It's the place of innovation, exploration and discovery.

The Moonshot Museum is a unique, one of a kind experience that you can't find anywhere else in the world.

So to me, Moonshot Museum is a field trip to the future.

Walk into Moonshot Museum on Pittsburgh's North Side and you'll be amazed.

So welcome to our moon base.

This is where you are going to be lunar citizens.

These students are from Manchester Academic Charter School, and they're getting their first glimpse of a brand new spacecraft that may one day touch down on the surface of the moon.

This is Griffin.

It's going to the moon.

Currently slated for fall of 2025.

It's going to the south pole of the moon.

Even more fascinating is that this lunar lander is being built in a dust and germ free environment right here in the Steel City by a company called Astrobotic Technology.

We have a partnership with Astrobotic where we have visibility into their clean room, so visitors get to see a real life spacecraft being built in real time.

Doctor Jimyse Brown is executive director of Moonshot Museum.

Like the museum, she to hold some very distinctive titles.

As the first African-American director of a space museum in Pennsylvania, and as the first black director to lead a museum focused on career readiness.

And what makes the Moonshot Museum so special is that we're the only museum with that focus of trying to ensure that children understand the diaspora of professions that is within the space industry, allow them to explore that industry at such an early age.

Brown knows the importance of both education and opportunity.

She was a gifted student, attending Kelly Elementary in Wilkinsburg and later earning a full scholarship to Winchester Thurston.

She played basketball, a Shepherd University in West Virginia, and at the University of Nottingham in the UK before receiving her doctorate from Point Park University.

My mom and my grandmother, my Nana, were absolutely instrumental in instilling the desire of learning, but also that desire for success in seeing my mom go back to school was something that was inspiring.

The level of class that my grandmother had, the level of fortitude, and the ability to serve others with such a humble heart.

So I try to find ways of how I can continuously serve others.

But with all her accomplishments.

Never in her wildest dreams did Brown ever envision herself serving as head of a space museum.

I wanted to be a forensic anthropologist, and unfortunately, like a lot of young students that look like me, I was steered away from the STEM industry.

I was told I should probably focus on basketball.

A weird story, but I saw a position for an astronaut, and in applying that allowed me to unlock my mind.

And that's when Moonshot Museum came up and I took a shot.

You know, this museum is really vested in the community.

They're really vested in our future.

And just as the museum gave Brown a chance.

Her hope is that young people like these will realize the potential for careers in the aerospace industry.

To open a space museum in Pittsburgh.

To me, it means that the industry is beginning to understand that there is untapped talent in various regions and places that might have not been considered before.

You don't have to be an engineer with a PhD working at NASA to be working in space.

This is Peregrine departing Earth and you can see a beautiful shot of the blue ocean.

John Thornton is the head of Astrobotic, which collaborates with the museum, providing visual access and instruction for visitors.

You have permission to launch.

We have ignition.

Last year, his company built and sent its first lunar lander, named Peregrine, into space.

- And liftoff of the first United Launch Alliance Balkan rocket.

So Peregrine took off earlier this year to head towards the surface of the moon.

We had a beautiful launch, great initiation of the spacecraft.

Until we had one problem, that we had a valve issue inside the spacecraft, which let super high pressure helium get into our fuel tank and actually burst the fuel tank.

So that was unfortunately a catastrophic event that could no longer allow the spacecraft to land on the surface of the moon.

But we did learn a lot.

Spending ten and a half days in space.

Now, Astrobotic is using that knowledge and experience to build another lander.

So Griffin is primarily made of aluminum.

And the reason we do that is one is it's readily available.

The supply chain is robust and we can design and machine it very easily.

Many of the parts were actually built by area Pittsburgh companies integrated right here in our clean room.

And when it's time for launch from Cape Canaveral, Florida, planned for 2025.

Those orders will come from a control room located right here in Pittsburgh.

This is Mission Control Pittsburgh, where all of the commands are sent back and forth to the spacecraft.

This is where all the data came back from our first mission, Peregrine.

This is also where our next mission, Griffin, will be getting all of its data from.

The principal goal of this mission is to show that Griffin can successfully land on the surface of the moon, and although it takes scientific know how and skill to send a spacecraft to the moon, what Thornton especially wants people to know is that space is open to everyone.

This is a space that is a $425 billion industry.

It employs hundreds of thousands of people from all over the world, from all different walks of life and all different disciplines.

And I think no matter what your talents and passions are, whether they're science, engineering or math or writing, policy making or art, there's a need in this growing space industry and there's a need right here in Pittsburgh.

Mike Hennessy is the manager of learning and programs at Moonshot Museum.

Here at Moonshot, we offer digitally driven, team building mission simulations so students can immerse themselves as lunar citizens maybe 40, 50 years in the future.

We're looking for ice.

We're looking for good access to sunlight.

So let's try finding the best, best region on the moon for that.

Okay, give it a shot.

So and that ice is the key to humans going back to the moon not just to visit this time, but to stay.

We can use that ice for drinking water, for growing plants.

We can also break that H2O apart.

That will give us hydrogen to fuel robots and rockets on the moon.

We get a ton of visitors, a lot of pre-K through 12th grade, but we also just get some space enthusiasts.

So we've had some people from the older generation who might remember the original Apollo 11, when Michael Collins, Buzz Aldrin and Neil Armstrong landed on the moon for the first time in U.S.

history.

But no matter their age, all these exhibits are designed to get visitors to think.

Rover one is already set to be able to be locked and loaded and ready to go, but we just need one more resource when it comes to power.

So we need a battery.

So.

There you go.

Very good.

These eighth graders may never venture into outer space.

Still, Moonshot Museum is a pretty cool place to visit.

I like it.

Just know about space more.

I liked it because the different things we did, different activities and helped me learn more about space.

We have to make sure that the rovers work together.

Moonshot Museum was a lot of fun.

Fun but educational.

I thought the whole experience was pretty cool.

You know, getting to learn about the moon.

And whether it be the moon, Mars or some other distant planet.

For Pittsburghers working in and on behalf of the space industry.

The sky is literally the limit.

Space is the final frontier.

And we can go to the moon.

We can go to other destinations.

It all starts with taking those small steps.

The allure of space is that it's a never ending journey.

There's always something to discover, whether it's a moon, whether it's a planet, whether it's a galaxy.

I'm excited to see what's to come.