The Chikyu Near Earth Orbital Foundation
 

Our History: Chikyū Earth Orbital Foundation has its origins in a field west of Boston, Massachusetts. It was here that a sailor, Ernie Ginnetti, returned from years serving in the U.S. Navy on the U.S.S. Saratoga (CVA 60). Having fallen in love with astronomy at sea, he settled near the historic Wayside Inn, set up a family business, and built an observatory where he had clear views of the sky. With a Watch Officer's stamina to stay up all hours of the night and a passion for celestial engineering, he started a lifetime of "just checking in each night with a few planets and stars." Ernie was fascinated with the U.S. Space Program, satellites, and their evolution. An avid "tinkerer." he was a member of the Amateur Telescope Makers of Boston and the Rockland Astronomy Club of New York. His other love, maritime art, came in a second to whatever was happening in the skies above. If you were up at 2 am and just wandered over to the observatory, Ernie would show you what was going on that night and not let you go until a dram or two was gone. After decades of enchanting his neighbors with evenings spent in his observatory, watch parties on the lawn, and telling everyone he came into contact with about exactly which satellites or other important phenomena were overhead (whether they asked or not), Ernie passed away in 2019. During the long Covid nights that followed, a collection of his neighbors and friends banded together to purchase his property and observatory. With one of them being (not by sheer coincidence) a graduate student in space economics, the mission of continuing Ernie's reverence for the skies and for teaching others about its importance for human creativity, ambition, and history was born. Our mission is to continue Ernie's vision by educating all-comers that free enterprise actors, within a well-regulated and representative system, together with transnational action by major democracies, is the key to nurturing space as an enduring common resource.Following in his footsteps, the Foundation seeks to connect and inform people about our vision. We believe that low and middle earth orbit (and beyond) is a common ground where known rules derived from democratic systems allow private companies and entrepreneurs to responsibly contribute to human development. However, Ernie was not only a proponent of private action in space, he felt governments had a definite role too. From his time at sea, he had developed a firm belief that any ship, private or government, was aided by a strong safety and support system. For example, he believed that the U.S. Coast Guard (and its predecessor, the Life Saving Service) was vital for merchant sailors to venture out into the unknown and should be an example for LEO, MEO and GEO. As a result, Ernie always advocated for a "Coast Guard for Space." As do we.And, as his friends would tell you, whenever you knocked on the observatory door in the middle of the night Ernie made a point of saying "Hey, it's cold, bring the bottle from the tool drawer as you come up." We keep that tradition alive. Together with a dread of light pollution.