The 3rd Australian Space Development Conference was held in Sydney in 1994 and was used by the then Australian Space Office to launch it's five year plan for the Australian space industry. Guest Speaker was Apollo XV astronaut; David Scott who spoke to a large audience at the Powerhouse Museum, in Sydney. The museum had earlier that year welcomed the NSSA as an affiliated society to the museum, in recognition of the NSSA's public relations work on Australian space activities. The Society and the Museum would go on to forge strong ties and equally benefit from the many space events held at there.

The three ASDC's to date had been aimed specifically at the business community, and whilst rewarding for the industry, were limited in their appeal to the general public and society membership. Also a platform was needed for the more far reaching and long term topics that could not find a place in the program of the ASDC. Space colonisation, interplanetary exploration, and future human existence, are just some of the subjects. With that view in mind, then Sydney Chapter President; Martin Thorne proposed and chaired the 1st Space Frontier Conference (SFC).

The first annual SFC was first held in July 1995 at the Powerhouse Museum. An exciting mix of talks and videos saw the event well attended. Students from the Australian International Space School were in the audience, as were other members of the Australian Space Research Institute, the Planetary Society and other groups. One aspect of the success of the SFC is the coming together of other similar minded groups and individuals. It is an acknowledgment that there are indeed societies other than the NSSA who are also working towards a spacefaring civilisation.

1996 was a turning point for the NSSA, two conferences and board reshuffle. The year began with a social cricket match in Gosford north of Sydney, between several NSSA chapters and space groups, namely the Science Technology and Research Party. We even had visiting Russian Scientists to the Powerhouse Museum have a bat. The match was on the anniversary of the Space Shuttle Challenger accident, and was dubbed the 'Challenger Memorial Cricket Match'. The enjoyment of friendly competition in the outdoors, with BBQ and model rocket launches, called for outing to become a annual event. Unfortunately the 1997 match was rained out.

The 4th Australian Space Development Conference was held for the first time outside Sydney, in Canberra, ACT. In conjunction with the 8th Australian Remote Sensing Conference and the 10th National Space Engineering Symposium under the banner of SPACEWORKS '96. The three day merged event included a prestigious dinner at Parliament House, and substantial media attention. Headline guest speaker was NSS Executive Chairman; Robert Zubrin, who also spoke in Sydney on his 'Mars in 10 years' plan.

Later in the year was the 2nd Space Frontier Conference, this time hosted by the Queensland NSSA chapter in Brisbane. The event showed the importance of having a team working together and it was decided to adopt a procedure similar to the NSS ISDC where host chapters will bid to hold the conference, like a city bids for the Olympics. Whilst in Brisbane the board of directors met to reshape the executive committee of the NSSA. Drastically cutting the cumbersome board of over 15 directors down to a core group of 8 each with a particular area of responsibility. The AGM later in the year confirmed these offices and voted the members to be responsible.

1996 also saw the demise of the Australian Space Office. More than ever the NSSA recognised the importance of having a body separate from government, but responsible to the people, that would help guide the Australian space industry. Along with ASICC, the NSSA called for the establishment of an Australian National Space Agency (ANSA) and, through the efforts of Philip Young, released the white paper "Space Australia" to the government. ANSA has not been established but the Society will be pursuing this goal in the years to come.

The 3rd Space Frontier Conference, was held in Sydney during July 1997 at the Powerhouse Museum, was noted with its guest speaker being Dr Seth Shostak, a leading researcher into the Search for Extra Terrestrial Intelligence (SETI). The NSSA as an organisation now had the credibility to attract people of note in the scientific community to its conferences. With this conference came the inaugural NSSA Awards, similar in concept to the annual awards presented by the NSS at their ISDCs. Awards were presented for Chapter of the Year, Space Activist of the Year and the special Space Pioneer Award for service to the space industry. The inaugural award went to Mr Gordon Pike, a senior OPTUS telecommunications engineer.

1997 also saw the establishment of two new Chapters and with them new ideas and projects. The University of NSW Chapter was established by then SSFS member Jeffery Candiloro who was attending the University as an undergraduate. Tony James, an NSSA Director at the time, was able to establish the Central Coast Space Frontier Society following at special talk given at the Gosford Community Centre by Apollo 15 astronaut, Dr. David Scott.

1998 marked the introduction of a new-format Space Frontier News. The magazine format was expanded to a newspaper-style with bold new layouts, articles and features. Current Editor Glen Nagle has intentions to widen the magazine's subscription base through creating a magazine for the Australian Space community at large, in addition to being the NSSA's own newsletter.

With the creation of the UNSWSFS Chapter, its new committee was able to attract a core of enthusiastic university students who felt that their Chapter's main mission would be to embark on a project which they hoped could launch their future careers. Thus in 1998, the Basic LEO Experiment Satellite was born - BLUEsat for short. This project for building an amateur communications microsatellite was able to impress academics and Departments within the University to such a degree, that research funds would be made available to assist with the project.

The 5th Australian Space Development Conference held in Sydney in July 1998, proved to be the most successful to date; highlighted by excellent media coverage and attendance by the then Science Minister, Hon. Mr John Moore and NASA Associate Administrator Mr Alan Ladwig.

In September of 1998, the 4th Space Frontier Conference was held in Melbourne. Led by Mr Richard Tonkin, the conference was held at the Scienceworks Museum. The weekend also featured a public talk at RMIT, by NASA astronaut Dr Andrew Thomas outlining his time spent on the MIR space station in 1998. With this success and having found a strong committee; the Melbourne Space Frontier Society was once again meeting on a regular basis following a hiatus of a couple of years.

To Be Continued . . .