Houston, we have a podcast. Welcome to the official podcast of the NASA Johnson Space Center, episode 116, Apollo versus Artemis.

I'm Gary Jordan, I'll be your host today. On this podcast, we bring in the experts, scientists, engineers, astronauts, all to let you know the coolest information about what's going on in human spaceflight.

We are returning to the moon, putting the boots of the first woman and the next man on its surface within five

years.

It's part of NASA's Artemis program, and there's a lot to it.

Now one of the main questions you may be thinking right out of the gate is how is this different from when we last

went to the moon? 50 years ago we were in the height of the famous Apollo program

the same program that put the boots of Neil Armstrong in Buzz Aldrin on the surface of the moon and

redefine what was possible for all of humanity. One of the driving forces

behind this initiative was simple. It could be condensed into a single phrase,

beat the Russians.

We were in the middle of a cold war with the Soviet Union,

not to mention the hot war in Vietnam,

and though there were many interested in the value of exploration

and discovery, the driving force was really political in nature.

And that driving force defined the parameters of the Apollo mission structure.

We had to put a man on the moon and return him safely to earth by the end of the decade.

Those were the driving political forces that put speed at the forefront.

This meant that the spot that you would land would be, quote, the easiest.

The trip would be short so you didn't have to

bring a lot with you and that you didn't have to focus too hard on the longevity of

the program. I'm not knocking Apollo because with this profile we redefined what was possible for human history.

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