.

[Sean Ryan]

So first, first and second, first ranked student gets to pick whatever they want and then it just goes on from there.

[Scott Poteet]

Now it's like F22s, F35s. So back to your question. I went to Shepherd Air Force Base and I did this program and I was about there two and a half or a year and a half to get through the training there. And then you go off and do supplemental training depending on what aircraft and survival training centrifuge. And then you do all these top off qualifications before you actually get to combat operations operational assignments, which is at that two and a half year point.

[Sean Ryan]

So hold on, let's backtrack. So pilot training is how long to get to pick what you're going to fly.

[Scott Poteet]

The actual training is a year, but there are certain elements or milestones you have to accomplish, like survival training. You might go before you even start pilot training, or it might be something in the middle, or it might be something at the very end. Centrifuge is something you have to go through because you're going to start flying higher performance aircrafts that can, that you need to qualify yourself in these certain profiles of pulling GS because some people have a really difficult time if you don't understand the G strain maneuver. It's just some people aren't physiologically cut out for pulling some of those high performance G profiles that you'll experience in a fighter jet. So the training is actually a year. It's about a year and a half, but then there's an extra six months you have to go through to learn how to fly an F16 or an F22 or an F35. So I was there a year and a half, okay, before I went off to my base to learn how to fly the F16.

[Sean Ryan]

Okay.

[Scott Poteet]

And it was, it was a miserable.

[Sean Ryan]

Experience for me flying the S. F16.

[Scott Poteet]

No. Pilot training.

[Sean Ryan]

Why?

[Scott Poteet]

Motion sickness. Academics.

[Sean Ryan]

Yeah. How did you get through the, how did you get through the academics? I mean, I, I thought I was going to be a pilot just as a, you know, as a hobby. I was like, oh, this sound might be kind of cool. And then I looked at all the shit I had to study and I was like, fuck that, I'm not doing it. Yeah, I was like, ground school? No, not doing it. But so, I mean, how, how did you, it sounds like you were a horrible, horrible student.

[Scott Poteet]

I, I, man, I, I was challenged then. I was challenged F16s. I was challenged weapon school. I was challenged space. And it's more my hard headed mindset because if I apply myself, I think I could do okay.

[Sean Ryan]

You have to have a drive. You do, you have to have a drive. Like you really want that end goal. And that's the only way you're able to concentrate and get through the shit that you don't want to do, like.

[Scott Poteet]

Study in pilot training. Even looking back, I'm like, well, I went to weapons school and I went through space. Pilot training was nothing compared to what I went through later. But at the time, I'm coming off outdoor education. Four years of scuba diving, rock climbing, mountaineering. I mean, my final exam in Nordic skiing was five days in Vermont doing Nordic skiing. As long as you didn't get a cold weather injury, you got an A. We were in bed and Breakfast in a hot tub in the afternoon and skiing all day long. Little hidden secret. But now I go to pilot training and the expectation is, dude, this is this big boy program, you know. And oh, by the way, I went right after graduation because I just, I was gung ho. I just wanted to get going. So I literally graduate. Three days later I'm on the road moving to Tennessee or to Texas. And my classmates were all top graduates at the Air Force Academy. So they're coming off aerospace engineering, astrophysics, you know, that's one of the premier academic programs in the country. And oh, by the way, these are the top graduates. So this is who I'm competing against in that stratification. And it was a steep, steep learning curve.

[Sean Ryan]

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[Scott Poteet]

Thankfully, there's the, the flying piece. You know, you got to apply yourself in the actual stick and router coordination piece. But there is the, the academic piece. You got to prove yourself there before they're going to put you in a cockpit. And we had these things and I still have nightmares about them. It's stand up and it's like, there's bold face like you have to memorize certain emergency procedures for that's specific to the aircraft. And it's like almost a haze where, you know, in the morning you have stand up and you gotta. They'll call on you. They'll randomly select. All right, kid. Back then, I don't remember what. Pooter, stand up. All right, this is your scenario. You got your aircraft and you know you have an engine failure and you're this far away and this parameters and it's just you're in the hot seat and you gotta verbatim give the procedures and then all the amplifying systems knowledge. And it's just a prove and test your. Your level of competency. And that was my nemes, you know, and if you don't do well enough, you know, Pooter, sit down. Next guy. And you don't get to fly that day. You're grounded until you have some remedial training. I was notorious. All right, Pooter, here's your second chance.

[Sean Ryan]

No shit, dude.

[Scott Poteet]

You suck. Sit down.

[Sean Ryan]

How did you overcome the motion sickness?

[Scott Poteet]

It took a long, long time.

[Sean Ryan]

A lot of drama.

[Scott Poteet]

I actually had to hide it from my instructors. I would. Thankfully, the 38 is, you know, is that tandem? You know, it's front back.

[Sean Ryan]

Yeah.

[Scott Poteet]

And you're separated where the 37 was next next to each other. So you see exactly what's going on in the cockpit. But in 38, you're in front. But I would have to puke and swallow. I would literally puke in my mask and just suck it up because you get to a certain point where, you know, depending on what your issue would just puke.

[Sean Ryan]

In your mask.

[Scott Poteet]

Yeah, this might be tmi, but no.

[Sean Ryan]

I'm like sometimes where does it go?

[Scott Poteet]

If you can hold it long enough, you can either. And my recommendation is if.

[Sean Ryan]

How do you concentrate flying a jet while trying like, trying like hell to hold vomit down?

[Scott Poteet]

If, if you do have to, my recommendation is always eat something you don't mind eating again. Bananas is a good choice. I remember one time, my first.

[Sean Ryan]

So you would, you would puke and then swallow it again.

[Scott Poteet]

You just got to fight through it. And then I had a great instructor. He was Norwegian and he hardcore dude, loved to party. Drove this old 1980s Cadillac with a big old steer horns on the, on the hood, hood ornament. He was awesome. He was sympathetic to my cause. So he would know because I'd be doing this heaving going on and I'm trying to fly this aircraft and pay attention and especially the aerobatics once you got to the airspace. But my first flight on 38, I thought I was over it, you know, six months. All right. It's getting a little better. Getting a little better because eventually you get to a point where like they stick you in the barony chair, you know, to force it out of you. Try to just break your will. None of that was working for me and I would just hide it via techniques already talked about. But my first flight in the 38, man, it came on so quick. It just, it came out of a mouse mask and all over my visor and I, I'm like doing this windshield wiper trying to clear my visor because my, my, my pilot's in the back and you know, I suffer through a sub below, well below average execution on my dollar ride my first flight. And I think I made it. I think I made it. And he climbs out of it and he climbs up to my end of my cockpit and he's looking around and he goes, not a chance. Because there's puke all over the dashboard of this. So I didn't pass that ride.

[Sean Ryan]

So hold on. Does it go? Is it like an initial. Is it initial. An initial motion sickness and then you puke and then it's gone for the rest of the flight? Or is it like the whole thing.

[Scott Poteet]

It ebbs and flows?

[Sean Ryan]

You know, you're just a sickness. Like you're just. You're in it shit.

[Scott Poteet]

Yeah.

[Sean Ryan]

And you still wanted to be a pilot?

[Scott Poteet]

Oh yeah.

[Sean Ryan]

Holy shit, man.

[Scott Poteet]

Yeah. I was, I was determined. I. Stubborn, strong willed, ego. I don't know what it was, but I'm like, I have, I can't fail this is, I gotta figure it out because there's one kid in my class that left. He just. I'm done. I got tapping out, I'm out. But I just, I wanted to figure it out. I, you know. You do. I mean I, I eat a greasy pork sandwich and, and go do aerobatics. As long as I'm flying. Stick me in the back seat and someone else is flying.

[Sean Ryan]

So you have overcome it.

[Scott Poteet]

Yeah.

[Sean Ryan]

Okay.

[Scott Poteet]

You know, people talk. Is it physio, physiological, is it psychological? I think it's a combination of a lot of things. Inner ear. Thankfully, space is not. There's no correlation because space adaptation syndrome is impacts 50% of astronauts.

[Sean Ryan]

What is it called?

[Scott Poteet]

Space adaptation syndrome. And it's because you, and we'll get to it. But like you experience all these G forces on the way up. And then it's a long ride. So it's about nine minutes. You're pulling four and a half GS. And then when that second stage separates, you're thrust forward, you're hanging in your straps. And now you're in space, floating. And so that transition, oh, it can force this cross coupling illusion of tumbling and it impacts everyone differently. It can be seconds, it can be minutes, it can be long durations of this tumbling. And it's different axis depending on who you are.

[Sean Ryan]

Do you know if you're going to get it before you go to space? So it's, it's, it's a big, it's a big surprise.

[Scott Poteet]

And, and puking in space with zero gravity. Oh man, you saw the movies, you know, Apollo 13, I was ecstatic. I was on cloud nine. I was on a drugs man, I was so pumped once I realized I got to orbit, I'm floating. I get through this tumbling sensation because you're, you're forced to deal with your circumstances. There's no, like I'll suck this up for 30 seconds on a roller coaster or you know, you're flying a fighter jet. Can you ease off and fly straight level for a few potatoes? No, you have, you are forced to deal with your circumstances. There's no, there's no reset button. And that's, that's very challenging because that capsule is rotating. You know, it's got to maintain line of sight with satellites for, for communication purposes. So as it's going around, it's rotating. So you look outside and you see the horizon. That makes sense. This is the top of the capsule and this is the bottom. You come inside, you float around and you look back outside and it's completely Opposite because it's. And now it's like whoa. After a while your body adapts and human body is amazing. You know, I would be, you know, a couple hours into it, I'd be on my iPad, laptop, whatever, iPhone, doing some science and research. I'd be completely inverted working, just hanging inverted when that's the top and that's the bottom. But it just. You lose all reference. But back to wow. Back to motion sickness. Yeah. I more or less got over it. I still get. Especially if someone's shitty driver and.

[Sean Ryan]

Wow.

[Scott Poteet]

Anyways.

[Sean Ryan]

Wow.

[Scott Poteet]

That's well more information than any other hurdles. That was it for pilot training was academics in the. In the motion sickness. Fear heights. I got over it's. Planes are fine. It's. Structures. Yeah. Ledges.

[Sean Ryan]

I have that too.

[Scott Poteet]

Okay. I figured that's.

[Sean Ryan]

I hate. I. Yeah. Jump school was not fun for me.

[Scott Poteet]

Yeah.

[Sean Ryan]

I hated it.

[Scott Poteet]

Yeah.

[Sean Ryan]

Terrified of heights.

[Scott Poteet]

We. We went free dive or free. Free diving. Yeah. Skydiving. Part of the space training and jumping out of a plane was.

[Sean Ryan]

Oh, you had to do it.

[Scott Poteet]

Oh yeah. Yeah.

[Sean Ryan]

What got you out the door? The only thing that got me out the door is I didn't want to look like a pussy in front of everybody else. That's.

[Scott Poteet]

That's it. But I had a bum shoulder. This was so this is the only program. I don't even know if we want to go here. But it was with the Air Force Academy. It's the only program in the world that is the first jump is free fall and solo.

[Sean Ryan]

What?

[Scott Poteet]

Yeah.

[Sean Ryan]

And you're scared to death of fights. Oh man, I gotta hear this.

[Scott Poteet]

Unfortunately I had hurt my shoulder years back. Dislocated it and I actually dislocated it in space training in the capsule in full on spacesuit and it's this emergency procedures. It's. We gotta. We just splash down in the, you know, in the Pacific Ocean and now we got to do this emergency egress. So it's you know, rush. See how quickly we can get out of the capsule. So my responsibility as the swimmer on the with all my Ironmans was to get out first and I got to throw the, the, the. The boat, the inflatable boat out in the. The water and pull the cord and as I'm pulling it completely dislocate my shoulder. And so this was an injury from years prior. So now I have this. I was able to get it back in because these suits, these are expensive suits and the docs came in and were trying to get my shoulder back in, but I'M in this suit. I mean, it's helmet, it's one piece. There's no way you can get up into the shoulder. So over time, we were able to finally pop it back in. And that event kind of just let this like, you know, all stretched out.

[Sean Ryan]

Yeah.

[Scott Poteet]

So it was. But skydiving didn't help. I actually. My first jump, I had to pull with my left hand. Worked out fine, but that kind of end my, my skydiving career until I had surgery post space.

[Sean Ryan]

Damn. Have you ever. Just a random question. You're a diver too, right? You had mentioned you did some scuba diving in school. Have you ever been scared of heights underwater? Have you ever come up like you're diving, you're diving on the ocean floor and then you hit a ledge?

[Scott Poteet]

No, I don't think I've ever been that deep. Shoreline off the Atlantic and the north is pretty shallow.

[Sean Ryan]

I get it. I get it on that.

[Scott Poteet]

Do you really?

[Sean Ryan]

Yeah.

[Scott Poteet]

I never thought looking down.

[Sean Ryan]

Yeah. I remember diving over a ledge once and I was like, oh shit, let's go back over here. Yeah.

[Scott Poteet]

How deep?

[Sean Ryan]

I don't know how deep it was. I can't remember. But I do remember the feeling, getting it underwater. Which you think you would never get. Cause you'd have that, you know, it's not like you're gonna fall, but there's that. Just that look off the ledge where you can't see the bottom.

[Scott Poteet]

I love watching those free divers. Free.

[Sean Ryan]

Yeah, yeah.

[Scott Poteet]

Holding their breath. Breath holds five, six minutes. That's pretty wild.

[Sean Ryan]

Yeah. So what. When did you, what. What place did you graduate in? Were you.

[Scott Poteet]

I was just. I think I was fourth or fifth out of 12. And then we had some, some NATO country. We had two Dutch, two Dane, two German. So we had a big class 20 or so. I think I was fourth, fifth, sixth somewhere right around there.

[Sean Ryan]

What's everybody want?

[Scott Poteet]

Honestly, it depends on what you. What mission you want to do. Because they all kind of function the same. I mean, well, if you ask a pilot who's flown them, there's certainly big dramatic differences.

[Sean Ryan]

I mean, are we talking like F16 and you know, C130?

[Scott Poteet]

No.

[Sean Ryan]

So.

[Scott Poteet]

So my drop again. Air Force needs my drop. Had, I want to say four F15C's didn't have any 15E's, which is the two seat strike platform. It's the mud hen. It carries a lot of munitions. Air to ground mission. But you have a wizzo. You got a backseater. Four 5F 16s, two A 10s and then it's like there might be a couple instructor to go right back into pilot training to be an instructor. If you don't end up in a fighter jet that you wanted, it's kind of an option. And then there was some bombers, a B52, B1. And so when I picked, I had the choice between a 15C and a 16. And I wanted a multi role platform. I wanted to do air to ground, I wanted to do CAs, but I also loved the sexiness of an air to air mission. You know, dog fighting and you know, doing, doing that type of mission. And F16 is, is multi role. So depending on what base you go to will be the focus of your mission. Like I ended up first assignment was Korea, then I went to Italy and then I started, I went to weapons school. But those first Korea was all about interdiction. You know there's going to be an initial air threat. If we ever go to war with North Korea, it's going to be capacity. They're just going to overwhelm you with these teenage MIGs, these old antiquated, you know, third gen type platforms. No capability and no competency. But they're just going to try to overwhelm the South.

[Sean Ryan]

Have you ever wound up in a dog fight?

[Scott Poteet]

No.

[Sean Ryan]

Damn.

[Scott Poteet]

Damn, no. All simulated. They're very, very rare. You know, back in, yeah. World War II in Vietnam. Since then it's been a, I figured it's been a handful.

[Sean Ryan]

Man, that would be awesome.

[Scott Poteet]

It would be awesome. But technology these days, it's all about not being seen.

[Sean Ryan]

Yeah.

[Scott Poteet]

So if you get to emerge, it's, it's because either you screwed up or you know, you just didn't get the information you needed. Yeah, yeah. So I ended up in the F16 was my choice.

[Sean Ryan]

And is that what you initially wanted? You wanted the F16?

[Scott Poteet]

I did.

[Sean Ryan]

And you got it.

[Scott Poteet]

Yeah. So that, and part of it is about the location as well. So you leave private training with a specific airframe and then once you get to that base for training, for me it was Luke Air Force Base in Phoenix. You spend six months learning how to fly the F16 to employ it. So now you've gone from the very basics, flying instruments, flying formation, just a little bit of aerobatic, that's it, you're competent, you're safe enough, you hopefully won't kill yourself. And now when you, you learn how to fly the F16, you go deeper, you start doing BFM basic 5 maneuvers, the dog fighting one 1v1. And then you do TI tactical engagements. Now it's working the geometry for a reform to an engagement, a visual engagement. And then you start adding more and more aircraft. Now it's act where it's like 4v4 and your actual, you know, you're doing long range stuff beyond visual range. And if you end up in a visual merge, you're competent enough to do the type dog fighting. And then you kind of go through this whole air to air flow and then you got to focus on the air to ground piece. So you start off by going to a range and you're dropping these little blue bombs for scoring purposes and you're trying to focus your skill sets on learning the basics of how to employ and fly the aircraft with specific parameters. So you get comfortable in certain air speeds and altitudes and ranges and how the aircraft feels. And you're shooting the gun, 20 millimeter gun. And then again that progresses. Now you're going to do close air support, you're working with troops on the ground. JTACs and SEALs are calling in, you know, engagements and you're employing in close proximity to ground forces.

[Sean Ryan]

How fat, how, what's the fastest you've.

[Scott Poteet]

Gone in an F16, it's Mach 2.2.05.

[Sean Ryan]

Is roughly, Mach 2 is twice two.

[Scott Poteet]

Times the speed of sound. And you know, it's roughly 700. For, for the layman's explanation, it's around 750 miles an hour. It changes based on pressure, altitude, temperatures, all that, but two times that. So 1500 miles an hour, whoa. It's all relative.

[Sean Ryan]

100 miles an hour, it's all relative.

[Scott Poteet]

I mean now talk about, you know, 6gen coming online and this, you know, 34 mach, it's, and it doesn't really feel intense until you get low on the deck flying, flying fast, low because you, you have that ground rush. You know, the trees are going by pretty fast I would imagine, but there's a lot of restrictions. So you can't break the sound barrier unless you're in a specific restricted airspace which is few and far between in the US So if you're breaking the sound barrier, it's, you know, above 30,000ft or higher and the sensation isn't there. You just see a little buffet on your, on your dial. Otherwise it just, you just continue to push.

[Sean Ryan]

What were you flying in regular pilot.

[Scott Poteet]

School as far as the airframe?

[Sean Ryan]

Yeah.

[Scott Poteet]

T37 is the first aircraft. Two seat, two engine, very low power jet. The next aircraft with a T38, it's the, what they call it the MiG20, MiG28 in Top Gun F5. It's this NASA flies them. Very stubby wing, sleek, long airframe, twin engine, very fast.

[Sean Ryan]

Okay.

[Scott Poteet]

And then so you do that for six months apiece, total of a year. And then you go off and you fly your platform.

[Sean Ryan]

Okay, so the speed wasn't, it wasn't anything new to you?

[Scott Poteet]

No. The T38, I don't know if you did a mach run. I don't think you did. I don't even know if it could handle it. But most of these, like older generation fighters, it's like right up to the machine. All the 4th gen, except for the A10 are built to go above Mach.

[Sean Ryan]

Damn. What's the lowest you've been flying?

[Scott Poteet]

Altitude. Yeah. Oh, it's hard to get up there. You got to do it in a dive just because the air's thicker down low. You're burning through JP8 pretty quick. A couple thousand feet. Nothing. I mean, 450, 500 knots. I don't know, five, 600 miles an hour on the deck is fun. Yeah, that's enough. Because if, you know, happens quick when you're going that fast and low, Thunderbirds is. We get, we have permission to fly low, you know, 50, 100ft. Pretty, pretty low, depending on the maneuver we're doing, the formation that you're flying. So that's where you really get a sensation. Talk about unwavering level of trust. And when you're flying, because we're flying anywhere from 3ft to 18 inches apart and you're that low, and if you're, if you're in the formation you're flying, I mean, that aircraft is 18 inches apart. You're. Whoa, white knuckles when you first start. You've been flying this aircraft for me, I'd been flying it for eight, nine years. Very competent in flying it. But when you're that close and that level of trust and that precise, it's like white knuckle. You're just death grip. Just over time, you get really comfortable. You're smoking a lucky, eating breakfast and you're 18 inches apart. But it's only because you're given the opportunity to go through intense training. I mean, two, three times the amount of flying that a normal fighter pilot would typically fly in a year. 500 hours versus 150, 180 hours.

[Sean Ryan]

Wow. Wow.

[Scott Poteet]

And all you're doing is doing one thing. Not CAS and interdiction and OCA and DCA and bfm, those are fun. But a lot of that is just employing using the sensors. Whereas Thunderbirds, I didn't even turn that on. It's all about the formation.

[Sean Ryan]

So. All right, so let's walk back through. Yeah, sorry, no, it's. Let's walk back through. So you said OCA and dca. What is all, what is all that? What are those acronyms?

[Scott Poteet]

Offensive Counter Error, Defensive Counter Error. It's just different mission sets depending on what the scenario is. So if we're getting invaded by China or Russia and we're protecting dc, we're going to set up caps with, hopefully we attack them with other things and ships. But kind of the last line of defense is going to be what we have in the air in these caps. And we're protecting the motherland and anything comes at us, that's what we're. But the focus is to stay back, defensive posture, that's dca. And then you have different category of missions called oca, Offensive Counter. That might be like an interdiction mission. Like, okay, we're going to attack North Korea. We're not. But if we were, there's key targets that we have pre planned that we want to go blow up. And we're going to send bunker busters, GB24s or whatever, whatever we have these days, big 2,000 pound bombs. This is OC, this is offensive Counter Error Interdiction. I'm gonna fight my way in, deliver my, you know, my munition, turn around and leave. So we are, you know, on an offensive posture.

[Sean Ryan]

Gotcha. Gotcha. So what section do you start with in school?

[Scott Poteet]

Building block. It's baby steps. So you'll start off okay, can I fly this aircraft? You'll spend, you know, 10, 12 sorties getting comfortable in the aircraft. You'll solo because there are two seaters. But it's meant to be a single seat fighter aircraft. That was the other reason why I wanted the F16 is I wanted to be the sole responsible person involved. And then you learn, you learn instruments. Okay, if the weather's bad, can I recover this aircraft to, you know, at a base that's socked in. So you got to learn how to fly instruments. Got it. Okay, let's move on. Let's start doing tactical stuff and that's where you'll do. All right, we're going to fly formation. Get comfortable flying formation because that aircraft is extremely responsive. Like literally the stick moves like that much. It's all fly by wire and throttle. Obviously moves a lot more. But versus like a P51 or F4 or an A4, that stick moves a lot. It's hydraulics. So flying formation doesn't take Much, honestly. It's like this thought process. You think about it and subconsciously you start doing it. So you overcorrect in the beginning. You just. That's where the nausea comes in. It's just. You porpoise because it's out of equilibrium. Because that, what makes it such a high performance aircraft aircraft is that it's, it's not a stable platform. So you're constantly looking for that, that sweet spot when you fly. After a while it becomes second nature. Now you're worried about all the ship between your legs, the radars and the targeting pods and the situational display and the queuing systems, all that kind of stuff. That's the focus. Second nature. The flying is, you know, you don't even think about it.

[Sean Ryan]

Do you get used to certain planes?

[Scott Poteet]

Oh yeah.

[Sean Ryan]

You do. Okay. So when you deploy, I mean, I'm getting a little ahead of myself, but I mean, so you really know the plane.

[Scott Poteet]

You do.

[Sean Ryan]

And if you jump in another one, you notice differences.

[Scott Poteet]

Yeah, everything's set up differently and how you flip certain switches and they all kind of have an intuitive infrastructure that you could easily learn one system to the next.

[Sean Ryan]

I don't mean like an F16 to an F15. I mean like, like, can you. I mean, it's your plane. It's like a. I don't know, it's like if you put somebody else's baseball glove on, it's still a baseball glove, but it's not your baseball glove. You know what I mean?

[Scott Poteet]

Yeah.

[Sean Ryan]

Is it. Do you know if you're alluding to another F16, is it the exact same or. Or that's interesting question. So you have like a rifle, like I have my rifle set up the way I like my rifle set up as a seal.

[Scott Poteet]

Yeah.

[Sean Ryan]

And. But if I have somebody else's rifle, I'm like, oh, I don't. Like, I can use it and I can be extremely effective with it, but I'm. I would rather have mine.

[Scott Poteet]

Yeah, it feels different. It sounds like a Full Metal Jacket quote.

[Sean Ryan]

Well, I mean, you know what I'm saying though?

[Scott Poteet]

My rifle, this is my, this is my.

[Sean Ryan]

I said I know my trigger point. I know, I know everything about it, you know.

[Scott Poteet]

Right. And so you have your name on.

[Sean Ryan]

One aircraft and you have your confidence in your rifle. Like you zeroed it. You set it up the way you like it set up.

[Scott Poteet]

Yeah.

[Sean Ryan]

You all that kind of. If you have somebody else's, you lose that, you know, shit. Is this thing sighted in, is it sided into me?

[Scott Poteet]

I don't Want, right.

[Sean Ryan]

Is it like that with the planes?

[Scott Poteet]

To a certain extent. So you have your name on an aircraft and you have a dedicated crew chief and he's got his name on his or her name on the other side. And you typically try to fly that tail. But the maintenance of these airframes, they could be down for months. Going through phase, they pull the panels off and all this is broken. We got to fix it. So it's constantly. Inventory is being moved around. So you might fly your tail maybe 30, 40, 40% of the time. That's probably a little aggressive. Except for when I was in the Thunderbirds. You fly so much and you're so queued into that aircraft, you know exactly how it's bent and you know how to trim up the aircraft because you know you can't different airspeeds, it's going to fly differently and it's going to lean one direction or the other. So you know exactly how much input you need on the trim to kind of level it out. And you know, on certain maneuvers, when you get to the top, you know you're 18 inches apart. We're doing this, this arrowhead maneuver where I am, I move up. I was slot, so I was number four, so I was behind number one. So I'm anywhere from 3ft to 8 inch, 18 inches. But in the arrowhead, I actually slide up and in, so I get even closer. And it's literally as close as this mic is the nozzle, the afterburner nozzle of the, of the boss, my, the number one aircraft. And when you get up in the top of a loop, you're. You're like 150, 175 knots. So it's, it's mushy, it's not responsive like an aircraft would be on the deck at 450 knots. So it takes a lot more inputs. And you're not used to flying the aircraft a lot in that regime. So by flying these same aircraft over and over and over, you know exactly how much throttle you need. Especially if you're, you know, deviating to a different show site. You might be at 2000 pressure altitude. Now you go to like Cheyenne, wyoming, and it's 5 or 6,000, so the air is thinner. So it's going to respond a lot different. And the more you know your aircraft, the, the more accurate and precise you're going to be able to fly it in those locations. But in a combat situation, combat unit, operational squadrons, you typically don't fly the same aircraft over and over. So you, you will have to set it up the way you want it. And some have different, you know, just different things that you like or don't like.

[Sean Ryan]

Mm. But interesting. Okay. All right. So you can get used to any of them, relatively.

[Scott Poteet]

You do. And you, you have to. It's just the nature of the beast and the inventory and the phase of the aircraft. But you, you were asking something about experience. You only know. You think you know more than you actually do at different levels of your career. Like, I thought it was pretty hot coming out of B course, F16 training. I'm going to my first combat unit. And then by the time I got to weapons school, I look back and I'm like, oh, my God, I'm glad I didn't kill myself in some of Those missions. Night MVGs in South Korea. It's scary type flying. And then after weapon school, you know, further along you get. It's like you don't know what you didn't know back then. And you're just glad you survived all these different, you know, phases of your life. Going through a career of, you know, flying fighters.

[Sean Ryan]

Yeah. So you get through. You get through F16 school. What. How's graduation?

[Scott Poteet]

Graduation again? Seems to be. I don't know, maybe it's a lot like the seals as far as there's.

[Sean Ryan]

It's got to be pretty surreal.

[Scott Poteet]

It is. Usually there's drinking involved. You gotta let go somehow, some way.

[Sean Ryan]

Yeah.

[Scott Poteet]

Yeah. Pilot training. It's a big deal to get your wings. You know, I still have my wings that were pinned on, took them to space. You just. Again, I don't reflect too much my personality. I'm always looking.

[Sean Ryan]

I get it, I get it. I'm the same way. But I mean, there's got to be a ton of tradition. Right? There's got to be a ton of tradition in becoming an F16 pilot or any type of fighter pilot. I mean. Yeah, I think, how do they pin your wings on?

[Scott Poteet]

You know, that was, that was anti climatic. There wasn't anything too sexy about the ceremony. In pilot training, the real traditions that we love and cherish are the. In the fighter squadrons, in the operational combat units, and every squadron is different. There's a lot of heritage because it goes all the way back to the World War I, to Vietnam on up. And those traditions have long lasted.

[Sean Ryan]

So you said what, there's, there's 12. Was there. You said there was about 12 people in the original. Plus the foreigners, which we won't count, but. Because they don't. I mean, they don't. We're not training them how to fly F16s.

[Scott Poteet]

They will go fly. I had a. There's a Turkish, Singapore has a squadron actually at Luke, teaches F16s. But typically they'll go back and, and do their own thing.

[Sean Ryan]

So how many Americans were there regular before you moved into the F16 school, you said, I think you said there was like 12. Yeah, I think so. How many go to F16 school?

[Scott Poteet]

I think we have five. Five because there was maybe it was more than 12. There was like four or five light grays, F15Cs. They went to Tyndall Air Force Base in, in Florida. There was five or six F16s that went to Luke and then there was two A10 pilots and then there was a B1 and a B52 and then two instructor pilots that stuck around. I think that's right. To whatever that equals.

[Sean Ryan]

So what's it like showing up to your command then?

[Scott Poteet]

So you go to Luke and now it's like that base is dedicated to teaching. It's the F16 schoolhouse. So there's, it's fighter squadrons. But it's still people who, you know, the instructors are all operational, experience, combat and now go back to the schoolhouse to teach. It's a good, you know, quality of life for the families. You're not deploying, you're just, you're just doing the, the 9 to 5 kind of teaching young punks how to be F16 pilots. And it's a six month rotation, so it's just constant. It's probably going to North Island.

[Sean Ryan]

Okay.

[Scott Poteet]

Coronado for instructors. I don't know, maybe. Yeah, that's probably more the weapon school at Nellis.

[Sean Ryan]

So, so you go, so it's regular pilot school, F16 then you teach.

[Scott Poteet]

No, I was just making a comment about the instructors that taught us how to be F16 pilots. They have experience. They were out in the field doing combat missions at operational units around the world. And they'll do that for an assignment or two, anywhere from three to six years and then they'll come back to be instructors.

[Sean Ryan]

That's very similar.

[Scott Poteet]

And then, and then they might go back, you know, do an assignment there for three years and then they'll go back into an operational.

[Sean Ryan]

So I guess what I'm getting at is what's, I mean, you kind of said it sounded like graduation was kind of anti climatic. So what's it like when you show up to your command after you graduate F16 pilot school?

[Scott Poteet]

So when you're in with you, you're.

[Sean Ryan]

In there with experienced.

[Scott Poteet]

Yeah.

[Sean Ryan]

Fighter pilots.

[Scott Poteet]

You Get a little bit of taste at F16 starts getting this little more combat flare operational mindset. Still a schoolhouse, but there's naming traditions and, and you know, Fridays in the, in the bar and you're, you're still doing combat training and then there's a graduation for that and then it's off to your unit. And that is. Those are combat units. This is when we're actually doing the. No you know stuff and depending on where you go. I went to Korea Osan Air Base in Korea, which was to me it's like one of those kind of. It's a remote location so there's not that many families. You can do a command sponsor where the whole family will show up. But 69, 70% of the squadron is bachelors, so there's not families there. So the mentality in Korea is like light your hair on fire, drinking a lot, going downtown, partying, flying awesome combat missions. It's push it up mentality. And it's kind of one of the only remaining. There's two bases in Korea, Kunsan, Osan. I don't know how it's changed in the last 10 years since I've been out, but that was a good. Just a introduction, indoctrination to the combat mentality.

[Sean Ryan]

Are you welcomed or are you treated like an fng?

[Scott Poteet]

No, you're an fng, but you have your LPA Lieutenant Protection Association. It's the mafia. Lieutenant mafia. So there's, there's the, the senior level, the lieutenant colonels, the commander, the director of operations, the do and. And then you got all the crusty old majors and then you have captains and then you have the punk lieutenants. And I think there was nine of us. It was awesome. One, it was just an amazing experience, especially being in Korea. I mean, you saw some crazy in Korea. This was in the late 90s.

[Sean Ryan]

What kind of crazy?

[Scott Poteet]

Oh, just. Just crazy like what? Drinking related crazy shit. You'd go up to Seoul for the weekend. Just we had money to burn and release some steam and energy from all the combat focused training that we were doing.

[Sean Ryan]

So it's like the SEAL teams. It's a work hard play card culture.

[Scott Poteet]

Absolutely, absolutely.

[Sean Ryan]

And all right, before we get into it, let's take a break before, before we get into Korea. But I do want to ask, is that wearing a Breitling?

[Scott Poteet]

I am.

[Sean Ryan]

What is what?

[Scott Poteet]

Don't, don't make fun of me because the battery died on me, so it's perpetually 320.

[Sean Ryan]

Nice.

[Scott Poteet]

It died on me on the way here. I'm too cheap to get a battery to replace it.

[Sean Ryan]

What's with pilots and Breitling? I know it's a pilot's watch.

[Scott Poteet]

This is my Thunderbird watch. So this is the one with the Thunderbird patch.

[Sean Ryan]

Oh, damn, that's cool.

[Scott Poteet]

Yeah, so it's kind of an heirloom. I took it to space, so this has been to space. I have one from weapon school. It's got my weapon school patch on it. I don't know. They're just cool watches.

[Sean Ryan]

Is it emergency?

[Scott Poteet]

This has an elt, but if the battery doesn't work.

[Sean Ryan]

Have you ever deployed one?

[Scott Poteet]

No. They, they told us do not break glass only in an emergency.

[Sean Ryan]

Yeah. Yeah. Cool. All right, well, let's take a break. This episode is sponsored by Roka. Roka is a performance eyewear brand for people who want to invest in themselves. Roka manufactures premium sunglasses, prescription eyeglasses and readers, and cuts all of their lenses here in the US at their headquarters in Austin, Texas. ROKA recently partnered with one of my favorite guests, Dr. Andrew Huberman, to launch a new line of glasses called the Wind down collection. Guys, I've tried these. You know, I have problems sleeping. I absolutely love, love, love these frames and lenses. They're available with and without prescription and have a proprietary red lens that helps filter out short wavelength light. Short wavelength light is in pretty much all artificial light and it's terrible for your sleep. Roka, let me try a pair of these things and I can feel the difference whenever I wear them. I wear them in the evening after the sun goes down. I pretty much start it at dinner and I wear it until bed. And let me tell you, these things work. With so many options and eyewear and wellness products out there, it's a relief to know the glasses I'm wearing help. Two things I really care about, my vision and my sleep. And as a business owner, with all the decisions I already need to make every day, day, wearing a pair of Roka's glasses is one of the best ones I've made. Check them out for [e-mail] and use code SRS for 20% off sitewide at checkout. That's roka.com with code SRS. I'm always on the lookout for ways to get healthier, especially now. That's why I'm so glad I discovered Armor of Colostrum. Armor Colostrum has thousands of people reporting absolutely life changing benefits, tens of thousands of five star reviews and transformational stories. Armor Up Colostrum is a proprietary concentrated bovine colostrum that harnesses over 400 living bioactive nutrients that can help strengthen the barriers of your body and help fuel cellular health for thousands of research backed health benefits. Armor Colostrum can help strengthen immunity and gut health, help improve fitness and metabolism and enhance skin and hair radiance. We've worked out a special offer for my audience. Receive 15% off your first order. Go to triarmora.com SRS or enter SRS to get 15% off your first order. That's T R Y A R M R A.com SRS these statements and products have not been evaluated by the fda. These products are not intended to diagnose, treat, cure or prevent any disease or condition. These statements and information are not a substitute for or alternative to seeking care from your healthcare providers. While we may have won this election, the fight to restore a great nation has just begun. Now is the time to take a stand and Patriot Mobil is leading the charge. As America's only Christian conservative wireless provider, Patriot Mobile offers a way to vote with your wallet without compromising on quality or convenience. Patriot Mobile isn't just about providing exceptional cell phone service. It's a call to action to defend our rights and freedoms. With Patriot Mobile, you'll get outstanding nationwide coverage because they operate on all three major networks. If you have cell phone service today, you can get cell phone service with Patriot Mobile with a coverage guarantee. But the difference is every dollar you spend with Patriot Mobile helps support the first and Second Amendments, the sanctity of life in our veterans and first responders. Switching is easy. Keep your number, keep your phone or upgrade. Their 100% US based customer service support team will help you find the perfect plan. Right now, go to patriotmobile.com SRS or call 972-patriot and get a free month of service with promo code srs. Switch to Patriot Mobile today and defend your freedom with every call and text you make. Visit patriot mobile.com SRS or call 972 Patriot. All right, Scott, we're back from the break. We're in Korea at your first station as a F16 pilot.

[Scott Poteet]

Hmm.

[Sean Ryan]

You met your wife there.

[Scott Poteet]

I did.

[Sean Ryan]

How'd you guys meet?

[Scott Poteet]

She was. She just graduated from college and her older brother was an F16 pilot. So post graduation she decided to go visit her brother with her other brother and we hit it off. She was actually dating another guy at the time. Nothing happened, but we stay connected when she left and then we started corresponding. This was back in the late 90s where MCI calling cards, email didn't exist at the time. So there's no correspondence that way. It was just a couple phone calls now and then. And when I decided to go visit her in Minnesota, where she lived for the weekend, vice versa, she came back to Korea for a couple days, spent a total of like four or five days together, and then she decided to move to Italy with me on my next assignment.

[Sean Ryan]

After living with just spending four or five days together. A couple days together, and then she's moving to Italy.

[Scott Poteet]

She's moving to Italy. Yeah.

[Sean Ryan]

Right on.

[Scott Poteet]

We knew we named our kids before we even, you know, hung out. Right on. What do they call it? Hanging out?

[Sean Ryan]

What was it about her?

[Scott Poteet]

Oh, my gosh. Now you're. Man. She's. She's absolutely beautiful. She's caring. She's fun. I don't know. Just. We just knew right off the bat. Yeah. Didn't take much to persuade her and vice versa. But we. We moved to Italy together. That was my second assignment. So Korea is only a year because it's remote.

[Sean Ryan]

Anything significant happened in Korea with F16 blowing up?

[Scott Poteet]

No.

[Sean Ryan]

Yeah.

[Scott Poteet]

No. It's pretty stable over there. You're. You're constantly prepared for an invasion.

[Sean Ryan]

Big party.

[Scott Poteet]

Big party, nice parties. A lot of nice traveling to and from Seoul.

[Sean Ryan]

Sounds like a UCOM in the SEAL teams.

[Scott Poteet]

Yes.

[Sean Ryan]

Maybe a Thailand deployment.

[Scott Poteet]

Thailand.

[Sean Ryan]

Although I never back in the day, even today.

[Scott Poteet]

Oh, really?

[Sean Ryan]

It's pretty. Yeah. Pretty wild.

[Scott Poteet]

Okay.

[Sean Ryan]

All right. Have you been to Thailand?

[Scott Poteet]

You don't remember? Philippines? No, I've never been to Thailand. Japan and Korea.

[Sean Ryan]

Where's your favorite place?

[Scott Poteet]

By far? Italy. No.

[Sean Ryan]

Italy.

[Scott Poteet]

Yeah. As far as what?

[Sean Ryan]

I don't know.

[Scott Poteet]

What's the criteria?

[Sean Ryan]

Anywhere you've been out of. Everywhere you've been in the world. Italy. That's where you. That's where he liked to be.

[Scott Poteet]

Yeah.

[Sean Ryan]

Why?

[Scott Poteet]

The culture, the environment, the food, the wine.

[Sean Ryan]

What about the culture?

[Scott Poteet]

They're so laid back and relaxed. We are so uptight in the US and it's just constant coming and going. That was the biggest.

[Sean Ryan]

It's interesting. I mean, you're a super competitive guy since childhood.

[Scott Poteet]

Yeah.

[Sean Ryan]

Roaming around the streets looking. Looking for people.

[Scott Poteet]

I can be everyone else. Just chill out. It's. It's me. Full throttle. No, we lived there three years and then an extra three years, so a total of six. Three with before kids and three after kids. So we got to explore kind of two different worlds, I guess, two different time frames. But the culture is just laid back and it's. Aviano is right. It's. It's about an hour north of Venice, it's right at the beach, the base of the Dolomites. So everything north is the Alps and everything south is farmland, flats, vineyards. And it's rural, It's. There's no. Venice's an hour. Portanone is the biggest town. It's, I don't know, half the size of Nashville maybe. And there's no base housing, so you live amongst the local villages and it literally, it's, you know, the 1500s, 1600s villages. And it's just a pocket where some creeks meet and, you know, crevices in the mountains. And we lived in San Giovanni de Pco, just a small town, right up nestled, actually. It's really cool because the hotel there, Mussolini and Hitler stayed in. Not that that's cool, but tiny, tiny little town, just beautiful. And the. Everyone's just laid back, just. Adamani, Adamani. We'll get to it tomorrow. Adamani, you know, the Reposo. In the middle of the day, one to three, everything shuts down. August is completely shut down. So when you get there, it's just like you have this wake up, you know, this culture shock because you're expecting convenience stores on the corner and 247 and get what you need and no, you, you go at the pace of the locals. And once you get used to it, it's just like, this is chill. I biked all up and down where the way they do the giro races and stuff like that, it's just, it's just beautiful. And the food, it's. I swear it's the water that comes out of the aqueducts underneath the mountains. So simple, very, very simple ingredients. But the food is the best ever and.

[Sean Ryan]

Right on.

[Scott Poteet]

Same with the wine.

[Sean Ryan]

Right on.

[Scott Poteet]

Yeah. So we go back once a year, actually.

[Sean Ryan]

Oh, really?

[Scott Poteet]

Yeah. Going back this week. My buddy who's on the Thunderbirds, he's the commander of Aviano, the air base there, and I'm going to be speaking at one of his events, so.

[Sean Ryan]

Very cool, very cool. So what were you doing in Italy? What was the, what was the mission?

[Scott Poteet]

So I was assigned to the Triple Nickel, 555th Fighter Squadron. There's two squadrons there and it's just this constant rotation who's deployed. What's tough about Aviano is that it's centrally located in you Safi ucom, so you're constantly pulled in so many different directions because you're close proximity to more or less everything that's of interest. So whether it's a show of force, you know, the, the Baltic policing, flying it out of Romania or Poland. Show forces around the world. Africa. We went to Morocco.

[Sean Ryan]

How long does it take an F16 to get from central Italy to Poland? That's a good ways.

[Scott Poteet]

No, it's a couple. It's not like we fly super fast because when you do that it's like a race car eating gas.

[Sean Ryan]

Okay.

[Scott Poteet]

So it's not like you have the legs, you're limited on range and. And you're going to be conservative. So you're flying airline speeds and if you're relying upon those tankers then you got to fly their speed or work some rejoin and route. So it's nothing. Everyone asking, you know, how quickly can you get across the country and stuff like that. It's. You typically don't. Gotcha.

[Sean Ryan]

What's the typical flight time?

[Scott Poteet]

You can stretch it F16s if you external tanks. Depends on how much gas you're carrying. But we would do. You could probably stretch it out two and a half, three plus hours if you're really back on the throttle and high altitude and winds are good and blah blah, blah.

[Sean Ryan]

Okay.

[Scott Poteet]

But it's not. You don't want to stay too long. The longest flight I ever had. This was actually the one of my favorite deployments. It was punk lieutenant and we do these traditions as fighter pilots. We have flat top February mustache March. And so in Korea we deploy to Alaska for Cope Thunder just operation Exercise. It's middle of the winter so there's no sun. So we have like, we're pasty white and we got these flat tops. So we're there for a couple, you know, raging as much as you can rage in, you know, middle of Alaska. And then we're going to take our jets and go shoot some missiles for test down in Panama City Spring break. So you got these pasty white dudes and these overgrown haircut flat tops and these. We start to grow these cheesy mustaches. We thought we were somebody. So that was that. Nine corps of lieutenants, the lpa. We did that. It was like a month and a half. We were on the road just doing fun stuff. So anyways, I can't remember where I was going with that. Oh, Longest sortie. Longest sortie coming home from that. We launched from Omaha, Nebraska and we stretch it all the way to get home to Korea. It's the longest I've ever been in F16. It was 13.2 sorting. 13 hours. Wow. It was extremely painful.

[Sean Ryan]

I'll bet.

[Scott Poteet]

And you know we got. I can't remember how many aircraft. 8 ish. 8 or 12. And the one of the flight leads in my formation. I'm a wingman, just a young punk. And it's day into night. And then there's weather now in Korea. So it's raining and you're sleeping. You know, it's. It's a long. You're popping drugs to stay awake, and then it's time to get your game on because you're gonna. You're landing in weather at night, wet Runway. And we need. When my flight lead took off 13 hours prior, he had a. A brake failure. And at night, you know, you. Ambient light and MVGs, you're gonna turn some lights down or turn them off or, you know, pop them to pull out the bulb. And he was getting annoyed by his brake failure light, so he pops it out so you don't see it anymore. 13 hours go by, and he completely forgets about it. So he's in the F16 in front of me. He lands Brick 1, puts the nose down, applies the brake, and nothing. So back up, you know, at that point is to put the hook down and take the cable. And if you take the cable, the Runway's completely shut down. So I'm this lieutenant, I'm in the touchdown, approaching his aircraft in front of me, and I. He's like, aboard, Aboard. Or. I can't remember what he said, but he's like, brake failure. So, you know. You know, you've been flying for 13 hours. It's raining. The last thing you're thinking about is your instrument departure when you're just trying to put this aircraft on the deck, and all you want to do is get out of this cockpit. But pouring rain, wet Runway, got to take off, and now we got to divert up to Suwon, which is just another base, so your asses and elbows just trying to pull up charts and land this aircraft safely. But that was the longest sortie I ever flew.

[Sean Ryan]

Was a long damn time.

[Scott Poteet]

Yeah. And it's no bigger than this seat. I mean, it's. I got a fist width between the top of the helmet and the canopy, and you got little rails you can put your arms in. I'm not a big guy. I. There's some. I got a buddy who's 65 and he flew Vipers, but it's actually sitting height, so it's from your butt to the top of your head. If you have short, stubby legs, you can be 6 5. But if you got a. Or no vice versa. If you got long legs, you're fine. If you get short, stubby legs and you got a Long torso. That's the issue. Yeah, that's the reason why the seat is banked back there is because it just fits into the cockpit. The Asus 2 seat.

[Sean Ryan]

Interesting. So anything significant operationally happen in Italy?

[Scott Poteet]

We deployed. This was late 90s, early 2000s, before 9 11, we were still doing Operation Northern Watch, Silent Watch. So you had the north swath and the south swath of Iraq. That was no fly zone for them. They'd launch their MIGs to do these mock runs, but they wouldn't get anywhere near. And we would sit there and patrol. You know, every once in a while you'd go after a couple targets, AAA pieces that were getting too close to the no fly zone, that were a threat to us patrolling. And then we ended up. We took on the Sandy roll Cesar as F16s, which is a challenge. Leave that to the A10s and the helos. But we deployed to Incirlik, Turkey, we'd fly across to the Northern Watch, Kuwait, we'd do the Southern Watch. So we did a bunch of those deployments. And then 911 hit. And I was in my second year. I had one more year left at Aviano. And I was in my. I was in my boss's office, the 06, and I walk in, and he's got the only TV on base because this is again 2001 in Italy, and they just didn't have that kind of technology. And we're watching the tower go down. And we immediately went into alert posture because we didn't know what they were going to expect of us, you know, after. You know, in reflection, it was. It took a while where there was any true movement and deployments. And it's not like we can do much from that location. Takes a deployment to get, and that. That takes some effort. And there's a cycle process. There's units back in the States that are on. So it's. It just depends on where you're at. And you. Same with the seals as far as when you're tasked to go do something, but we're certainly not going to respond like you typically would. So as things began to heat up, I got selected for weapon school, Fighter weapons school, now called the Air Force Weapons School because there's more than just fighters there. There's everything in the Air Force inventory has a weapon school now, but back then it was called the Fighter Weapons School. It's the Air Force version of Top gun, but it's six months long. It's like getting your PhD in all things tactics. So I was selected for that and then I went to Nellis Air Force Base in Las Vegas which is pretty much all the all thing tactics.

[Sean Ryan]

So what exactly is weapon school?

[Scott Poteet]

So it's a six month long program. You go under the banner of your MDS, your airframe. For me it was F16s. So I go to the F16 fighter weapons school. And the hierarchy of within the fighter community is you start off as a wingman and then eventually maybe a couple years you'll go in as a two ship flight lead. So now you can lead around a wingman and then from there you'll go to a four ship flight lead. So now you can lead four aircraft. From there you'll be an instructor. Your next step is to be an instructor. And then once you become an instructor, you can become a flight evaluator. Just given exams, checkrides. But once you become a seasoned instructor, you can apply and compete for fighter weapons school. And the idea behind fighter weapons school is to hone your skills, tactics, techniques and procedures for all things F16s as well as everything else in the inventory. And you become a weapons officer. And so every unit is going to have a dedicated weapons officer who's more or less in charge of that organization's preparation for combat. There might be a couple patch, they're called patch wearers. It's a bullseye patch gray. The commander might be a patch where the deal might be a patch where there might be a couple. But the dedicated position that you're, you're more or less your commitment to go. If you go to this school, your commitment is to be at least for three years a patch wearer, a weapons officer.

[Sean Ryan]

Okay.

[Scott Poteet]

And you are the expert. You are teaching your youngest wingman to your most seasoned ip. You're responsible for, for training them and preparing them for combat deployments. And it's cyclical, you'll go through different phases. Hey, here's my training plan for the year. We're going to focus on air to air. We're going to focus on CAST during this month and then we're going to do our combat prep for the specific mission we're going to do in Afghanistan, Iraq and then we're going to deploy. And so he's responsible for, for developing that. You go to Korea to be a weapons officer. Your primary job is to prepare for war against North Korea. So he's, he or she's focused on developing those plans.

[Sean Ryan]

Interesting.

[Scott Poteet]

So that's the role behind weapon school. And it's six months and it's the most intense thing I've Ever done really? Oh yeah, it's you sleep, eat and breathe, all things tactics. You have no responsibilities other than just to graduate. You know, the day you show up, you get a manual. Let's stack that high on the research philosophy or radar philosophy. It's kind of a haze, but they're like, hey, here's your manuals. You have two days to study this and you're gonna have an exam. You know, so it's just this overwhelming fire hose effect because it's, you know, you're taught all this stuff going through the ranks to up to instructor pilot. That's five, six, seven years before you get to this point post pilot training. But you take it to a, a whole new level. You know, you'll fly one mission and, and it's phase based, it's that building block approach. So you start off BFM, that, that 1v1 dog fighting skills. You got to hone those skills. Then the, the 2v2 and then the 4v4 and then these huge massive employments towards the end of the graduation to include all the air to ground missions. So you're, you're learning everything you possibly can throughout each phase. And you might fly a one hour flight assorting BFM1 mission. You'll put five, six hours of prep into that. You'll fly for one hour and you might debrief it for 10 hours. You're dissecting every single thing that you did to hone your skills and become the best tactician that you possibly can be. You can be going to debrief sun setting and by the time you come out and sun's rising, you go grab, you know, dinner at the, or breakfast at the 2Five Club or something across the street at Nellis. But that's your life for six months and everyone's, you know, on edge and am I going to survive this program? Am I going to make it through? Yeah, because there is a washout rate and it's very intense.

[Sean Ryan]

Interesting.

[Scott Poteet]

Yeah.

[Sean Ryan]

Let's talk about when is the first time that you, you flew a combat mission.

[Scott Poteet]

There's certainly different flavors of combat. Some of the missions up in Korea you're flying the patrol along the border, those are considered combat. The Northern Watch, Southern Watch, some every once in a while you would employ against some AAA piece out in the middle. Honestly, it wasn't till the, towards the end of my career when I deployed to Afghanistan at the heat of ISIS 2015 doing counterterrorism missions that it was like every day you're employing.

[Sean Ryan]

You remember the first One.

[Scott Poteet]

I do yeah. So our configuration loadout what we're carrying for munitions we have all my bros are going to give me if I can't Remember. There's a GBU 38 and a GBU 54. These are 500 pound bombs. They're guided either coordinates that you put in or laser. You can use your targeting pod and a laser designator with the same PRF code and designate a target but those are typically not fast movers. Those are stationary targets, buildings. KS19 piece out in the open or camouflage you know based on the intel you're trying to figure it out. And we carry a maverick so that's the tank buster. That's I think a 300 pound warhead that it's a, it's a missile and that's can be guided saying but it's typically guided. It's, it's the way you employ it as a two ship. So you got one aircraft that's going to roll in three to five nautical mile wheel rolling at certain altitude and point at the target general area, put the thing on the thing, launch the, the Maverick and it's whoosh. It just rockets off your aircraft. And the other wingman is up, stacked up high and through all the coordination, the nine line, the, the verification of target identification, the designator is up stacked up high and he's just staring at his 4 by 4 inch screen targeting pod. He's got the thing on the thing and he's lazing that target. 20:32 second time of flight and shack the target. And so my first employment was against a vehicle that was on the move. And you know, depending on your timing and when you flew these missions day, night, sometimes it got hot. It was like every time you went up it was kind of you're getting targets and the way that it was run back then was just kind of a progressive approach on we're not going to hit your average, what were they called? Mams Male our military average male. Age I can't remember the 3:1 term for them but it wasn't like we were just going after your basic terrorist. They were progressively looking for a higher value target based on resources and all the intel and scenario and what was going on at that time in Afghanistan I had one vehicle that was, had five ma'ams, the, the males all terraced, all verified. We've been tracking it for days because how it, you know, they, they'd find one guy human, we'd figure out who it was and we'd watch him for the next you know, proof of flat or you know, what is it called?

[Sean Ryan]

You were in on this planning process?

[Scott Poteet]

No, most of this was done. I did a little bit of at the jock at Bagram, but it wasn't, Most of us was, we were just getting the intel feed before we took off. We'd fly a four hour sortie, refuel every once an hour kind of thing and we'd be given a region. We flew out of Bagram so we're centrally located. So we were flying all over. And it was pretty hot along the Pakistan border up by Tajikistan, was pretty hot and then some in the mountains up in the northeast corner. But we would, we'd have more and more confidence as things developed. And we're like, okay, this is a high probability sortie kind of thing. And we get the initial intel and then once you get on, on scene in the ao, they would give you, you know, intel update and a nine line if there was a potential for a target. And now you're building your situational awareness over the target area. And once you get the information you put in your systems and now you're just trying to get eyes on to the target and then you got to go through the verification. Depending on who you're talking to. Most of it we're talking people who are in the jock with feed from you know, high def predators. And then you know, we had a certain type of munition. The predators had hellfires but depending on how big the target was or how critical it was, you were going to choose the platform that best suited that target weaponary and the, the target set. And this was a vehicle that had five terrorists in it. And we decided to, it was on the move. So we decided to do a maverick attack. And my wingman was going to be the shooting platform and I was going to lase it. And as, as soon as he rolled in, he neglected to go master arm hot. So there's, there's an option on the, on the master arm switch that goes simulate off or master arm hot. Well, it's just a habit pattern to go into sim because training, you know, 99% of your flying is training. So he goes to sim, rolls in, shoots, doesn't come off the aircraft because it's loud. It just. And so he has to recover because you have a very, very small window in range kind of thing. So as soon as he comes off, he spooks the vehicle so it stops all five just run. Oh, so we burned the target at this point and we're like, that's, that was our chance they're, they're gone to the wind. So we leave and we stand off out of earshot, but we have enough gas and a couple hours left. So we just wait for the next, you know, update. Well, lo and behold, they decide, oh, they're gone, let's get back in the vehicle. So they all slowly, one by one come back and they're like, holy shit, this is developing. Let's get back in this. So we get a little bit closer and again continue to earshot and then we switch roles. So I'm going to roll in and employ. And my wingman lases it, but he was pissed. Hey had his chance.

[Sean Ryan]

So you did it.

[Scott Poteet]

Yeah.

[Sean Ryan]

How'd that feel?

[Scott Poteet]

It's pretty intense. You know, it's. At the time it's like isis, you know, we're watching people, orange jumpsuits stuck in cages, drowned and burned alive. So there was, there was a lot of rage, I guess in our mindset changed too because what we're taught in survival training, you know, be able to talk your way out, resist the, any torture you might experience if you're ever caught and how to evade. And once that all started developing, it was, all bets are off, man. I'm bringing extra. Nothing compared to what you guys are carrying. But I'm going to, I'm going to bring extra couple clips. I had one dude who was carrying a machete that was strapped to his leg. Like that's gonna do anything, God bless him. But it was like, if you have to go down, you either get hit, your engine fails, good luck. Yeah, you know, I fight to the death kind of mentality versus, you know, play your game, figure it out, try to manipulate your situation until someone arrives kind of thing. But, you know, and it was real. I mean, we had two guys that got hit total golden BB kind of theory. He was doing an employment and whether it was a AK47, some guy on the side of a mountain taking, you know, plinking shots, put a hole in his ventral fin, those fins in the back of the aircraft, put a big old hole right through that. No idea until he got on the ground and did his post flight check. But he's like, holy, there's a big hole. And then one guy, he was flying too low, too long and they took a shot at him and it hit his Amraam, his AIM120 missile, which is on the wingtips. It's for air to air employment, which is never going to happen in Afghanistan. But it hit the missile and the missile caught on fire. So the the wingtip of his aircraft's on fire and so he's emergency, he's trying to get back to Bagram and I'm sitting supervisory position and so I have a radio with me and I hear this and I'm going out to see this. But thankfully the airflow eventually put the fire out. He didn't have to punch or anything like that. But we're flying a single seat, single engine aircraft, so it's very reliable. GE and Pratt Whitney depending on what airframe you're what, what flavor F16 you're flying, but still only one engine and it, you know, there's no glide ratio in the Viper. It's going to fall like a rock and you're gonna have to punch.

[Sean Ryan]

So how did it feel for you though? You described your wingman's approach and mess with the sims and then you just breeze right by your, your approach.

[Scott Poteet]

It'S satisfying too grotesque. You know, in combat, the highs and lows you experience are. It's all too familiar with any type of combat. And I think the most intense emotional experience is having to make decisions that will hopefully save the lives of the friendlies on the ground. But you also have to deal with the consequences of your actions that you're taking the life of the enemy. I, I pray that when I meet my day, it's, I'm judged based on, you know, making the right decisions based on the information I had at the time and. But it's heavy. You got to deal with. Happened a lot on this deployment.

[Sean Ryan]

You took a lot of lives.

[Scott Poteet]

There were quite a few, yeah.

[Sean Ryan]

When did that start to affect you? When did you start thinking about answering to God at the end?

[Scott Poteet]

It's always been there and I think.

[Sean Ryan]

It'S, you know, was it there on the approach?

[Scott Poteet]

No, no. There is a moment that, and I don't know if other fighter pilots experience it, but it's like right before you push the button, squeeze the trigger, there's just this intense, not apprehension, but just massive adrenaline rush on do I have all the information that I need? Am I making. And I don't know if it's the same for pulling a trigger on a gun, but I've employed it all. I've shot the gun in anger. I've 500 pound bombs, Mavericks, it's, there's always this, I hope this is the right decision, but. And I think you have more time to think about it when it's those scenarios where it's an element of surprise. There are situations where they're shooting at me and I have zero hesitation. I wouldn't even call it hesitation. It's just this intense feeling of, I hope this is the right decision. Because it's, you know, I think it's one thing to look through a scope or be close to the enemy, but I'm, you know, up at 20,000ft.

[Sean Ryan]

Did it make you feel like your career was complete?

[Scott Poteet]

Yes, I'll be honest. Absolutely. You know, timing is everything.

[Sean Ryan]

I think there's. I think there's, like, in any combat role, fighter pilot, ground guy, tank, whatever it is, you know, the mission is to go and to kill people. And there's a selfishness in that. And I think. I think a lot of people think they may have a failed career if they never get the opportunity to take somebody's life in combat. And that's how we think of it. We think of it as, I never got to kill somebody.

[Scott Poteet]

But is this how we're trained to think like that?

[Sean Ryan]

I think it is. It may be not how we're trained, but it's how the culture is, you know, because. And how fucked up is that? If you think about it, I never got the opportunity to fucking kill somebody.

[Scott Poteet]

To employ an anger. Yep.

[Sean Ryan]

Whereas, you know, most normal people would say, you know, I never had to do that. I never had to kill somebody. And so I think the culture, you know, makes you. Manifests that inside of you.

[Scott Poteet]

But.

[Sean Ryan]

But at the same time, you know, when you're talking about meeting, Meeting, you know, God or Jesus and answering. Answering, you know, to all those scenarios that you played out. You know what I mean? There's also. I mean, there is a selfishness, because I know what you're talking about. And. But it's also comes down to, you know, I mean, you're a Christian. We're going to get into, you know, we're going to get into that. Your experience later. But, you know, I think it all comes down to what's in your heart. Right. You know, you think you're doing the right thing.

[Scott Poteet]

Right.

[Sean Ryan]

They think they're doing the right thing. They're just doing what they believe is right, and you're just doing what you believe is right. Right?

[Scott Poteet]

Absolutely. And if you don't do that thing. In several employments, I had quite a few. It's like, if I don't. Because right now they're getting shot at, and who knows how that's going to develop? They're hunkered down, the threat's got RPGs, and, you know, they're pinned down. And so if I do hesitate or I miss a switch or I'm willing to make that decision based on knowing it's helping my side, I guess.

[Sean Ryan]

Yeah.

[Scott Poteet]

No, I mean, it's.

[Sean Ryan]

And they're thinking the same thing.

[Scott Poteet]

Yeah.

[Sean Ryan]

If they don't plant that bomb on the side of the road and kill Americans and more of them are gonna die. It's just a, it's a, it's really kind of, you know, it's just fascinating to think about.

[Scott Poteet]

Yeah.

[Sean Ryan]

And because everybody is legitimately just doing what they think is right.

[Scott Poteet]

So who sets the guidelines? You know, who? God.

[Sean Ryan]

Yep. But when did that, you know, when did you, when did that kind of stuff start entering your head?

[Scott Poteet]

It was always there because there's always that moment when you're pushing. There's always the freefall of the munition, you know, the time of flight, anywhere from 20 seconds out to a minute, depending on, you know, how you're releasing it. But that whole time is just like, it's very compartmentalized. It's like check and double check that I've done everything that I possibly can to mitigate any collateral damage concerns. But then the whole flight home, you're thinking about it and then going through the debrief and analyzing the BDA after the fact. I mean, I don't know if you ever fully get over it other than, you know, it's there and I'll have to answer for it.

[Sean Ryan]

Well, I mean, on the other, on the other, you know, I mean, we're not talking about civilian casualties here. But then on the, on the other hand, everybody's very aware of the consequences. Everybody's, everybody involved, you know, is aware of what the ultimate consequences. You are aware what happens if you go down, you talk, you know, orange jumpsuits, beheadings, burning you alive, whatever, torture. And they're just as aware the consequences if they get compromised, that there's going to be a 500 pound bomb that lands on their vehicle. And so, you know, it's voluntary. Everybody's, Everybody on both sides is fully aware of what the consequences of engaging in war is.

[Scott Poteet]

I guess that's why we sign up to serve.

[Sean Ryan]

Yep. So, you know, I don't know. I think a lot about it, but, you know, the whole thing is, you know, Jesus knows what's in your heart. And I think that's all that matters.

[Scott Poteet]

Absolutely. We're definitely influenced by our experiences too. And that's why, especially the older I get, the more centered I want to be on following Jesus. And I mean, look how screwed up our world is. It's easy to get caught thinking the sky is falling and the world's going to end. But if you're centered in your faith, we're not in control. We're all sinful. We have free will and that's probably our demise, you know, but we're not in control. I hope I made the decisions that I did in combat for the right reasons.

[Sean Ryan]

How long were you over there?

[Scott Poteet]

Fighter squadrons typically do like six month rotations, so that time was six months in 2015. Before that they were anywhere from 90 days to six months. We were coming and going. We'd spent half Aviano that central located. I mean you barely had time to enjoy the country because you were constantly coming and going. You'd come back to the States to do red flag exercises, big coalition force type exercises with hundreds of aircraft at Nellis Air Force Base in Las Vegas where we spent six years for various assignments. But yeah, that deployment was six months.

[Sean Ryan]

How many missions did you fly, do you know?

[Scott Poteet]

I was flying every other day, probably every two days sometimes I was in a leadership position. So you got the squadrons and then above that is the group and the wing. I was at the group level, but flying with the squadrons. I was just old into my career. I was 20 year point, so I would fly as much as they let me.

[Sean Ryan]

Yeah, yeah. It's crazy, man. I haven't done one of these type of interviews in a little bit.

[Scott Poteet]

Yeah, it's that you strike a chord with the whole feeling complete in a career. And I don't know if it's just the fighter pilot or the operator mentality.

[Sean Ryan]

It's the fighter mentality, man. It is the warrior mentality because that.

[Scott Poteet]

Is certainly how it is in our world. I've done things that are. That take me off that track with Thunderbirds and test and aggressors, but it's almost a blessing and a curse.

[Sean Ryan]

I mean, you get to experience maybe not you get. You experience something that. I mean there's just next to nobody that experiences that.

[Scott Poteet]

No, in fact, I've been speaking more keynotes and stuff and one of my stories is combat. And it's like I almost have to take a step back because even doing interviews and talking about it, it's like you got to put this in perspective. How do you apply this to someone who doesn't necessarily go to work? That's life or death situation. Other than, you know, our frontline providers, it's. Yeah, it's a tough conversation to have too. I'm struggling to articulate exactly how I feel at this Point. It's just because it's definitely there. No doubt of it. Especially as you get older, you know, and kids and.

[Sean Ryan]

Would you want your kids to go to war?

[Scott Poteet]

Would I want them to go to war?

[Sean Ryan]

If your kid wanted to be an F16 pilot or whatever the equivalent is today.

[Scott Poteet]

You call me old.

[Sean Ryan]

You know.

[Scott Poteet]

Yes, it is. It's a legacy platform.

[Sean Ryan]

Would you want them to have those experiences?

[Scott Poteet]

If you ask me what I want them to serve, I would be honored. I. I will never pressure my kids if they want to be whatever they want. I don't. I could care less. I just want them happy and to pursue something that they're passionate about. Not some societal expectation, sports, employment, jobs, whatever, academics. I just want them to pursue something they are passionate about because that's exactly what I did. And I feel very blessed and happy of what I went through. So if they wanted to serve, I would be very proud and honored. And I. There's a chance a couple of my teenagers might, but if they don't, I don't. I don't care as long as they're living a life that they're happy with. I certainly don't want them serving just because of me. Now, to get to. I've been avoiding your question, which I want them to go to war, I would say no. And that's. I don't know if that's selfish in the fact that I don't want my kids at risk and the shit I've seen and been through. I. Because there were plenty of times, not even in combat, just. I was a split decision of death because of just the nature of the business. You know, I fly on a Thunderbird show and I delayed a rejoin too long, and the aircraft pulls nine GS. I pulled 10.5 GS because I thought I was gonna hit the ground. And, you know, I recovered 100ft from the ground, which is in a fighter jet that's. That's damn close. And so it's just like those split decisions is. Could have gone completely different. I've had plenty of people. Good buddy of mine, I was stationed in Aviano, Trojan Gilbert, he was in combat and he was strafing and recovery for strafe is like 75ft. So you get in amongst them in a. When you're shooting the gun. And he ended up dying in combat. And so it's just like. Doesn't take much, you know. Yeah. But you could also get hit by a car walking across the road.

[Sean Ryan]

Well, I think, you know, I'm more asking Would you, You know, do you want. I think about this all the time.

[Scott Poteet]

You know, especially with kids.

[Sean Ryan]

And I mean, you know, who I have on the show and this. The stuff that we talk about and the toll that it takes and the burden you have to fucking live with afterwards and all. I mean, I don't know what. I don't know what it's like for pilots, but, I mean, the suicide rate amongst special ops guys is just astronomical. You can see it. You can see the load we're all carrying. I mean, immediately. And I just. I think about that. I mean, it really changes you.

[Scott Poteet]

How. Like, how do you see it? Body language, carry themselves.

[Sean Ryan]

You can see it in their eyes. I mean, it's like stoic, emotionless, lack of humor, just a heaviness.

[Scott Poteet]

Is that because of enduring all the experiences, or is it the intensity of the experience? Or is it.

[Sean Ryan]

I don't know. I think. I think the verdict's still out on that. I think it's just all of it. I think it's. I think it's resentment because other people didn't have to experience it. They don't understand. I think it's the experience itself. I think it's the guilt, it's the loss. I think it's all of it, you know, wrapped up and. And that's the product that you get.

[Scott Poteet]

I think you guys certainly have it a lot worse because you're. You're down there. It's a lot different from 20, 30,000ft.

[Sean Ryan]

Yeah, maybe. Maybe not. But, you know, it sounds like you're struggling with it.

[Scott Poteet]

Yeah, maybe that's what brings me closer to my faith. Hopefully. It's not like me trying to justify, but.

[Sean Ryan]

Yeah. How did you find your faith?

[Scott Poteet]

So I grew up. We went to church in Georgia, but it was more of a formality. I think the extended family was. It was part of the expectation, but I don't remember much of it. Sunday school, getting donuts and Krispy Kreme afterwards. That was about it. Once we moved up at age 5, we didn't step foot in a church. It wasn't a part of my upbringing. I always believed there was, you know, something I just didn't. Was ignorant. I just didn't have the education or mentorship. And it actually wasn't until, in fact, I didn't even know if I was baptized. We grew up Lutheran and then married my wife, and she's very, very Strong Christian. And 2011, I was. We were. I can't remember where we're stationed, but we were on vacation in Minnesota her parents house live on a lake, cabin on a lake. And our kids are, I can't remember, two, four and six, two girls and a boy. And our four year old's going to be baptized and, and so that's part of the trip to up north and, and so we're up there for vacation. Things are all going on and, and it's fourth of July and we're, we're having prep for fireworks. We get the whole, all the dads are getting together. The kids have been playing on the lake all day and it's evening now. They're, you know, shepherd inside to take baths and get in their jammies and get ready for the fireworks. And we go out back, not the lakeside, we go up garage, it's like 300 yards away. Tree lines, it's, it's out of earshot and everything. And my four year old daughter Maddie, she sneaks out of the house, sneaks down to the dock. She's looking for a toy she left and she reaches over and falls off the dock into the water. And I'm up completely earshot away, can't see, can't hear anything. We're in the garage working, music's going. And all of a sudden I over, I'm overcome with panic. I just, complete panic, hair on the back of my head. I just, I start freaking out and I just run out of the garage and I run around the house and I don't even know where I'm going and I just run towards the water and I'm, I don't even know what I'm looking for, but I'm just panicking, starting to yell. And all of a sudden I see a body out in the water and it's Maddie face down in the water about, I don't know, 50 yards off the dock. And I dive in, pull her to the dock and resuscitate her. And she, you know, she comes back pretty quick and it just, I'm screaming to God, you know, please save my daughter. And we take her to the ER and she gets checked out and absolutely nothing wrong. No idea how long she was down. The doctor thinks she was down for probably about two to three minutes. And the sheer divine coincidence of the entire situation is that we were baptized just hours before together because she was scheduled to get baptized. And my wife says, hey, we don't know if you've been baptized. Do you want to get baptized with Maddie? And I'm like, sure, I'll go along to get along. I believe in something. Sounds like a good idea. We bond. And this was literally hours before saving her life. And, you know, that was God, divine intervention. You know, there's no way. It wasn't. Because I was. I was heads down in the garage, couldn't hear anything. And I just. Sheer panic. So he was getting my attention. And I'm still, you know, processing my faith. It's a journey. I am fully committed. It's, you know, common question when you go to interviews and stuff like that. It's like, what are you reading? You know, what's the latest book you read? I'm just reading the Bible. I find my guidance and messages, and you name it, I'm reading the Bible just to. Because I think that's the answer to everything.

[Sean Ryan]

When did this happen? What's the timeline here?

[Scott Poteet]

2011. 2011, 14 years ago. Yeah. And so that's what brought me closer to Christ. And it's only getting more and more intense or matured over the years. You know, going to space, there's just moments that you're trying to make sense of everything. And it's just this. It's a battle, it's a. It's a journey. It's. It's challenging because back to that whole, you know, we have free will, we can think. We have the freedom to think anything we want and make decisions that we want. But I'm trying to focus my life on making the decisions that puts God first and that, you know, it's kind of why I want to speak more at this point in my life, is to share my stories and hopefully God can use me as a voice to get his message out. If you had any more experiences, nothing that intense. You know, there were moments on orbit where I'm trying to reflect and, you know, it's this. I had this overwhelming sensation of feeling insignificant on orbit. Just looking down, knowing there's 8 billion people down there on the planet. And, you know, I'm traveling around every hour and a half and 17,500 miles an hour. And I'm just trying to make sense of it all and. And put significance behind it. And I've been reminded constantly when I get into the Word and start reading, it's just like, it's not about me. Stop making it about you. There's a greater good, there's a greater cause, there's a higher purpose. I'm so stubborn, and I need to learn how to listen better, because that's what I, you know, that's that journey, that's that struggle that I feel is like we just constantly bouncing off the bumpers through life and it's like, it's selfish endeavors and then I got to bring it back to more of a centrally focused faith walk and yeah, it's a bit of a ramble.

[Sean Ryan]

Well, that's pretty big experience was for.

[Scott Poteet]

Me, that it was.

[Sean Ryan]

And you said your daughter was in there for they estimate 20 minutes?

[Scott Poteet]

No, two to three minutes.

[Sean Ryan]

Okay, yeah, yeah. Where the hell did I get 20? Yeah, she was, we were two to three minutes. I mean, yeah, I mean she was.

[Scott Poteet]

Blue when I pulled her up. Never felt so helpless in my life, you know. Feel like you're invincible.

[Sean Ryan]

What did you do? CPR.

[Scott Poteet]

I started resuscitating. She started, you know, after 30 seconds or so she starts coughing up and getting a little bit of her color back and she comes too. And then we're worried about, you know, brain function at that point and oxygen deprivation. Take her to the ER and like check her out. Absolutely nothing wrong with her. She's a healthy little four year old. Pigtails. Yeah. Now she's a pain in the ass. 17 year old.

[Sean Ryan]

What do you mean reflection when you're up in space?

[Scott Poteet]

I can certainly talk about this when we get to space, but it's, it's. They call it the overview effect and it affects people differently. It's the, this literally it's, it's a cognitive shift that happens in your perception of. It could be your perception of visual what you're seeing of the planet, life perspective. It can be spiritual, it can be intellectual. But when you see the planet from, especially with the altitude that we went to, it's the highest that anyone's been in 50 years since Apollo 17. It's the highest Earth orbit ever flown. And it's, and it's almost like this. My immediate response or feeling was like it's this visual illustration of what life must have been like back at the creation of the heavens and the Earth because all you can see is oceans and continents. You can't make it any details, you know, because when we. That's on the, the apogee, the furthest part of the orbit. It's highly cyclical. So it's pretty close on the perigee. The backside was really close, 190 kilometers. So it's 1400 by 190. So it's, it's very far. And then we skim and when you're skimming the atmosphere, it's like you can see contrails, you can see geographical features, all these land masses. But up above it looks like what the planet must have looked like. Its creation so when you have this perspective and you're going through this overview effect, it's just. For me, it was, it was, it was that feeling initially of insignificance and trying to make sense of it all. And it's what's unique and it's almost like this. And that's why I'm so interested in some of your podcasts like the, the NDEs. And when Pastor Burke talks about some of the, some of the things that he's interviewed the 1500 people with the ND experiences, it's like. And this is by no means anywhere near what they've gone through, but the light, the radiant light projected on the Earth versus seeing it from the surface, looking through the atmosphere, and it's filtered by all the different gases, it's just this radiant glow. And it's almost like this transcendence of your senses. It's not just visual, it's almost like you can feel the radiant glow of the light of the planet. And it's, it's bright, but it's not like looking up at the sun kind of blinding light. It's just this radiant. And it's constantly evolving because you're traveling so fast. And sunrises and sunsets are happening every 90 minutes. Our orbit was 106 minutes just based on its shape. And it starts off, the phenomenon is called the thin blue line. It's the dawning of a new day. It's just this arc of a blue purplish hue as the sun starts penetrating the atmosphere. And it just, it just grows and starts to split into this radiant sunbeams. And then it starts to light up the entire planet and then vice versa. On the backside, on the, on the sunset, as you see the, the night start to eat up and then even at night. So when, when at night you're seeing all the cultural lighting, we saw the northern lights, so all the green beautiful waves, you see all the stars, billions of stars, because you don't have the light pollution that you're used to seeing the moon obviously glowing, you're seeing strings of Starlink satellite systems. And then you have this pulsing of the Draco engines. It's just these constant engines that are firing to keep you oriented. In the capsule, based on the priority is to point the antennas towards the satellite for communication purposes. So that puts out this constant hues of orange and yellows and, and all of that together. You're just constantly seeing something new and it's just, it's not something. You stare at a sunset for 5, 10 minutes as the sun goes down. It's just this constant evolution of this radiant glow and it just feels like it's, it's more than just visual that makes any sense. Again, I'm having a hard time articulating. It's only been, you know, five, six months since we were up there. And that's, you know, the ISS, they're up there for six months, they're at 400 kilometers. We went an extra thousand kilometers past that. So slightly different perspective. Yeah.

[Sean Ryan]

Does that strengthen your faith?

[Scott Poteet]

100%. I am a firm believer. God created everything. I don't see how it couldn't. It'd be a sequence of millions and millions of miracles to happen. You know, you look, you look at the planet and then you look at the other action. It's, it's intimidating. I mean it's black. There's to think what's out there. Endless, you know, it's. That is intimidating. I'm hoping at some point in my life I'll make more sense of the experience and I hope I didn't miss my opportunity while I was there trying to absorb because we're, you know, you're very operated mindset. It's, you're focused on the mission. We got 40 science research experiments. I don't want to screw it up. And we got the spacewalk on day three and the starlink test going on and all this radiation testing we're going through and you know, that's, you got this mission mindset, but this is also something that very few people have experienced. And I hope at some point I can communicate and articulate that impact it had on my perspective.

[Sean Ryan]

Yeah, see, I don't know man. You know, we're talking, you know, back to the decision making and all this, you know, killing people, combat, what's it gonna be like when we meet him, you know, things like that. I just one, if he was done with you, then I don't think he would have experienced that up there, you know what I mean? I think he's still working on everybody, no matter what you've done. And it's those experiences that draw you to the light. And you know, I don't know, I think about this kind of stuff all the time and I think is he.

[Scott Poteet]

Still working on you or is book's written? You're just, I think he's, you're in your next chapter.

[Sean Ryan]

I think he's working on you all the way until the end. It's a tricky world, you know, I think there's only two influences in this world. There's good and there is evil and that's it. And it's kind of weird the way you just described the earth with the lightness and the darkness and continuously rotating. Because I just, I don't remember who I was talking to or how this even came up, but I described it as I was talking to somebody about the end. Kind of like revelations type stuff like the end. Because everybody's all, you know, is the sky falling? Are we in end times? I mean, lot of people think we are. And everybody's looking for the signs. And the way I described it was I think, I don't think anybody knows when the end is. I mean, even in the Bible it says nobody. Jesus doesn't even know when the end is. And the way I kind of like think it's happening is if you look at like a marble, like a two tone marble, you know, but maybe it's fluid in there and the two colors are just constantly fighting each other for what takes over the marble. You know, I think that's very similar to good and evil. And there are times that it looks like evil is potentially taking up more surface area than good. And then things start to change and then you see equilibrium, you know what I'm saying? And I think that's just constant. It's just a constant battle for total control of the planet and what that looks like. And it's the two influences, you know, going to work against each other. And, and even like this conversation right now that we're having, it's gonna get people thinking and people that. It's gonna get people thinking that have never thought about that before. And the colors are gonna start to change and more good is gonna start to overcome more darkness. And the way you just described the planet with the light and the dark, I mean, that's kind of how I think of this all, man. And, and it's just constantly evolving. It's always changing just like that. Marvel, do you know what I mean?

[Scott Poteet]

Absolutely.

[Sean Ryan]

And he knows how tricky evil can be. I mean, we were both immersed in a culture where that became the normal. I got to kill somebody. I finally got the opportunity to kill somebody, or I never got to kill anybody, you know, and that's, that's not a good way to think, you know, but I mean, you get, you enter into, you enter into the military at a young age. You're with all your idols, the people that you want to be, the F16 pilots that have the lineage all the way back to World War I. And you want to live up to what those Guys have done, and I joined the SEAL teams, and I want to live up to the Vietnam generation and the World War II guys. It's just. It becomes you. It becomes you. You immerse yourself into that culture, and then it seems good. It seems good. It's a fucking deception. It's a deception whether you're doing it for the country or whatever. Yeah, we all did it for the country. Right. Well, who says the country's good?

[Scott Poteet]

Right.

[Sean Ryan]

You know, and who says that country's bad? And yeah, we can talk about 9, 11, and all that kind of stuff, and you know what I mean? But, but, you know, what were we doing there for 20 years?

[Scott Poteet]

Right?

[Sean Ryan]

20 years. You know, and so, and so when I say, like, he's still working on you, I mean, it's not over. You know, you're either going to succumb to good or you're going to come to evil. And I think. I think there's seasons of it, and when you start steering one way, the other way is trying to pull you back. And both of them, you know what I mean? And, and, and they talk about deception and how. How Satan is the master of deception. And he can, he can. And he uses. He uses temptation, you know, whether that's money or sex or living up to a culture.

[Scott Poteet]

Yeah.

[Sean Ryan]

You know, and, and, and it may seem good and may, you know, maybe it is, but it's. It's, it's. It's, you know, we're just humans, man.

[Scott Poteet]

You know, I love that analogy. I mean, my first thought was, and I didn't even comprehend it until you mentioned it, but you talk about good and evil, light and dark. I felt this warm glow looking on the planet. Just loved. It was mesmerizing. I wanted to put my eyes off it. And you look through the Ford hatch towards space, and it's just this intimidating. It's almost like you're at that cliff, scuba diving in that black abyss over the ledge. You know, you feel a lot more security, probably where that ambient light's coming from. Yeah, there's something there I like. But how do we. I mean, you talk about that marble and the constant. Whether it's a struggle or not. Search, but constant evolution looking for equilibrium. This is rhetorical, but how do we influence more good than evil as that morph continues to happen with the marble of good and evil.

[Sean Ryan]

Yeah, that's a good question.

[Scott Poteet]

Or do we. It's in God's hands.

[Sean Ryan]

I mean, they say everything's in God's hands. Right. But it. I mean, I Think, you know, we talk about free will, and I think that is. That is really the only free will.

[Scott Poteet]

That we have is good and evil.

[Sean Ryan]

Is good and evil. You can either choose to believe or choose not to believe, because everything else is so contorted and twisted and decept. You know, it's. There's just so much deception out there. And I think that. I think that you cannot. As hard as this sounds, I think you cannot succumb. You cannot sacrifice your values for temptation. Does that make sense?

[Scott Poteet]

You should not. Or you physically can.

[Sean Ryan]

I think you should not because that is staying true to yourself, which is good. And in temptation is everywhere. It's money, it's sex, that's culture. It's. It's all of that stuff. And. And you just see people every day, you know, they sacrifice their values for temptation, and they justify. If you catch yourself justifying, you know, why you did something or. Or. Do you know what I'm talking about? We've all done it, right? Absolutely all done it. I did this to this person. Probably wasn't that great of a, you know, wasn't a good thing to do, but now I'm stuck in the justification process. Like the. Well, I had to do that because this happened to me and that happened. They did this to me. And so this is how I justify it. Or somebody fucked you over, or you fucked somebody over, and you have to. Then you catch them justifying or justifying to yourself why you made the decisions that you made, and that alone in itself, that's succumbing to evil.

[Scott Poteet]

Evil. Do you think I've always tied authenticity to being true to your values? Do you think you can be authentically evil, or do you think people are naturally authentically good and as long as they are authentic, they can maintain true values?

[Sean Ryan]

I think that we are more evil than we are good because it takes more effort to be good and not succumb to temptation than it does to be evil and succumb to all that shit. Because the reward doesn't come until the end to be good. The reward to be evil, which is. Is immediate. It's an immediate reward.

[Scott Poteet]

So we're evil and weak on.

[Sean Ryan]

Yeah. You want to take a break? Sure, let's take a break. I'd like to invite you to gain access to an exclusive experience on Vigilance Elite Patreon. Our patrons are the driving force behind the success of this show, and their support allows us to keep doing what we do. Depending on the tier you choose, you'll get access to benefits like behind the scenes, footage before each interview, early access to episodes, end of the month live zoom calls with me, exclusive merch and more. Join us and become a patron starting at just $5 a month by visiting patreon.com vigilance elite. That's patreon.com vigilance elite. Thank you for listening to the Sean Ryan Show. If you haven't already, please take a minute, head over to itunes, and leave the Shawn Ryan Show a review. We read every review that comes through, and we really appreciate the support. Thank you. Let's get back to the show. That was a good conversation.

[Scott Poteet]

Mm. I have a lot to think about. I'm 51.

[Sean Ryan]

Yeah. Yeah. That was heavy. Where were we?

[Scott Poteet]

I have no idea.

[Sean Ryan]

Yeah. Any more thoughts on that?

[Scott Poteet]

Plenty. But that's what he's doing. He's at work. You know, he's got my attention, that's for sure. I just wish I could.

[Sean Ryan]

I mean, he's trying to save us from this. That's the whole thing. Right?

[Scott Poteet]

Well, look how stubborn the prophets were. Man had a tough time listening, and he's telling them outright, I'm going to die for your sins. And. And they had a hard time believing, and they were with him, you know, thankful. We do have the stories in the Bible, though.

[Sean Ryan]

Yeah. You know, he just. He sprinkles these things in our lives, like your daughter, you know, and it's. I mean, that sounds like a very profound moment. You know, not just because you saved your daughter's life, but spiritually. You know, it's. We're all looking for some type of proof. Right. And because it is. It's hard to believe this stuff. It's. It's just. It is. And. But when you get those little. Sometimes they're not always little. Sometimes they slap you in the face just like what happened to you. I mean, that's what that is. It's. In my opinion, that's what that is. That is. Here's what you needed so that you can believe. And from what I've noticed in my journey, and I'm not very far along in this either, sounds like our childhood was very similar. I mean, I grew up Catholic, and I didn't really. You know, it was a hassle to go to church. I didn't want to go. Didn't want to go to Sunday school. I didn't want to do any of that. I never. I never took it seriously until, what, I guess about two years ago, you know? And ever since then, like, I just. I'm just always paying attention, and I See, now I even see little things that get dropped, you know, and I just look at them like, oh, that's all right. I'm on the right path. Or that's the sign that I needed. And I think it happens all the time.

[Scott Poteet]

Absolutely. But we just don't. We don't have the humility.

[Sean Ryan]

Yep.

[Scott Poteet]

To listen. We think we have all the answers.

[Sean Ryan]

Yep. Or we're so distracted in our own bullshit that we're not. It's impossible to see it because we're not. We're not looking. And so the, the, you know, the more I can get out of the noise and. And start paying it. It's just like having your eyes wide open, you know, everywhere they come all the time. It's pretty cool. Pretty cool stuff. Especially when you know it's real and.

[Scott Poteet]

You know what it is and you're convicted. Yeah. It's just building that conviction is what's tough.

[Sean Ryan]

Yeah. Though that stuff that you were talking about with Earth, that just made me. I just had that conversation. Or just used that marble reference like I think it was last weekend. I can't remember who the hell I was talking to. But that's just how I envision it, you know, that's just how I envision what's going on in the world and how it's all. How it all plays out. Yeah, but. But what got you so. What got you interested in becoming an astronaut anyways?

[Scott Poteet]

Relationships that I'd built and fostered over. Over the years. When I was coming off the Thunderbird assignment, I met a gentleman by the name of Jared Isaacman. Very successful entrepreneur, no military background, but started his very successful multi billion dollar payment processing company, parents basement, when he was 16. His passion has always been aviation. So he progressed, started the hobby early. 18 years old and just worked his way up in the civilian world. And he started a civilian air show demonstration team. Former fighter pilots, former Thunderbirds. And I was not a part of that, but I had met them while they were doing air shows just through the community. And then that's when I first met Jared. And then a couple years later, I'm the commander of the aggressor squadron for the Air Force. So there's two units within the Air Force that have dedicated missions of doing adversary support op for just replicating the bad guys. China, Russia, tactics. And that's your sole purpose in life versus. And there's only two units, one in Vegas and one in Alaska. Otherwise, if you're like stationed in Italy or Korea, you're generating your own bad guys. Organically, so you'd be in your F16, you'd dumb it down and simulate foreign tactics, threat tactics, help me train, and then we'd swap roles next day. It's not a very good use of resources, but there's two units dedicated to do this, and one's in Vegas, where we have a lot of the Red Flag exercises, the big coalition exercises. The weapon school is located there. So there's a lot of reasons why people go to Vegas to train. Airspace is good, Area 51 area. And I was the commander of that organization, so that was my job. And his air show gig went on for about two years, and he wanted to do something bigger. And he's always been a Patriot. Service has been a big part of who he is, and he had the resources to kind of, you know, develop some of this novel ideas. And one of them was, let's. Let's turn this fleet of fighters doing air shows into a commercial adversary organization. And now we can provide this service to the military, DoD, Air Force, Navy, army, and in a cast role, and. And the Marines. And it's going to be a fraction of the cost. So instead of doing it organically all over the world, you know, 20 grand an hour at the cheapest, let's do something where it's a fraction of the cost. Using old fleets of fighters that he will acquire a 4s, L159s, F1s, countries that are either disbanding their fleets of old fighter jets, not there's not a big market out there, people, there's not many customers, or they're upgrading their fleet of generation aircraft to the next level. So he goes out proactively and acquires fleet from New Zealand, a fleet from Czech Republic, from Spain, from France, and builds the largest privately owned fleet of fighter jets.

[Sean Ryan]

Wow.

[Scott Poteet]

And this is while I was an aggressor, so we had a little bit of interaction. He's just bouncing ideas off me and just seeing if it's, you know, what. What's the likelihood of the Air Force, you know, interested in this kind of concept. And so he builds this company, you know, build it, and they will come kind of before he even had a contract. And they did put in a lot of hard work. And. And eventually when I retired, I was coming off Afghanistan. I'm like, the last thing I want to do is go fly airlines. That's a typical career path coming out of the military. And long story short, my wife was diagnosed with cancer when I was deployed, right before I was deployed, and she's Got to pick up the family, a 10, an 8 and a 6 year old, move from a foreign country back to the US establish care in Boston with her oncologist and her husband's deployed to combat zone. So God bless her and her service to her country. So I was coming off of Afghanistan and the last thing I wanted to do is go fly airlines. It's not my jam. I needed to do something different. So he was building this company and I'm like, hey, you got any room for an old fighter pilot? Because I was staring at like if I stayed in the military beyond 20, it's you know, Colonel, you're going to one year remote here and a joint staff here and you have less and less control over your career. And we didn't know what Kristen's future was going to look like with her issues. So he brings me on the team and he secures a contract with the Air Force. Just a basic proof of concept contract. And that just ignited the industry, turned into a $6 billion. It was like four primary players in this field and they would just acquire all these fleets of aging fighters, kind of sweeten them up with better avionics, more capability. But the platform was still kind of a third generation, fourth generation. So it gave more iron in the sky for F22s and F35s to train against. So we established this first contract in Vegas, started supporting the super bowl of all Super Bowls, red flag exercises and weapons school. And we did that for about five years. That was a blast. But I started off flying but I'm like, I kind of want to do something different. So I got involved in the business development side. So I did that for about five years. He ends up selling the company because he's going public with his, with his other company. And as soon as he left, the culture changed. And I lasted about a month and I'm like, I'm out. And so he pulls me over to shift four to do business development or strategy. Fish out of water. So I was doing fintech, trying to figure it all out. Just learning from him and his team and they're recent, recently gone public. It's kind of a big deal company. But he started having conversations with SpaceX. So he starts building this relationship and it ended up being the, the first opportunity for a commercial flight, the first all civilian mission to space. So he secures the relationship and, and the contract for this mission and you know, he, he's got a core of individuals like me and he brings us all together and he, he's like, hey, here's, here's my vision. And, you know, we're all excited we might get to go to space. And he's like, no, this is not taking your buddies fishing. You know, this is something bigger. We're gonna, we're gonna make an impact with this. So that's where we started to develop. And this was 2020. Right in the middle of COVID We came up with this concept of the first all civilian mission space. We're going to randomly select this crew and within six months we're going to train them for space, take elements of NASA's training. Because they take three to four years before they go to space, we obviously don't have that luxury and resources. Commercial space is about to make this huge paradigm shift in their philosophy. There's only been. There was only two, I think, civilians that had been to space. One on a Soyuz or both on a Soyuz, I think. I'm not sure someone's going to fact check me on that one. But. But this was like, this is a big deal. And so we randomly selected his crew and we wanted to partner with a nonprofit so we could have a continued impact, positive impact on life on Earth. So we. Well, back up even a second once he pitched this idea. I'm doing whole fintech VP of strategy. I'm like, I'll do whatever you want. This is more up my alley. And so I take on the role as the mission director. That's a little false humility on my part. And the fact that a mission director sits in mission control and controls, that's not what I was doing. I was doing all the legwork, the coordination, the fundraising logistics, sitting through the training, but more as. Just because I was doing all these cats and dogs. So we ended UP partnering with St. Jude Children's Research Hospital because he's done other. He supported Make a Wish. He just. This means a lot to him. And we had this platform and this opportunity to continue to improve life on Earth. But let's, you know, let's explore what's out there as well. So we ended up giving one seat to St. Jude and then we were going to do a sweepstakes for another seat and a contest for the fourth seat. So we ended up selecting Christmas. I think it was either right after day after Christmas or not. We. We have a conversation with the CEO at St. Jude and we end up giving one seat to Haley Arseneaux. I think she was 28 at the time. She was a cancer survivor. She beat cancer when she was 10. And she went on to be A physician's assistant at St. Jude because they saved her life. Great story. She's. She's a rock star. So we picked her. And then we did a sweepstakes super bowl commercial in 21. And that kicked off our sweepstakes to raise money for St. Jude. Everything 100% for St. Jude, whatever we made in this project with St. Jude ends up being $250 million.

[Sean Ryan]

Wow.

[Scott Poteet]

And, you know, less than, you know, six month period. So we do sweepstakes 30 days, and then we're going to randomly pull a name out of the hat. And, you know, and each seat had a quality or concept behind it. Leadership, hope, generosity, and prosperity were the three seats, if you will. Jared's leadership hope was Haley, generosity was the sweepstakes donations. And come to find out, we picked a name out of a hat. And the individual who was selected medically disqualified himself. And so based on his generosity, he's like, I got to give the seat back. I can't do this flight. But I appreciate. And we're like, no, this is your seat. You can do whatever you want with it. And so he actually, through his generosity, gives it to one of his buddies who also made a donation, and that was Chris Sembroski. And then we did a contest for the last seat. And that's the whole, you know, he was an entrepreneur, he had many opportunities or he, you know, through his hard work, created opportunities and entrepreneurship, and he's a big believer in that. So we had a contest, you know, someone who was starting a small business, and we, social media helped us, all these marketing companies helped us. And we, a panel of celebrities picked, you know, the best video promoting their small business. So Dr. Cyan Proctor was the individual pick for that seat. So the cruise set, it's like end of February, beginning of March, immediately pick them up, take them to training. And over the next less than six months, they go through training. And we do various things for the training. Centrifuge, the altitude chamber for pressure altitude. Just getting an idea of your hypoxic symptoms and stuff like that. And then all the simulator training, we climbed Mount Rainier for some experiential training. Some of the things that astronauts already do, we just kind of fighter jets, we train them. Jared and I obviously flew and the other two crew members, or yeah, we'd swap the three in our back seats. So we'd give them experience in fighter jets and blah, blah. So we go, we do this, and it's hair on fire for six months, just coming and going constantly going to headquarters SpaceX headquarters in LA. We go to Johnson Space center for training with NASA collaboration elements and then we go to Kennedy Space Center, Cape Canaveral. Because all human space flights out of there, majority of the launches, almost 95% of them, there's been a couple that weren't off of Pad 39 Alpha, but it's the historic one shuttles, Apollo right there in Cape Canaveral. And then they go to space. They spent three days in orbit, very successful splashdown in the Atlantic and you know, we wrap it up in September, did a Netflix documentary called Countdown 5 part series kind of explains the entire project. It's pretty cool. The week or the month leading up to their launch, conversations about the next project began because we're having too much fun. But this is, we never do things, it's always what's the next step up. And so we started to formulate a program which became the Polaris program, which is a three part up to three missions. And it's a, it's a developmental space flight program. And this is analogous to Project Gemini. So if you look at NASA's history, you got initial space flight with Project Mercury, prove that we could get to space and then you leapfrog, that was the 50s and then leapfrog over to the late 60s and 70s when we went to the moon, you know the Apollo program. Well in between there in the 60s over a five year span, there's 12 missions called Project Gemini. And the purpose behind that developmental program was to solve some big challenges. They had to figure out how to dock vehicles in space, to do a spacewalk, to do long duration missions, longer duration missions than Mercury, multi crew missions. These are all things they had to solve before the they headed to the moon. So in a similar fashion, we kind of built the Polaris program off of a developmental concept where we're helping identify what challenges does SpaceX and other companies face trying to get back to the lunar surface and Mars and Beyond. The first two missions of the Polaris program are aboard the Falcon 9 with the Dragon Castle. And then the third flight is supposed to be the first human spaceflight of Starship which will might be launching in the next couple hours. Test Flight 8.

[Sean Ryan]

Wow.

[Scott Poteet]

Largest rocket ever built, bigger than Saturn V. That's the vehicle that I believe will go back to the moon and that will go to Mars. So that's the idea behind the Polaris program. And then the first mission we did in September, it's called Polaris dawn. And based on our conversations with SpaceX and Elon about what do we want to accomplish again, what challenges? Well, we got to do a spacewalk. It's the idea is that we want hundreds if not thousands of people bouncing on the surface of the moon. We got to build a spacesuit, so. And we got to do a spacewalk. So let's do the first commercial spacewalk. Well, we're pushing the envelope. So let's extend the capabilities of the Falcon nine and the Dragon capsule and go further and fast, you know, further and further than someone, anyone has been in over 50 years. And you know what came out of that is let's set the Earth orbit altitude record. It was originally set by Gemini 11 back in 1966. Pete Conrad and Dick Gordon went up to 1368 kilometers. Put that in context. The station's right around 400 Star Starlinks, right around 350, 300, 350 kilometers. Where do we want to go? Well, ideally let's go touch the lower portions of the Van Allen Belt. Higher radiation level caused by the gravitational pull and let's just push the envelope. So it was about the spacewalk, it was about the altitude. And then communication is a big challenge, especially when we talk about going to Mars. Eight months, you know, the, the broadband requirements and the latency issues. Imagine sending back a combite that's 30 minutes old, if not hours, what's it becomes obsolete. At that point you've already solved whatever issue you're working on or your situation is a hell of a lot worse. So Starlink is the future of communication with it being laser based. Let's see if we can get it to work from space for the very first time. Works on Earth. Great. We would take these dishes, we actually took some to the Ukraine in the beginning of the war to drop off. So St. Jude satellite hospitals, because they were getting destroyed in the beginning, so they had to relocate and take all these patients and kids to Poland and Macedonia. And we delivered some, some starlinks so St. Jude could set up their hospitals and have telecommunications or telemedicine capability with doctors back at, at Memphis. So works on Earth, we got to figure out if it works on, in, in space, which was a cosmic feat in and of itself for the engineers to figure that one out. And then, oh, by the way, we're going to be up there for five days. That's the life of, you know, that's about as long as you can exist up there in that capsule alone, not docking with a space station. Let's fill it with science and research and we'll focus those 40 experiments on again, what are the challenges the human body faces for these longer duration missions in the future? Because that's going to be the kids opinion. That's the biggest limiting factor is going to be the human body because austere environment of space, it's tough. Besides being a vacuum, you got to deal with zero gravity, loneliness, psychological issues. Just we are meant for 1G on earth. So those were the four main objectives and then we spent three years training for those objectives.

[Sean Ryan]

How did you get picked?

[Scott Poteet]

So based on my contributions during inspiration 4 and the fact that I had operational test background, I did a lot of test. There's a unit called the 422 Testing Evaluation Squadron at Nellis where we do we test new weapons, new software, new computer systems and on the platform. It's not a test pilot Chuck Yeager type developmental test that's done at Edwards, that's done testing on the platform. This is more specific to weapons and software upgrades and capabilities. So I've had background experience in doing operational test and this being a test program, it was kind of a logical fit. I caveat that with there are plenty of people in this world that could have been in my seat. I know I'm very blessed to have this opportunity. And again God's influence for sure, especially going through the training because you got Jared, very experienced astronaut, been to space already already highly intellectual individual, knows these systems inside and out. And oh by the way, we're going up in the same capsule he's already been up in. So he's, he's, he didn't have to study. He does because he's a dedicated individual. But. And then we have our two other crew members and we kind of, this is a collaboration partnership with SpaceX. So we gave two seats to SpaceX and we selected Sarah Gillis and Anna Menon and they were both engineers that were involved in the first mission. So Sarah, she was graduated at CU Boulder, one of the smartest individuals I've ever met. She was hired as a SpaceX engineer to be the lead astronaut trainer. She teaches astronauts how to operate the vehicle. She knows the systems inside and out. In fact she's teaching our instructors things as we go through this program. Then Anna Manon, she's got a master's in biomedical engineering. She used to work in at NASA and she was hired by SpaceX to pretty much write the procedures, the nominal procedures contingencies for our vehicle. So again these two know the systems inside and out. And then you got kid outdoor education, barely graduates college. So I know My place. It kind of tainted my, my attitude or approach in the beginning. And it took some failed training events to wake me up. And that kind of gets back to that whole, it's not about me. There's a lot writing on this and I need to step up because I'm being way too reliant upon my crew to pull me along. Because we go into this program, it's developmental, we only have three years to, to focus on these huge milestones. So it's like, hey, we're going to assume everyone's knowledge is right around here. We're only going to focus on this top tier stuff. And I'm kind of going along, get along. I'm also, I have this fear of failure, fear of judgment and doubt. Not that they would ever judge me, but it's like I'm hanging on and I'm, you know, when I'm asked questions, it's like I'll deflect with humor, I'll respond questions with questions. Phone a friend. Use way too much leverage on the crew, not fully grasping, hey, this takes a full team, this takes all four crew members because there might be situations where, you know, they lean on me in time of need and if I fail them because I didn't get my game where it needs to be, this could go really bad. And you know, my wake up call was actually, you know, it was a training scenario. We're in the simulator. There's, there's kind of three levels of training that we did. We did physiological training. That's the centrifuge, the altitude chamber, the vacuum chamber, the zero G flights. There's the, the practical training that we went through. Experiential mountaineering, scuba diving, skydiving, flying fighter jets. And then there's the procedural where we spend a majority of our time in the simulator. And they would give us very difficult situation scenarios, you know, some very unlikely, but you know, it's to test our knowledge and our experience and our teamwork and all that stuff. And one of the scenarios was Jared is incapacitated for whatever reason, he's out. And now we got to do an emergency deorbit. And based on the configuration of the cockpit or the capsule, there's three displays and Jared and I sit in the middle as the commander of the pilot. And we are the only ones with access to those three screens. And that's where all the systems and procedures are. And then the outboard seats. Sarah, Nana, Mission Specialist they, they can't see the screens when they're strapped in their seat. You know, 90% of the mission, we're out of our seats, floating around and doing whatever and you have access to the screens. You just float underneath. Well, Jared's incapacitated. Well, in nominal procedures, he's doing everything and I'm backing him up. I'm just kind of verifying what he's doing action wise and checks and balances. Well, he's out, so kid's there to save the day. And I fail miserably. It's most humbling experience because I can't keep up, I make the wrong decisions. I can't rely upon these two because they can't see what I'm looking at on the screen. It was just, it was an epic fail. And that was the attitude adjustment that I had. I'm like, I got to step up. I got to, I got to change. I got to be more humble, you know, have more humility in the fact that I need to rely upon my. And be honest with my weaknesses and lean on my crew members because they got to help me get my knowledge where it needs to be and I need to be. I need to be authentic in the fact that if I'm going to set goals to get my knowledge to where it needs to be, I got to be true to myself and know where my limits are. But it's got to get to a certain threshold if you know, because again, getting back to this is 100%, this is zero fail. We have to, you know, have mission success or we're going to set the entire space exploration program, not just SpaceX, but everybody back. And it, you know, we're doing things, we're doing some crazy. Yeah. Anyways, that's a lot.

[Sean Ryan]

That's that wow. And how long was this timeline? Three years.

[Scott Poteet]

Three years. We were supposed to launch the biggest challenge. And talking about space, I go on all day long how smart these people are. The long pole in the tent was the development of the EVA suit. So they had to build a brand new suit that, you know, the IVA suit they wear to and from the station. It's meant to pressurize in the case of a depressed situation and keep astronauts alive. But it's not meant intentionally to go outside of the capsule in the vacuum of space. So they had to build a new suit. So they took the prototype, the IBA suit and spent years enhancing, you know, with a big focus on thermals because it's 250° plus or minus swing when you're either in the sun or in the clips of the.

[Sean Ryan]

Wow.

[Scott Poteet]

So it's plus or minus 250 degrees. Mobility is a concern because it's pressurized. And we had to come up with a way to bring the entire capsule down to vacuum because we don't have the luxury of an airlock like they have in the space station. So we have to bring the entire capsule, which means we're all four going to be pressurized, which has never been done before. Never had four astronauts involved in the same spacewalk. So we had to come up with this novel pre breath approach profile where we're going to bring the pressure down in the capsule, increase the oxygen levels because we're trying to mitigate the risk of dcs.

[Sean Ryan]

What's dcs?

[Scott Poteet]

Decompression sickness. Nitrogen bubbles, Scuba concerns. Because if we, if we do it too rapidly or because, because on the, on the space station and the airlock they're going to pre breathe 100% oxygen and it's going to purge all those nitrogen bubbles out of your system. So DCS isn't a huge concern. It's still minor, but it's not huge. We don't have enough gas oxygen on board to purge our entire system. So we have to come up with this stair step approach where we'll increase the oxygen, mitigate the risk, bring the pressure down so we get closer and closer. So we're climatizing the body to those lower pressures with increased oxygen levels. And we're not eating up our gas consumption too soon anyways. So back to the suit. Their big focus in the development over that three year period was thermals mobility. They came up with these new funky joints, certain bearings on all these joints to have mobility because you want it pliable when you're not pressurized. You want to be able to move, you know, it's a one piece. It's got a big old spiral zipper around the waist. It's just a zipper, you know, you just cinch it down as maybe almost like a dry suit, okay. But it handles pressure. So we were just over 5 psi delta. So as we're coming down, you know, we're at 14.7 at sea, at you know, sea level. And then you know, as you go up to the Mount Everest, it's, I don't know where it's at, you know, 9, 10 psi. And then eventually you're going to work it down till you know, you can't survive anymore. And that pressure delta is always going to be a plus five. So as long as we maintain that plus five, the suits pressurized and we can bring it all the Way down to a vacuum and then open the hatch and go outside. And so that was a big focus is coming up with all these different thermal layers, like 12 different layers. The, the visor had to be changed. They added a helmet mounted site or yeah, more of a hud, not a queuing system. We didn't laser. It just projected like pressure, temperature, duration.

[Sean Ryan]

Like a heads up display. Yeah okay.

[Scott Poteet]

That's exactly what it was. A little monocle and it's just this team was insane. They would, it's like a monster garage. So they would piecemeal. I'd be walking around this frankentine suit. This glove is, this arm is completely different and this bearing's different and we would be trying out a lot of stuff. We go home on Friday, we'd fly back on Monday for more training and it's completely revamped. Hey, we're going to try out this HUD with this monocle. See what you like, give us some feedback. And, and this was what it was like. Over the course of, of two and a half years going through this program is developing and you look at the, the initial like holy, I'm going to space in this suit to the final product. It was like, it was insane.

[Sean Ryan]

Damn.

[Scott Poteet]

And that took you know, decades for other EVA suits to be developed and billion dollar programs. This was done on you know, millions. I don't know how much it costs but. And in two and a half years granted, I mean it's umbilical so we're attached to the vehicle to pump in that oxygen, nitrogen and nitrox. Um, but full faith and confidence. This is only, you know, it's probably revamped. You know it's been six months. They're probably on you know version six, six to nine at this point on a new suit and they'll come up with some self contained. They, they got it. You know, they're wow. Like I was like, I'm like the 51 year. I'm like the oldest dude. They're all like 20 something 30 year olds. Brilliant, brilliant, very passionate. I love that organization because Elon and Gwen, they set the vision. There's no doubt this is the vision for the organization. But they're very flat structure where everyone is empowered and everyone feels empowered and that just breeds and fosters this environment of, of passion. So you know they're willing to work those long hours and long days because they're, they're doing things that are changing the world. You know Starlink and everything they're doing at SpaceX and what they're able to accomplish in such a short period. And they have this, you know, the fail fast mentality. Like when you see starship, if it blows up, it blows up. It doesn't matter. We're going to learn so much from that and they'll take it and make the next damn version even better. So.

[Sean Ryan]

What are you telling your family? They gotta be worried about this, right?

[Scott Poteet]

I'll tell you, it was. Yeah, we had our moments. It was tough. Yeah. Deploying to combat is one thing when you intentionally sign up to go to space on a developmental test, spaceflight. Especially when you thought we were into our retirement years. Yeah, it was tough. God bless her for hanging on and putting up with me.

[Sean Ryan]

Is she glad you did it?

[Scott Poteet]

Yeah, I mean, certainly pride is not a great thing to. But she's proud of all the accomplishments and what we did, and she's very thankful it's over, obviously, and I'm safe. Like I said, she's a believer and she knew it was in God's hands. But it's still a leap of faith. Especially watching that rocket go off. Being strapped to that rocket is an unwavering level of trust because I'm not in control, you know, fighter jet.

[Sean Ryan]

Yeah, yeah.

[Scott Poteet]

I'm doing the inputs. I can control that. And oh, by the way, if shit's not working out, I can punch any jet. Rocket ship's a lot different.

[Sean Ryan]

Yeah. What's up, man? Okay, so how long did it take you to get up there? So how exactly did this go? Was the spacewalk at the same altitude? Is the.

[Scott Poteet]

No, everything was done different altitudes, highly elliptical, meaning we'd go far and then pass on the backside, really close. So 1400 kilometers by 190. Our entry altitude was 1200 by 190. So that was just to kind of go through some checks in the systems. And then after a couple orbits, we bumped up. We did some phase burns to get up to that 1400. We set the record. We did about eight orbits at that altitude to do some radiation testing, and then we brought it back down to 7:50ish. And that's where we did the spacewalk.

[Sean Ryan]

So was that the last thing?

[Scott Poteet]

No, that was day three. So it was five days. So the first day bleeding into the second day was the altitudes and then we phased down immediately. And then the third day is when we did the spacewalk. And then the rest of the days were all signed. Some research, starlink testing, everything else.

[Sean Ryan]

Well, let's walk. Let's walk. So, initial entry into space. So even I touched on this earlier.

[Scott Poteet]

I mean, even the, even strapping in, you know, I, I don't know if I told you. It's. It produces 1.7 million pounds of thrust. So that's equivalent of, of 70 F16s, 69 F16s. Because I'm a fighter pilot. One F16 is Mach 2, 1500 miles an hour pulling nine GS. This thing is like the equivalent of 70. And what's the big delta? People ask me what's it like comparing find a fighter versus a spaceship? Spaceship is I'm in control in a fighter. So if I'm not digging the G forces, I can ease off. In a spacecraft, it just continues to accelerate, doesn't give a shit how you feel. And it's different G forces. So in a fighter jet, it's head to toe. This is the Z axis, I believe. So it's centrifugal force that when you pull back on that stick, it's centrifugal force that causes that G force and that pooling of the blood in lower extremities, the fear of passing out because the blood leaves the brain. That's why you wear the, the, the G suit and, and do the G strain to kind of restrict that blood flow. That is a lot different because in a spaceship, based on the orientation of the seat, the G forces is through the chest. So it's this and it, and it builds up to about four and a half GS. And so once you, you know, right before liftoff, this rocket is alive. It's venting, it's hissing, it's making all these knocks and pings. It's swaying. So the Strombeck gets retracted and it's just sitting there balancing, just waiting to go. And you can feel this sway and it's just.

[Sean Ryan]

Man.

[Scott Poteet]

And you're, all you're doing is watching the clock. You're strapped in, you're. I mean, they, they cinch on you. You know, in Apollo 13, put your foot on your. Yank it. They don't, they don't mess up the suit, but it's pretty damn tight and visors down and you know. Here we go, you know. By the way, how long are you.

[Sean Ryan]

In there before takeoff or before launch? What do you call launch?

[Scott Poteet]

That's a whole different story. I have an old man bladder.

[Sean Ryan]

Yeah, I was wondering that. I mean, besides that. I mean, I don't, I mean, I don't know how you were in pre mission going to combat, but me, I feel like I gotta pee like every two minutes. Like, oh, shit, I gotta Go again. Oh, shit. I gotta go. Like, then you hear the hilos. Oh, yeah, I gotta go.

[Scott Poteet]

People always ask me, what was. Were you scared?

[Sean Ryan]

I mean, that's a lot of anticipation, dude.

[Scott Poteet]

I wasn't scared. I was scared about drowning in my own pee. I peed eight times because we went delay after delay for weather, and I couldn't hold it. So we wear these. They're called mags. Maximum absorbency garment. Depends. And I went eight times and I'm drenched and I'm freezing. I got trench foot. It's just like pooling. And it's like, I'm in the middle of this and I'm freezing my butt off. Shaking. I'm literally just shivering. I'm like, please, let's just get to space so I can get into some warm clothes. And then I'm thinking to myself, zero gravity. Is this gonna float up into my helmet? You just see that, the headline now. Astronaut drowns in his own Tang. He. I don't know. So that's what was going through my mind during this launch phase. But back to the launch. It just. You know, once the clock expires, those nine Merlin engines, they just. They just come alive and it's like an earthquake. It just shakes your world, you know, you can't concentrate on anything. It's just. And it's like slow mo, because it just lifts off and it just slowly starts to build and accelerate and faster and faster. And the first. First segment is two and a half minutes. And you're watching the clock and you're watching your. Your profile, and you're going up. It's a inclination of 51.6 degrees, and it takes you right up the coastline. And the reason why is if anything happens, the capsule will eject off the booster and splash down in the Atlantic Ocean. So you have all those resources along the coast versus going directly out over the Atlantic. And now you're in the middle of the ocean and you never get recovered kind of thing. So it's accelerating and you're going faster and faster and faster. And two and a half minutes is you're waiting for MECO main engine cutoff. And the G forces start to build up. And it's. It's four and a half G. So it just feels like somebody is just sitting on your chest. And there's a lot of pressure on the neck, so it's hard to talk and breathe. And it's just. It's an endurance event. So in a fighter jet, it's just, you pulse nine GS and you deplete your energy state. So you can't, can sustain nine GS, but four and a half or two for, for two and a half minutes is, is, is fairly intense. And then Miko happens. And when Miko happens, it's just a big old boom and you get launched forward in your straps and you float because of that deceleration, because that, you know, you're no longer connected to the booster. And you're waiting for the separation to happen. And it's the longest 10 seconds of your life because you have to have the adequate separation for the second stage to light. This is a big old Merlin vacuum engine. It's only one engine, but it's massive. 220,000 pounds of thrust for one engine. And as soon as that light it, as soon as that engine light, it's just a bam. You're back in the seat. And now you're, you're on a six minute ride and those G forces build back up to four and a half. And now you're just on this trajectory. Eventually you get to about 200km and you, you level off because you're kind of above the atmosphere and you're just accelerating and you're trying to get as fast as possible. And you get up to 17,500 miles an hour is orbital velocity. This keeps you in orbit. Otherwise you get pulled back down into Earth because gravity is constantly pulling on you, even at 17.5. But you're just falling in the same orbit all around Earth. But if you go slower, eventually gravity pulls you back into the atmosphere. You hit all the gases in the atmosphere and you slow down drag. But once you get up there, you accelerate. 17, 5, Mach 25. You're going five miles a second and you're waiting for that SEO to happen. Second stage cut off and that's where that second stage will separate. And when that happens again, it's just this boom. You've separated. Now you're floating and now you're in that, that transition that, you know, fluid shift, organs are shifting, brain lift. Did I explain this? I don't remember if I did or not.

[Sean Ryan]

A little bit.

[Scott Poteet]

I talked about the space adaptation, this disorientation, that tumbling. Other things that happen is the fluid in your body is shifting so it's free floating. So your organs are actually kind of moving around and your, your brain is floating inside csf, but gravity's pulling on it. Well up there it starts to shift up and it floats inside your skull and it causes this like space fog. It's almost like this Fullness. And if you see images of us, we look full, like bloated, swollen. It's almost like if you hang upside down from your bed, that blood rush, it's just constant and it's, it's something you have to get used to and it's, it can have an impact. Like, I had this chronic headache, mild headache. I actually, I did an experimental surgery for this mission a couple years prior. One of the big concerns is intracranial pressure. So the fluid in your spine, the CSF in your brain, the pressure changes, zero gravity. So it actually applies pressure to the ocular nerve and changes the shape of your eyeball. It flattens your eyeball and it affects the visual acuity and actually can cause temporary blindness. A couple astronauts have had temporary blindness. So you imagine the concern. You're on your way to Mars and you go blind or you lose significant visual acuity. We don't know much about it because we've only done non invasive experiments. Contact lenses that take pressure measurements, little guns you squeeze and point into the eye, take measurements. But those are all non invasive. They're not as accurate as we would like. NASA being somewhat risk adverse. There's never been a invasive experiment. There's no real volunteers. And commercial isn't really a thing yet. Like, kid's dumb enough, yeah, I'll do it. So I signed up for this experimental surgery where they're going to surgically implant a transducer into my, underneath my rib cage. And that transducer takes measurements. And it's got a catheter that runs up into my spinal column. So they drill a hole into my spinal column and they slide up about 10 centimeters of this catheter. And now that fluid can flow into the transducer. And we have this wand. We just, you know, brush the wand over the transducer and it takes a measurement. So you take measurements before, during, and after. And now you can, you can understand the pressure changes so we can learn more about it. Unfortunately, the, I did the surgery and for some reason the, the, the technique used the catheter backs out of my spinal column. And so I just have a big hole leaking csf. And that was debilitating. I'm, I couldn't function. I literally just, you know, lay down. I couldn't, I couldn't. You know, it's just this massive, massive headache. And I have the most utmost respect for hydrocephalus patients. The swelling of the brain is absolutely debilitating. So they had to do emergency blood patch into my spinal column. And then eventually had to do another surgery to remove all the shit in my. I had 11 surgeries the one year leading up to space. Damn random shit. Damn appendix, gallbladder, ercps, this hernias, you name it. Old but it was a.

[Sean Ryan]

So you go straight up to.

[Scott Poteet]

Sorry, yes.

[Sean Ryan]

Yeah, you go straight to. You did. You said there was some. You did a couple of orbits at a lower altitude and then shot up to. What was it?

[Scott Poteet]

1408.1 was the. Is the record which will be broken in no time once we continue to explore and push the envelope. And then we did that for eight orbits because the radiation level was a concern. Cycles on the hardware software as well as the human body. Didn't want to expose too much. It was the equivalent of three to four months living on the ISS what they're exposed to. And in our eight orbits because it's pretty intense band of radiation called the Vanilla Belts. And then we brought it down to 750ish, I think it was.

[Sean Ryan]

You were up there for how many days? Three days?

[Scott Poteet]

No, up there was just eight orbits. So 106 minutes times eight, whatever that equals hour and a half. I don't know, 12 hours, 12, 14 hours.

[Sean Ryan]

So when you were up there, I mean could you see the whole Earth at once?

[Scott Poteet]

No, there was. I wish I had pictures.

[Sean Ryan]

Do you have pictures?

[Scott Poteet]

Oh yeah, absolutely. IPhone. We took thousands of pictures with our iPhone.

[Sean Ryan]

Can you send me some?

[Scott Poteet]

Absolutely. They're. They're all over the Internet. We have a Flickr page I'll send you that's got really cool with videos. Time lapse. The best pictures actually are from outside the capsule. It looks like cgi. Looks fake. It's not just like the moon, but it's just. They modified again standard SpaceX badass. They had a camera outside, a selfie cam with a fisheye lens outside the hatch, the nose cone. So it had this beautiful picture of the. The spacewalk. Just time lapse of all the. You know, the evolution of the light, all that stuff. So I'll send you plenty.

[Sean Ryan]

So could you see the whole.

[Scott Poteet]

No, you could see good portion of it, but you couldn't. We weren't far enough away, there was enough underneath. And the. You know, there's Windows aren't that great. I mean it's. There's two windows, they're about that big. And then the Ford hatch, the actual hatch has a window in it.

[Sean Ryan]

What's it like looking out into Nothing.

[Scott Poteet]

Very eerie. Sometimes you depend on the lighting, but you could see stars and sometimes you couldn't. Especially when the Dracos are firing, all you see is this hue of, of yellows and reds from the, from the fuel exhaust. But there were times where it's just billions of stars. I mean more than you could ever imagine. We did see Constellation of Starlink. It passed like 70 km away. Ish, which is pretty close. I mean relatively speaking. They track all that. It's called mmod. Micro Meteorite. Orbital debris. Any that's, you know, worthy of. Well, anything that big would put a hole in your, in your capsule. But.

[Sean Ryan]

What was, I mean what was, what was the routine up there? Were you guys just. Did you have to be redoing stuff?

[Scott Poteet]

Oh yeah, no, it was, it was constant. We packed a lot ten pounds of shit into a six pound sock. It was, it was a lot because we wanted to make it. I mean how many astronauts have there been? You know, it's. We got to maximize this opportunity and leverage every minute and second we have. So we had a very intense timeline. And then you talk about all the adaptation to the environment. It's just like, like you're, you're challenged.

[Sean Ryan]

Any downtime?

[Scott Poteet]

Sleep. I slept maybe three, four hours a night if I was lucky. It's tough. I mean if you're a back sleeper, it's, it's okay because by the time you fall asleep you're flat as a board levitating like Exorcist type above the bed. And the, these seats are like bucket seats, almost like a racing kind of seat. But you loosely connect the super seat belt because you float away. But by the time you fall asleep. And falling asleep is tough because since you're floating you feel like you're falling. So it was just once you hit like rem, it's like you get startled and wake up because you feel like you're falling. And so you go through this cycle until eventually you get so tired. I'm just. You fall asleep and then when you wake up you're just this flat as a board. Wow. We'd have these little, you know, down sleeping bags, just these little profile kind of things for comfort. Jared would sleep up on the top, I think Sarah slept on the bottom. I slept in my seat. And you know, it was just wherever you could find space.

[Sean Ryan]

What are you guys eating?

[Scott Poteet]

You know, it's like. So people ask, why do you mount? What does mountaineering have to do with spaceflight? Well, there's a lot of consistencies and you know when you climb a mountain and we did, one of our guides took us Ed Veasers. I don't know if you know Ed, he's only American to summit all fourteen 8,000 meter peaks without oxygen. American. Anyways, he took us down to Cotopaxi, Ecuador in 19,328 foot volcano, multiple days. Get up close to the summit. By the time you get up there, man, you're, you're hungry, you're dehydrated, you're sleep deprived, you're dealing with oxygen, you know, issues with altitude. You're in confined space on the tent and very consistent to how you feel in a capsule. And this gets to your question. You're just not that hungry. You're eating camp food. Because we're gonna bring this entire capsule down to vacuum. So if there's much, if there's a lot of water in any of the food, it just zaps it, it's just gonna freeze it and you know, it's not gonna taste good. So we had a little bit of fresh food to kick off. Cold pizza, these empanadas and little, little Hawaiian roll sandwiches. Otherwise that was gone. I was the only one eating. I mean, I'm, you know, being an endurance guy. I'm just like. And I felt great. So my crew members were like, you're kid. And so I was the only one eating this stuff. But otherwise it's like Clif bars, beef jerky, that kind of stuff.

[Sean Ryan]

Yeah.

[Scott Poteet]

Just to sustain till you get five days. Five days. I mean, you didn't really want to sleep, but you felt like you had to do something. You want to make the most of it. But all of our time was science and research. And then the prep leading up to the spacewalk, that was a big deal.

[Sean Ryan]

Could you guys, I mean, how much time do you get to look at Earth and look at the vastness of space? I mean, just.

[Scott Poteet]

Yeah, because in the brightness of the sun, it is, it's, you know, it's not worthy of pictures. So it's not like we're focused because it's so bright and it's dark in the capsule. So it's really tough. Photography wise, it was more the transitions that were like, oh my God, that's amazing. The thin blue line. And then as sunrise and sunsets happen, that, that was really cool. The low altitudes, catching, you know, crossing over, you know, Egypt and the Gaza or Giza and the Nile and Suez and Israel. That was beautiful because your, your profile, the way you fly around the Earth is, it's pretty consistent. You're, you're descending over Europe into Africa, India, Australia, and then you start climbing back up through the Us and then back down. It's just how the orbit is with the rotation and interesting.

[Sean Ryan]

How long would it take to orbit the Earth?

[Scott Poteet]

It's 106 minutes for our orbit. 100, it's usually like 90 minutes for like the station hour and a half to get around. We were an hour and 46 minutes. That's because of this highly elliptical profile that we did with the. The furthest is called the apogee and that was a 1408. And then the lowest closest on the backside of that orbit is called perigee and that was the 190. 190 km which is like you're skimming the atmosphere.

[Sean Ryan]

It's close.

[Scott Poteet]

So we were just doing. You would catch a glimpse while you're doing all the science and research, blood samples and simple stuff that we don't think about that we have to solve for like triage. You know, you stick 100 passengers on a, on a starship that's headed to Mars, shit's going to happen. Cardiac arrests, you're going to have to incubate, cpr, whatever. Those aren't easy things to do especially in the volume of like a starship where you don't have leverage per se. Whereas small capsule, we had to do a CPR test, little compression thing, little trainer kind of thing, click, click, click. And just simply getting leverage to do CPR for two minutes because it's equal and opposite reaction. You push and now you're floating.

[Sean Ryan]

Yeah. How do you get leverage?

[Scott Poteet]

You just put your feet on the ceiling and so you'd have to move the patient over to one seat because you can't get to the patient underneath the other two seats. It's. You got to think about every little detail. Airway assessment. So the shape, everything changes shape wise. So your airway becomes more constricted. So if you're going to incubate and need to stick something down someone's throat, it's a different shape. So we don't know exactly what those changes are. So I did a endoscope camera exam of my airway. So this camera, this long little antenna, just stick it down the nose down to the airway and you're taking images before, during and after the flight. And all the smart people will go back, take this information. CGMs. Someone's going to have diabetes who goes to space. A simple CGM little device doesn't work so well in space. So just simple stuff. Drawing blood because you know as soon as blood it's flowing, floating, so you're so Used to gravity on some of these devices that, that draw blood. They weren't working in space. So we had to test new ones to draw blood.

[Sean Ryan]

So what does there have to be suction?

[Scott Poteet]

There's a little bit. It's like a part of it was centrifugal force. The one we tested didn't work. It was a device you just slap on, you push a button and it's supposed to like draw but was having difficulties because zero gravity. The fluid is just floating, man. Another cool test was it was an ambulance in a box. Literally just a suitcase pelican case. And it had all these leads. And so you go in cardiac arrest. We're sticking all these leads on doing a. And we can do an EKG and oxygen, blood pressure, pulse, anything and everything. All that's fed through Starlink down to the smart doctors on Earth. And they can monitor patients from space with this new device. And it's never been tested before, so.

[Sean Ryan]

Very interesting stuff like that. Yeah, yeah. Wow. So let's. So the spacewalk.

[Scott Poteet]

So this was.

[Sean Ryan]

I mean that had to scare the shit out of you, right?

[Scott Poteet]

Yeah, it's I think getting town to.

[Sean Ryan]

Vacuum, especially looking out into nothing, that was.

[Scott Poteet]

The fear came before that. And it was as you started to go down to, to vacuum. Because this suit, it's the only spacesuit that is a single panel of a visor, this iridium, whatever glow gold plated kind of thing. It is the only suit that is a single layer. You know, the emu suits they wear, they're multi layered and you know, different shades and stuff like that. So it's literally just this thin between you and death, you know, because if you lose pressure, pray that it's a slow leak and you can re pressurize the capsule in time.

[Sean Ryan]

But probably not.

[Scott Poteet]

Yeah, I didn't want to think about that too much. But you're watching the one on the HUD because that's your suit pressure and it should be additional five psid above whatever the capsule is. So, you know, if we're at like 10, I hope I'm reading 15. And then as it comes down, you know, eventually I see five and I know the capsule, we're in a vacuum, so we can just simply open the hatch. And so that is just a. And then it's just this whole compartmentalized the box breathing, you know, I'm just. Because you're in this confined space and if you're claustrophobic at all, I mean there were events in training where you're playing along with the scenario and you're rushing around because something happened, is an emergency situation. And the visor is down and it's 12 layers thick. And the idea is to retain your heat. But that is a huge concern because at some point you cross a threshold where your body can't cool itself anymore. You're just going to cook inside the suit because it can't cool fast enough. The airflow isn't that great. There's some vents right here, just right by the visor and the gas from the umbilical. But if you catch yourself overheating too fast, it's a point of no return kind of feeling. And you start to like, have this hyperventilation feeling because you're just trying to calm yourself down. And so you would experience this in training because you're, you're jumping all around and you're at 1G, having to fight the pressure of this suit. And it's just so. It's almost like that meditative state you had to get into for this spacewalk because of you did not want to like ever get yourself anywhere near. I never did, you know, you especially where I was sitting and what I did my role during the spacewalk because I stayed in my seat. So we only had enough gas to send two astronauts out. 15 minute increments, that's all we had. But technically the hatch, it's literally right there. I mean, space is right there. I just didn't get to stick my head out. Wanted to, but I'm locked in my seat belt. And same with Anna. And then Jared and Sarah were the ones that in the middle seats, did the swap soles.

[Sean Ryan]

One at a time, one at a time.

[Scott Poteet]

That's all it fits because you're pressurized. So the volume in the capsule, when you're pressurized especially. Jared's not a. Not a small human. He's six something. Six, two or six. I don't know what he. But he takes up a lot of that volume. You know, I'm just a widow guy, so. And I'm over my side, Nana's over her side and Sarah's small, so. But so enough room for him to get up, do his thing. 15 minutes. Did some mobility testing out there.

[Sean Ryan]

I mean, outside. Holy. By yourself. I thought that. I thought you'd have a buddy or something.

[Scott Poteet]

Yeah. You have a Kevlar cord for tether and then you have the umbilical. So it's. And then I guess I could, I could grab him if I had to.

[Sean Ryan]

What are they doing out there?

[Scott Poteet]

Mobility tests. He got a beautiful view so as soon as he opened the hatch, well, we actually had an issue with the hatch opening. I can talk about. But as soon as he got the hatch open, man, Earth just filled that entire. It was. It was unbelievable. And I got a great view of it, and Jared got a great view about halfway through his window. Sunset happened. So it got all black. So Sarah actually went out and it was just black. We were in the eclipse of the planet. So it's pretty dark when she went out. There's ambient light from the capsule and, and there's. There's lights up there, and she's got a light on her visor, but it's our camera, but the hatch. So our protocol was, Jared is going, once we get down to vacuum, everything's good. He's going to unlock it, break the seal, get out of the way, and it's going to be automated because they were concerned about him exerting too much force and generating heat. And that was a big concern. Well, as soon as he unlocked and broke the seal, it would automatically close on its own. Come to find out, the residual pressure from our suits was forcing the hatch to close so he would open a little bit more. But it wasn't enough. Finally, you know, again, based on the training that we went through and the rehearsals and these scenarios we were. It was meant for it. Our backup game plan was just to do a manual. Jared's just gonna open the hatch. So that was the, the first issue. The only issue that we had was he had to default to a manual hatch opening, which was kind of cool. And so he opens it and, and there's Earth and he goes outside. First commercial spacewalk. It was, wow, it was surreal. And a lot of people, There were a lot of doubters out there. You know, social media is an evil thing, but a lot of people doubted what we were doing, what SpaceX was able to accomplish. I'm sure Elon gets it constantly. I mean, just starting the rocket business and doing boosters, landing on drone ships, and now catching boosters with chopsticks. It's not a matter of if, it's just when. When are we going to accomplish all these things? And so he comes back in and then Sarah goes out and then she gets her 15 minutes, and then we're just. Our role underneath was just to manage the umbilical cords and safety monitoring the systems. Because if anything happens, it's like, abort, abort, abort. Get back inside, close the hatch, repressurize. And we could, you know, we could live in those suits for Hours, if not days, pressurized and we would eventually, you know, repressurize and deorbit if anything ever happened, man. Yeah.

[Sean Ryan]

How long do you think it'll be before the majority of Americans have been to space?

[Scott Poteet]

You know, it's absolutely inevitable. I believe it for sure it's going to happen. The concept of launching these starships and as soon as it starts taking the first human, it's, it's not going to be long after that. It's because they're already building out the. It's called Eclipse or the architecture, the infrastructure inside these. They have prototypes of, they got them down at Star Starbase in, in Texas where they do the launches, these mock ups of what it would look like in theory. And it's almost like these little cubicles, there's spirals stacked inside this immense. You know, it's. I don't know if it's 30 by 30, 30 foot diameter across, but it's. Ours was 12ft. I think it's 12ft. 12 or 14ft. I think it's 12ft is the diameter of our capsule. This is like 30. And it's like you have all this volume to float across. And the idea is these little cubicles, almost like these Japanese trains that have little, just enough space to lay down, but hundreds of these spiral stacked up inside this capsule and you got multiple levels. So now you have all the living quarters and then you got the eating quarters and then you got the operations where the crew of six to nine people in charge of the vehicle are going to operate. And then you have all these passengers that are just going for the ride. But I think we're a ways away. I, I think we're.

[Sean Ryan]

I feel like my kids are gonna take a school field trip there to.

[Scott Poteet]

To space, to low Earth orbit. Yeah, but it's this, this thing is the lymphatic, the body, you know, if 50% space adaptation syndrome get sick, could you imagine a hundred people?

[Sean Ryan]

No.

[Scott Poteet]

And 20, 30 people puking. What a show. It would be bad. So hopefully we can solve some of that. I don't know if it's drugs or I don't know.

[Sean Ryan]

What's it like coming back?

[Scott Poteet]

Well, another thing we did on orbit is the starlink tests. Oh yeah, I don't, I don't. I mean I can briefly cover this, but. So the idea was we're going to do a global music event. Sarah Gillis is a professionally trained violinist, absolutely beautiful, extremely talented. And we're going to do this global event, this flash mob where all these orchestras around the world are going to perform and she's going to perform in space. And it's all going to be broadcast via Starlink because it's never been tested up there. And we weren't sure about the, the probability of success. It was just an unknown because you gotta, it's all lasers, you know, and these little glass, I don't know what they are on the, on the actual Starlink that they had align all these things and, and they're traveling 17:5 and you're traveling 17:5 to figure out the math to make all this happen. And now you're passing through their orbit in your elliptical because they're circular, they're at 350, let's call it, and you're passing through them. So you got to communicate and it's just like smart people figure that stuff out. So we didn't know if it was going to work. As soon as we got up there, they're like, we think your WI fi is working. Can you guys get on your iPhone and see if it's working? We literally. And so the way you communicate with anyone in space is it's ground stations strategically placed all over the planet. And as you're going around, you're communicating line of sight to all these stations or you utilize what's called TDRS satellites, just national assets. I think there's only five or six out there. And it's high demand, national security kind of stuff. And you timeshare based on if you're on the iss. And you know, if we were going to utilize that, it's going to be about maybe 80% coverage. Otherwise we're in blackout, we're not talking any one kind of thing. Starlink is hopefully going to change that. And so they say, hey, we think it's working. Can you guys get on your iPhones and check literally ding, ding, ding, ding, ding, ding, ding, ding. All these messages start populating in my phone and we're like, can we call our families? We literally, I call my family. So I dial my wife and she patches in. We're FaceTiming. My kids are at school, I got two in high school, one in college. They step out of their classroom and everyone picture we have, we have like snapshots of our phone there we are talking to our family and I can only think back to when I met my wife and I'm in Korea and she's back in Minnesota and we're using these MCI calling cards and I get maybe 5, 10 minutes out of it and I, while I deployed to Kuwait. And I got two phone calls, five minutes each over 90 days. And that's all I talked. And oh, by the way, I proposed to her the day before I deployed and we got married three days after I got back from my deployment, so. And so we're engaged. I talked to her twice.

[Sean Ryan]

Geez.

[Scott Poteet]

Anyways, so I think back to just, I don't know, what was that 25 years ago? And now here we are, I'm in space, I'm 1400 miles up, I'm traveling 17,500 miles an hour. I'm currently over Africa on my way to India, and my kids are in school. And I'm talking, you know, it's just absolute mind blowing. What we have access to talk about information flow. I mean, we took some Starlink to Philippines so St. Jude could set up some of these at remote locations. And so all these people who live in jungles now have access to this telemedicine, otherwise who wouldn't, you know? And it's just now we got Starlink down to our phones and it's just living a different world.

[Sean Ryan]

We do, we do. And so coming home.

[Scott Poteet]

So it's a drawn out process to get ready because you got to strap everything in because it's a violent ride. I think it's more violent coming home than it is going up. Your body is deconditioned, so you're used to zero gravity. But we've only been there for five days. I mean these astronauts on the space station, when, when I come, when Butch and Sonny come home in a couple weeks, you know, they've been up there for six plus months, they're way deconditioned. So it's, it's tough because you're not using the skeletal system. Your ligaments, your tendons, your muscles like you normally do. That's why they dedicate hours, three hours a day to working out up there on the station. Our five days, you still feel deconditioned. So the moment you start this re entry and what happens is you turn the capsule around, you fire the Draco engines into the direction of your velocity and that slows you down. So as you begin to slow down now, gravity starts taking over and you enter your deorbit profile. And as soon as you start coming down, you hit the atmosphere. And that's what really slows you down because you have all this drag, but it also generates plasma, heat, fire. So that's what you enter the blackout phase. So as you start, the first step of the whole process is to separate from the trunk. So you got the capsule, and then you got this extension. It's called the trunk. It's got solar panels because this, this entire vehicle is energy depleting. So we need the solar panels for, for energy, for power. So you separate from the trunk a couple hours prior, and it's just this big old thump. And that's okay. We're committed because we can't survive in this capsule for. For too long. We got to come home. So you're coming home anyways. You get in your suit, you get in your, your, your seat, you strap in, and. And engines start firing. And it's just this constant repetitive as these engines are firing to slow you down. And then it just, it just slowly starts to build this vibration, this chatter. And as you start to hit the atmosphere, it's. You got your two little windows and you can see just enough. And you initially see like, these sparks. Almost looks like campfire sparks up high. And then all of a sudden it turns into, like, these streaks, and then it just turns into fire. You are literally on fire. And it's like. I think it's like 2,600 degrees. So it's. You're cooking. You're praying that TPS the thermal protection system, your protection on the belly is working. If any MMOD hit that stuff, you didn't know about it. Well, you probably wouldn't find out. You just, you wouldn't survive it. And then you hit blackout, and it's just. You're hauling ass and it's shaking. And you start to build up those G forces again because you're slowing down. You're going from 17.5 down to like 350 miles an hour. So this is just massive G forces. So again, four and a half, but it's a lot longer. And the fact that you haven't been at G's on orbit point two feels. Whoa, I feel heavy. Four and a half. It's like, okay, I don't know how long I can sustain this before I feel like I'm gonna pass out. You're so hyped up on adrenaline anyways. And then you're just watching the clock for certain milestones. You're looking for the drug shoots to come out. And then once the drug shoots come out, it's. They'll pull the shoots eventually. And those are explosives. So it's another big old. You know, the panel gets blown pulled. And, you know, it's. They're superimposed images on our display, so I can actually see it happen. So it's the first point of Relief is okay. The drugs are out. They look good. They're not tangled or anything like that, like a parachute. And then the big moment is when those shoots come out. And it's just a big old. It's almost like a car crash. It's just this boom. Four big chutes come out. And then now it's just a soft ride down. The impact is like a car crash, like a fender bender. It's pretty intense. That's why it's only built for water landings versus land. You'd break your back if you landed on the land. And then you're just trying to get used to gravity and you're bobbing, you know, waiting for them to pull the recovery. Because again, it's SpaceX. They got everything in top fashion. They have this dedicated boat. It's literally within a mile of where they splash down. They know exactly where you're going to end up. They pull that boat. They send out special ops guys, a bunch of PJs. They all have military backgrounds. They're on their jet skis and they're fast boats. And they pull right up to the capsule. They, they, you know, do some sniff tests because hypergols is a big concern. It's just this fuel that can kill you if you breathe too much of it. So they do a sniff test to make sure there's no leaks. Put some straps on the capsule. Then they pull the big boat up right behind you. They get this crane and they just, literally just pick you up, put you on the deck, slide you right up to a deck where the hatch is. And they open the hatch. Doctors come in, check you over, give me a thumbs up. Because millions of people are watching the broadcast and you don't want to. When you step out or you can't stand up or for whatever reason, they check you out. And then one by one, it's like wave to the families and crowds. And then they do a med check. Helicopter comes, get in the helicopter, and they buy you back for the reunion, the family reunion in the hangar.

[Sean Ryan]

How was it seeing your family?

[Scott Poteet]

It was awesome. I think that was actually one of the highlights because it was, you know, getting motion just thinking about. It's just like this relief knowing that she's at ease now because for me, I'm living and breathing and, man, I'm. I'm on cloud nine. This is. This is my jam. But for her, knowing that it's like it's over and she can kind of just let go because she's trying to hold it together for the Kids this whole time and you know, from the launch to the spacewalk to the splashdown, it's just all these. And having to think about the inevitable. Not the inevitable, but God forbid, the worst thing that could happen. You know, having to live with that, thinking about it for years leading up to this. It was just kind of a emotional. It's over for her. Damn.

[Sean Ryan]

Well, that's a hell of a journey, man. That is a hell of a journey.

[Scott Poteet]

Yeah, it's. It was only September 15. We splashed down, launched on the 10th. We were up there on the 11th, September 11, talked to Folds of honor in space, which was cool. We called Dan Rooney and a couple of the families the CEO. So that was. That was cool. Sarah did her music event and Anna wrote a book, children's book for her kids. So she read that on. On Orbit. We all kind of got a. A little taste.

[Sean Ryan]

Very interesting.

[Scott Poteet]

Yeah.

[Sean Ryan]

Is there anything I should have asked that I didn't ask?

[Scott Poteet]

That was a lot.

[Sean Ryan]

Well, you know, when we met at inauguration, you had offered to take me up in an F6.

[Scott Poteet]

Oh, I did, Did.

[Sean Ryan]

I'll settle for the first podcast in space.

[Scott Poteet]

Oh, the first podcast in space. I think that is definitely. That's right up your alley, man. That would be awesome. We got the connectivity for it for sure.

[Sean Ryan]

Yeah, we could do it live.

[Scott Poteet]

Why not? You got to pick your. Who would you interview? All right, let's turn the tables. Let me ask you questions. Who would you interview in space?

[Sean Ryan]

Well, I mean, you know, Elon seems pretty fitting, so. But man, that would be really something, wouldn't it?

[Scott Poteet]

Yeah, but would you go? Yeah, Space. That was actually one thing, that, that upon reflection, getting down, you know, I'm trying to make sense of it all and I keep on, ego wise, bring it back to myself and what was it? What was, you know, the significance of it all and blah, blah, blah. And then I have the conversation with people and they're like, oh my God, what was it like? They immediately go into this mental simulation where they put themselves in the situation and it's a hell no, there's no way I'll go. I just don't know if I could do that or I'll sell my firstborn to go to space kind of attitude. And that's what makes me realize, okay, stop making it about yourself. It's so much more than that. It's about inspiring this next generation to want to go, to be that person.

[Sean Ryan]

I talk to my wife about this all the time. I mean, I think the possibility of our kids going to space is greater than them not. Things are just evolving so fast, you know, I think it'll become the norm before I die if I live up, you know.

[Scott Poteet]

And it's not just the moon and Mars. It's going to be low Earth orbit as well. I mean they're going to create habitable structures whether it's a bunch of star. The volume in a starship is equivalent to the iss. So the entire structure of the ISS up there is the same as a starship. So now SpaceX has dozens of these lined up down there and just waiting to launch, to test they can manufacture these and they give us the numbers when we go down there for tours and stuff. It's crazy, it's mind blowing how quickly they can build these rockets and they're only getting more and more efficient. That's his business model. It's like, okay, Widget X. The production of Widget X by company Y is slowing us down. Let's bring this in house, 3D, print it and do it ourselves. And that takes out that whole delay. So you know, they become more and more efficient and they're again, these engineers are empowered to do that, you know, with the, with the ability to take risk as needed. You know, safety always being the primary concern to be able to create all these starships and, and it will be, you know, reality when they're launching all the time. Yeah, constantly. And now you, you take these starships, one of them. How about docking three, four of these together? And now you have three or four space stations up there. Create hotels and you know, whatever research labs and 3D print, some organization.

[Sean Ryan]

It's a fascinating subject. It's I guess you know, the new frontier. Well, Scott, what a, what an interview, man. Covered a lot of ground there and man, it was an honor to sit here with you and learn about your life and got into some pretty deep discussions and talking about space and God and everything, man, it's been, it's been an honor.

[Scott Poteet]

Thank you. Honor's mine, man. I just appreciate the opportunity. What you're doing is absolutely amazing and all the power to you. I wish you a lot of success because you're changing lives and just getting the message out, whatever it might be, you know, it's, this is, this is the message that people need to hear. Not necessarily my story, but all the things and people you interview and you know, you've talked about like dj he would never have a platform like this. And now everyone knows his story and the sacrifices that he's made and there's dozens and dozens more like, like, dj that you're allowing this opportunity. So we owe you the thanks, brother.

[Sean Ryan]

It's cool to be able to do it. Thank you. Thank you, but. All right, Scott. God bless, brother.

[Scott Poteet]

All right, brother. Jim Rome takes on sports. Why? Because you're not playing me with rapid fire takes.

[Sean Ryan]

Y'all went from the super bowl straight to the toilet bowl. He's not over the NFL. The NFL is over him. Scorching debates, all the good, all the bad, all the ups, all the downs.

[Scott Poteet]

He's the spitfire of sports. Smack.

[Sean Ryan]

Sorry for what I said, because it was appropriate when I said it, but I can't say it anymore. Dude, you are killing the game. The Jim Rome show podcast.

[Scott Poteet]

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