Vytal Sines

From the peat bogs of northern Scotland to the Mojave Desert and the edge of space. In this episode of Vytal Sines, test pilot and Virgin Galactic astronaut David Mackay shares how a childhood dream, relentless work, and hard-earned resilience led him to become the first Scot in space. In this episode with David Mackay, you'll learn: • About David's upbringing, watching low-flying RAF jets...

Former NASA astronaut and artist Nicole Stott joins Vytal Sines with Paul Wizikowski and Ryan Cristelli for a deeply human conversation about life on the International Space Station, the space shuttle, the overview effect, and why we must embrace our role as crew aboard Spaceship Earth. Across two ISS missions and a spacewalk, Nicole shares vivid stories of launch, living and working in orbit, eme...

What does it really take to become a NASA astronaut, stare down failure, lose friends in flight, and still strap back onto a rocket? In this episode of Vytal Sines, NASA astronaut Michael “Mike” Fincke (4 spaceflights, ISS veteran, Crew-11 pilot) unpacks the mindset, data-driven decision-making, and resilience required to push human exploration forward. From flunking out of pilot training on his b...

In this episode of Vytal Sines, Paul Wizikowski and Ryan Cristelli sit down with Michael López-Alegría (MLA) – U.S. Astronaut Hall of Fame inductee, former NASA astronaut, and Axiom Space Chief Astronaut – to unpack a lifetime of extreme moments: Surviving the “nightmare scenario” of free-flying in space with only a SAFER pack 10 spacewalks building the International Space Station (and why Russian...

His first launch ended in catastrophic failure. At 30 miles up and traveling 4,000 mph he reached the edge of space only to come crashing down. And then he launched two more times! In this episode of Vytal Sines, we go inside the Pentagon to sit down with U.S. Space Force Brigadier General Nick Hague — former NASA astronaut, International Space Station veteran, and survivor of one of the most dram...

In this electrifying episode, Dr. Peggy Whitson – record-shattering astronaut, biochemist, and ISS commander – takes us from a tiny Iowa farm town to the very edge of uncertainty in space. She reveals how Apollo 11, Star Trek, and stubborn grit turned a “flash in the pan” dream into nearly 700 days off the planet. From tense negotiations in bugged Russian rooms to a violent ballistic Soyuz reentry...

Hello and welcome! My name is Paul Wizikowski and I am a storyteller at heart. But my good friend Ryan Cristelli, he’s the real talent. For the better part of a decade he and I worked at the same ad agency and found ourselves chasing stories and highlighting the humanity around this planet. We’ve wandered through the rainforests of South America, stumbled through the frozen tundra of, well, mostly...