Neil deGrasse Tyson on Artemis II Launch: ‘By the Time We Get to the Moon, They‘ll Say, Where Have You Been?’

EXCERPT:

DEGRASSE TYSON: “Well, first — last I measured, I think it‘s way bigger than the Statue of Liberty. So, to put that in context. And I‘m impressed. Finally, we‘re going back to the Moon. By the time we get to the Moon, they‘ll say, where have you been? I‘m thinking. Anybody on the Moon would be asking us that. As we all know, it‘s been 50 years since anyone has been back to the Moon. We‘re we‘re mimicking Apollo 8 in this journey. Apollo 8 went to the Moon in December 1968. Did not land, so fewer people remember that mission for that reason. But it did a figure eight around the moon and came back — excuse me. Apollo 8 orbited. This one will just do a figure eight and come back. But the point is, no one has been that far away from Earth, not only in the 50 years since Apollo 17, but because it‘s this huge looping figure eight, these astronauts will be farther from Earth than any human being has ever been before. So, that’s kind of an interesting fact about this.”