{"id":17831,"date":"2026-05-20T16:23:28","date_gmt":"2026-05-20T16:23:28","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/globalnewstoday.uk\/index.php\/2026\/05\/20\/how-a-socal-native-became-one-of-nasas-most-valuable-assets-los-angeles-times\/"},"modified":"2026-05-20T16:23:28","modified_gmt":"2026-05-20T16:23:28","slug":"how-a-socal-native-became-one-of-nasas-most-valuable-assets-los-angeles-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/globalnewstoday.uk\/index.php\/2026\/05\/20\/how-a-socal-native-became-one-of-nasas-most-valuable-assets-los-angeles-times\/","title":{"rendered":"How a SoCal native became one of NASA\u2019s most valuable assets – Los Angeles Times"},"content":{"rendered":"

This is read by an automated voice. Please report any issues or inconsistencies here<\/a>.
One of NASA\u2019s most valuable assets is a Southern Californian.
Following the space agency\u2019s successful Artemis II mission<\/a> around the moon last month, Victor Glover<\/a> \u2014 who grew up primarily in the Inland Empire and has spent much of his career at Southern California\u2019s many military and aerospace hubs \u2014 is now the only pilot to have flown NASA\u2019s Orion capsule.
As the crew finishes its international victory lap<\/u><\/a> before the media<\/u><\/a>, Glover is preparing to put his head down and get to work training the Artemis generation of moon-faring astronauts.
\u201cI think Artemis is going to demand us to change the paradigm,\u201d he told The Times.
Science & Medicine<\/a>
Victor Glover, who grew up in Pomona, will pilot NASA\u2019s first crewed flight to the moon since 1972. If successful, he\u2019ll be the first Black person to reach the moon.
The International Space Station, which has been continuously inhabited by a revolving crew of astronauts in low Earth orbit for over 25 years, has a \u201cvery well-worn\u201d training program, he said. But developing a new instructional regimen for complex high-stakes moon missions<\/a> as the agency tries to aggressively ramp up Artemis launches<\/a> from once every 3 1\/2 years to every six months is a different beast.
\u201cUntil we get really ramped up and have a solid training program, I think astronauts need to take more ownership of the training and be involved so we can share this experience,\u201d Glover said.
As of today, the list of Artemis astronauts<\/a> is only four people long. And the list of Artemis pilots has only one name: Victor Glover.
Glover, 50, was born in Pomona, graduated from Ontario High School and lived \u201call over\u201d Southern California\u2019s urban sprawl, including Baldwin Village (which he instinctively referred to by its pre-1988 name<\/u><\/a>, \u201cThe Jungle\u201d). He completed his undergraduate studies at Cal Poly San Luis Obispo and received graduate degrees (plural) from the Naval Postgraduate School in Monterey and the Air Force Test Pilot School at Edwards Air Force Base.
He cut his teeth as a test pilot at Naval Air Weapons Station China Lake, in the Mojave. After NASA selected him as an astronaut, he learned to fly SpaceX\u2019s Dragon capsule at the company\u2019s then-headquarters in Hawthorne<\/a> before riding it to the ISS.
Glover particularly misses those test pilot days, when he was pushing the limits of the F\/A-18 Hornet and Super Hornet in China Lake while completing a master\u2019s degree on the side.
\u201cThat was actually maybe one of the best times of my career. We had our fourth daughter while we lived in China Lake,\u201d he said. \u201cI was … working really hard but having a ton of fun at a house full of kids.\u201d
In one of Glover\u2019s favorite pictures, snapped by his wife, he is sitting at his desk in his tan desert flight suit, focused on graduate school work while holding one of his daughters.
Science & Medicine<\/a>
NASA\u2019s powerful Launch Abort System, designed to outrun an exploding rocket, is the result of years of work from scientists and engineers across the country, including in Southern California\u2019s Mojave Desert.
Glover sees himself as just one example of how the Golden State\u2019s deserts and coastal cities have left a lasting mark on America\u2019s space program.
\u201cSouthern California is very uniquely postured to help NASA,\u201d Glover said. \u201cSouthern California has the combination of culture and technology \u2014 and it doesn\u2019t hurt to have Hollywood\u201d to help share NASA\u2019s mission and values.
(Glover fondly recalled his joy seeing the \u201cIron Man\u201d production crew, including actor and rapper Terrence Howard<\/a>, roll through Edwards Air Force Base during his tenure.)
Glover, who now lives in Texas<\/a> near NASA\u2019s Johnson Space Center, is focused on bringing that SoCal sensibility and invaluable experience piloting the Orion capsule to the agency\u2019s astronaut training program.
When asked if he hopes to fly again on an Artemis mission, he gave a simple answer: \u201cNo.\u201d
There was one other thing on his to-do list, though.
\u201cTell L.A. I love them and all of Southern California \u2014 and I can\u2019t wait to get back out there and visit my home state and my hometown.\u201d
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Noah Haggerty is an environment and science reporter at the Los Angeles Times covering wildfire in the American West. A graduate of Northeastern University, he has a background in physics research, focusing on spacecraft propulsion and fusion energy. Haggerty joined The Times in 2024 as an AAAS Mass Media Fellow.
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This is read by an automated voice. Please report any issues or inconsistencies here. One of NASA\u2019s most valuable assets is a Southern Californian.Following the space agency\u2019s successful Artemis II mission around the moon last month, Victor Glover \u2014 who grew up primarily in the Inland Empire and has spent much of his career at […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":17832,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-17831","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-science"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/globalnewstoday.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17831","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/globalnewstoday.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/globalnewstoday.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/globalnewstoday.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/globalnewstoday.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=17831"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/globalnewstoday.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17831\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/globalnewstoday.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/17832"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/globalnewstoday.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=17831"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/globalnewstoday.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=17831"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/globalnewstoday.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=17831"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}