Back to the Moon!

After 53 years humankind is going back to the moon

As long as it’s been since I’ve posted on my non-fiction blog, it’s been way waaaayyyy longer since humankind has ventured past the bounds of low earth orbit into deep space. The last time was the flight of Apollo 17 which launched from Cape Canaveral — at the time, officially known as Cape Kennedy in honor of the assassinated president who set the nation on the path to the moon — on December 7, 1972, and returned to a splashdown in the Pacific Ocean on December 19, 12 days later but more than 53 years ago.

Two of the Apollo 17 astronauts, Gene Cernan and Harrison Schmitt, were the last humans to walk on the lunar surface, while their mission mate Ronald Evans orbited the moon in the command module. At least part of that history is to be added to now as the four crew members of the Artemis II mission hurtle toward the moon, escaping the grasp of earth’s gravity for the first time since the flight of Apollo 17.

There are naysayers today, just as there were in 1972, who question the value and purpose of the space program in general, and human space exploration in specific. My purpose in writing this essay isn’t to address those skeptics. There is ample evidence of the tangible value the space program has brought to both the U.S. and the larger world in the seven or eight decades it’s been a reality, and that evidence is easily uncovered. My answer to them is much simpler. We go into space, to the moon and points beyond, because it’s there. We don’t need any greater explanation or justification than that. It is in the human spirit to go beyond our known limits, our known frontiers, our known worlds, and space exploration captures and embodies and extends that spirit.

Back to the Cape

As a journalist who for some years covered the space program, I’ve spent a lot of time at the Cape and observing launches from both Kennedy Space Center and the Canaveral Air Force (now Space Force) Station. I can tell you from direct experience, seeing a launch on the tube or from a distance isn’t the same as being close up. I can see night launches, and occasional landings of SpaceX first stages, from my home, 120 miles (193 kms) distant, and even hear them, about 11 minutes later. But that’s not the same as being close-up to a rocket lifting off from the pad and heading for space.

I’ve become a bit complacent over the years and have only gone down to the Cape a few times since my career as a science and aerospace writer ended some decades ago. In truth, I almost didn’t go down for the launch of Artemis II (I was there when the initial launch of Artemis I was scrubbed shortly before launch time). It’s a bit of a trip, dealing with traffic and the crowds can be challenging, and the chances of a scrub all too real. As fate would have it, I had errands to run the day of the launch in Ocala, so I figured I was already part way there so decided in real time to just keep going. And that’s how I wound up on the shores of the Indian River in Titusville, directly opposite and just about nine miles from Pad 39A, where Artemis II was in final stages of preparation for launch.

It is always gratifying seeing the crowds of people who come from all over the country and, even more telling, all over the world, to see a launch. It’s especially gratifying seeing all the kids in the crowds, animated and excited as they await liftoff. One of the things that has struck me the most since the end of the Apollo program is how humankind waited and wondered throughout eons of history when a person might walk on the moon, and how whole generations have been born since that last human presence on the moon and were again relegated to waiting and wondering. And now these kids were again going to be able to see their dreams and wonderings realized.

My Personal Journey

My engagement with space and space travel goes back to my own childhood, growing up at the height of the Space Race in the 1950s and 1960s. I go into some depth on this in my piece Voyage to the Moon: My Personal Journey, posted in this space on the eve of the fiftieth anniversary of the first moon landing on July 20, 1969. That piece is as accurate and worth reading now as it was in 2019, and I strongly urge you to click on the link and read it. I won’t rehash all the detail included in that piece here.

That said, it is worth noting that, during my years covering the space program, I got to interview and in some cases hang out with half the guys who had walked on the moon. Most notable among them was Buzz Aldrin, second man to walk on the lunar surface, with whom I spent a few fun days palling around. Also notable, especially in light of the flight of Artemis II, was the time I spent with Walt Cunningham. Cunningham never walked on the moon, but he was part of the three-member crew of Apollo 7, the first manned mission of the Apollo program. That mission corresponds with Artemis II. The four Artemis astronauts — Mission Commander Reid Wiseman, Pilot Victor Glover, and Mission Specialists Christina Koch and Jeremy Hansen — won’t be walking on the moon, at least not on this mission. But they are the crew of the proof-of-concept mission that will lead to the first planned Artemis lunar landing in 2028. Unlike Apollo 7, which orbited the earth for nearly 11 days, in its 10-day mission Artemis II will travel to the moon, go around the back or “dark” side of the moon, and then sling-shot back for a return to earth. Its crew will have traveled further from earth than any other humans ever have.

The Launch

It is said that when the powerful Saturn V rockets which last sent humans to the moon lifted off, the sound waves broke windows in Titusville, the vantage point from which I was viewing the launch of Artemis II. Given the 8.8 million pounds of thrust, making Artemis the most powerful vehicle ever launched — 7.2 million pounds of thrust from the liquid-fueled main stage plus another 1.6 million pounds from the two solid rocket boosters latched onto the main stage — I fully expected sound waves at least equivalent to those generated by Saturn V’s 7.6 million pounds of liquid-fueled thrust. In truth, while I certainly heard the sound of the mighty rocket as it headed for space, I can’t say it was remarkable. Having witnessed many Space Shuttle launches, with their 6.4 million pounds of thrust, from the KSC press site — just three and a half miles from the launch pad — and feeling how those launches shook my insides, I expected more. Nevertheless, the liftoff was still a majestic moment, the sound of launch almost drowned out by the cheers and claps of the gathered crowds around me.

There had been a number of points in the last hours before launch, as I waited with the crowds and able to listen to the broadcast of a space group tracking the launch, when things looked iffy. There was the weather, which at times looked more than iffy. That fortunately improved toward launch time. There was a hangup closing and sealing the main hatch. It was found that a human hair was preventing the perfect seal needed, so that problem was corrected. There were high temperature readings with an onboard battery, and the mission management crew subsequently decided the readings were an instrumentation error and not a problem with the battery. Perhaps the biggest issue was with the Flight Termination System (FTS), a range problem. Flight controllers were unable to communicate with the system which would terminate the flight — read that as blow up the vehicle — were something to go wrong during ascent. At one point I was giving the chance of launch no more than 70%. To me, it’s always preferable, if there is to be a scrub, that it come sooner rather than later. In any case, finally, Shuttle-era gear was hauled out to deal with the FTS issue which resolved that problem. Things were looking better for launch.

Launch time — 6:24 p.m. EDT — came and went, with no launch. I had moved into position close to the shoreline where I could get a clear view of the launch site, through an opening in some bushes that would frame my photos, and waited, like everyone else. There was a Russian or Ukrainian family to my right, and their kids kept running back and forth in front of me on the rocks, a source of some annoyance. A number of different nationalities, mostly Asian and Latin, were to my left. There was a two-hour launch window, but I decided I’d give things 10 minutes before abandoning my post to see if I could learn the source of the holdup. Before that time tolled someone listening to a countdown report called out that launch would be in three minutes. I built in some time for a delay in the broadcast, which proved prescient since the vehicle ignited on the launch pad when the person was still calling out 30 seconds. Liftoff came about 10 minutes later than initially planned, but it was flawless as Artemis headed for space.

I won’t burden you with further verbiage about the launch. The pix and the videos that follow them below will tell you all you need to know and, if you didn’t have a chance to see the launch, wherever you are, you can share in it here. For now, three days in, things are going well with the mission, and if that trend continues we’re still on schedule for humans once more to set foot on the moon in about two years.

Click on the links below for some videos of the launch. Be sure your sound is turned up. It’s worth hearing the sound of the launch and the crowd.

All images and videos by the author.

This piece also appears on my non-fiction blog, FJY.US. Comment, share, and subscribe, here, and there.