3…2….1… Liftoff of Artemis !!
Excitement is over the moon.
After months of delays and setbacks…
It’s the first time we’ve flown this rocket and this capsule…
NASA’s Artemis 1 blasts into the heavens, ushering in a new era of space exploration.
Now our generation is going to have its own moonshots!
Back to the moon… and beyond.… now on The Inside Story: Liftoff!
Thanks for joining us, I’m VOA Midwest Correspondent Kane Farabaugh here at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center at Cape Canaveral.
Fifty years since people last walked on the surface of the moon, hundreds of thousands are drawn to Florida’s Space Coast…
To witness the beginning of a new chapter of NASA’s human spaceflight mission, with the launch of the agency’s rocket and spacecraft system, designed to return astronauts to the lunar surface, with the goal of one day reaching Mars.
The first step back to the moon however, is unmanned, and marks the beginning of NASA’s Artemis mission. As it launches into the sky, it carries with the agency’s hope of reinvigorating interest in space exploration.
For nearly forty years, Brenda Mulberry has owned a space themed clothing shop not far from Kennedy Space Center in Florida, where business was slow since Space Shuttle launches ended in 2011.
But this year, she says, is different.
Excitement is over the moon.
People are flocking to Mulberry’s store to get anything they can related to NASA’s new Artemis mission.
On a normal day we might see 60 to 70 people in a day in our store, and we’re seeing hundreds and hundreds and hundreds an hour. It’s a zoo.
After overcoming some last-minute technical issues, NASA’s Space Launch System, or S-L-S, rocket and boosters successfully roared into the night sky over Florida’s space coast carrying an unmanned Orion spacecraft into the heavens on a test flight to the moon.
I always admired rockets and fast vehicles, and that’s probably why I became a fighter pilot now.
Andrin, a Swiss Air Force F-18 fighter pilot, traveled from Switzerland to Florida just to watch the historic Artemis 1 launch up close, in person.
The SLS rocket has about 250 times the thrust of an F-18 fighter jet so that is quite a bit more than I am used to.
The loudest thing that has ever launched.
Retiree John McDonald joined throngs of visitors filling parks and viewing areas near Kennedy Space Center to witness the event he described as “unifying” for a country divided by polarizing politics in the wake of mid-term elections.
Nobody here is talking about whether they are Trump people or Biden people. Politics doesn’t enter into any of this. They are just here for one thing, to see space and to see that rocket launch.
Nobody cares about whether you are red, blue, purple, whatever. I think it is a great unifier to have something like this to latch on to.
Florida author and artist Josh Novack hopes the Artemis program reinvigorates interest in space exploration like NASA’s Apollo missions to the moon in the 1960s and 1970s.
I can see how an event like that can bring people together and galvanize everybody towards a goal, and I think that goal should be improving life on Earth and I think a great way to do that is to explore space.
One of the main goals of the 26 day Artemis 1 mission around the moon is to test the new Orion spacecraft in preparation for crewed missions.
It’s amazingly cool!
NASA Astronaut Stan Love says plans for Artemis includes diversifying the makeup of the crews, paving the way for the first woman and person of color to make history on the lunar surface.
We are going to broaden our demographics, so it won’t just be white guys on the moon.
I call it the Artemis generation. Apollo had a twin sister – Artemis – and this is our generation.
Branelle Rodriguez is an integration manager for NASA’s Orion capsule which will house the astronauts.
I think it’s a fantastic thing for us to experience, for people to go explore and create a presence on the moon.
It’s the first time we’ve flown this rocket and this capsule so there are many, many things that can go wrong. This is a test flight. Don’t get your expectations too high.
But with throngs of tourists gathering in Florida for each launch attempt, plus reporters from around the world assembled at Cape Canaveral, astronaut Stan Love knows those expectations are high, due in part to the large price tag of the endeavor.