as the crew of apollo 17 left the surface, they didn't know that gene cernan would be the last person to walk on another world for quite a while. we're on our way, houston. but now, in this decade, finally... ..we're going back. mission control: and lift—off of artemis 1. nasa's artemis programme will, in the next year or two, return us to our neighbour. part of its mission — to land the first woman and the first person of colour on the moon. another part — to use what we learn here to send the first astronauts to mars. this is where it all began — florida's kennedy space center — named after the president who made the original pledge to go to the moon. and now, this place is at the centre of even grander plans, because this time, we're notjust visiting the moon — we want to stay. this is gateway, humanity's first space station that will orbit another world. it will go round the moon every seven days. and, like the international space station above earth, astronauts will call this place �*home'. although, where the iss can accommodate up to 12 astronauts and is comparable to a five— o

gene cernan, last man to walk on the moon, did kindly give me a pin that made me an honorary astronautyway, i'm fascinated in this stuff, this launch today because this is boeing's attempt working with nasa to sort of take on elon musk and his spacex drag gone capsules that have been per r -- ferrying astronauts back and forth to the internal if national space station. starlineer has enormous implications beyond this. it could eventually be the start of bigger rockets and all that take us to the moon if beyond. there's artemis, this giant, giant rocket that is really going to lead to the stars and beyond. this is part of that process. and if you live along the space coast or the east coast of florida, my gosh, you're seeing almost a launch every over day from various rocket enterprises manned and unmanned as we get back to space with a vengeance. so this kind of stuff and this 22-person crew set to take off a little more than an hour and a half from now, is a continuation of that. a take it from this, well, kind of astronaut, that's a big deal. that's us. that's america. after this. ho