Blue Telescope, an award-winning, interactive exhibit agency, has created two new exhibits at the Kennedy Space Center Visitor Center. The Robotic Space Explorers Wall and the RL10 Upper Stage Rocket Challenge, new immersive interactive adventures that explore some of the most iconic satellite missions, opened to the public in June 2022.
While the museum has tended to focus on crewed space missions, this new installation tells the stories of the robotic explorers who can go further and stay longer.
Robotic Space Explorers Wall
The Robotic Space Explorers Wall is a fully interactive 30’ x 9’ gallery that invites users to visualise and engage with 40 of the 400+ space probes currently exploring our solar system. Three touchscreen monitors offer a detailed timeline, as well as a deeper dive into the history of each mission.
Visitors can also get hands-on, launching satellites onto the wall and following each one as it makes the journey from Earth and out across the solar system. The wall captures guests’ gestures in star-filled silhouette shadows to highlight and name each spacecraft, as well as the planets and asteroids they pass.
With detailed facts and behind-the-scenes stories about each mission, the Robotic Space Explorers Wall makes each mission unique. It also features surprise “easter egg” animations that visitors can activate by gesturing at beacons on the flight trajectory. These include
- OSIRIS-REx, which shares a cheeky homage to the vintage arcade game Asteroids
- JUNO, which offers a peek at the actual LEGO minifigs of Jupiter, Juno & Galileo, who hitched a ride on the spacecraft
- VOYAGER, which presents highlights from the iconic “Golden Record” it has carried for the past 45 years
Meanwhile, the Aerojet Rocketdyne RL10 Engine Challenge interactive guides visitors through the ignition of this flagship upper-stage rocket engine. When visitors virtually mix liquid hydrogen and oxygen, initiating combustion at just the right moment, the powerful engine comes to life.
The new exhibits are part of a new attraction at the Kennedy Space Center Visitor Complex called Gateway: The Deep Space Launch Complex, which opened earlier this year.
The Kennedy Space Center says that this new attraction allows visitors to explore the visionary designs that are paving the way for humans to travel deeper into space, enabling guests to discover the latest cutting-edge space exploration innovations from NASA and its commercial partners.
Blue Telescope works to highlight the unexpected, bring new perspectives, and upend expectations. The company has won more than 100 awards for creativity including a Muse Award for the Liberty Science Center’s Beyond Rubik’s Cube exhibit. It specialises in location-based interactive storytelling experiences that make data beautiful and engage audiences in content.
