NASA Investigator: Moon Bases, Mars Anomalies & Uncontacted Tribes | Nadia Drake

Science journalist Nadia Drake, daughter of SETI pioneer Frank Drake, joins Danny Jones for a wide-ranging discussion of space exploration, astrobiology and the politics of funding big missions. Drake describes recent reporting at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory on the Voyager mission, saying both probes still communicate with Earth and that Voyager 1 is expected to reach the symbolic distance of “one light day” away in November.

The conversation turns to the search for life on Mars and how standards of evidence shape what NASA attempts. Drake argues that after Viking’s ambiguous 1970s life-detection results, NASA became more conservative, prioritising habitability and water before returning to biosignature work with Perseverance. She says Mars Sample Return grew so expensive that Congress defunded it last year, leaving uncertainty about how cached samples will be brought back for definitive testing.

They also discuss Artemis-era lunar plans and the governance problem of protecting historic lunar landing sites; Drake says the sites lack legal protection and depend on behavioural norms. Outside space science, she recounts reporting in south-eastern Peru on an Indigenous group living in voluntary isolation that has increasingly appeared near riverbanks and communities, and she challenges media claims about their language and name.

On UFOs/UAP, Drake says she served on NASA’s independent UAP study team, describing pilot reports as credible but not, on their own, proof of non-human origin, and she emphasises how classification can reflect sensor secrecy rather than extraordinary content.

• Drake says Voyager 1 is expected to be about a light-day from Earth in November, implying a 24-hour one-way signal delay.
• She argues NASA’s Mars life-search strategy became more conservative after Viking, focusing on habitability before renewed biosignature efforts.
• Drake says Congress defunded NASA’s Mars Sample Return programme last year after cost growth, creating uncertainty about returning Perseverance’s cached cores.
• She says lunar landing sites, including Apollo artefacts and bootprints, currently have no legal protections and rely on informal norms.
• Drake recounts reporting in Peru on an Indigenous group in voluntary isolation emerging near communities, with health risks from contact and episodes of violence.
• She says some media accounts mischaracterised the group’s language and name, and reports they prefer to be called “Namo”.
• Drake says she served on NASA’s UAP independent study team and cautions against leaping from unexplained sightings to claims of extraterrestrial origin.