This latest episode of Stories from Space featured a special guest: Dr. Alex Polanski, a postdoctoral researcher at Lowell Observatory. During our discussion, we talked about how the Lowell Observatory played a vital role in training the Apollo astronauts. This consisted of detailed images of the lunar landscape, which the astronauts used to help select landing sites for their missions.
The astronauts also trained on the volcanic terrain of northern Arizona and the Barringer Meteor Crater, which provided an environment analogous to the Moon. Here, astronauts donned spacesuits and gathered samples from the local terrain, similar to what analog astronauts do today in environments similar to the landscape of Mars (Arizona, Utah, Nunavut, and Hawai’i)
Today, as we enter the Artemis Era, Lowell continues this tradition by providing education and outreach to students who will become the next generation of space explorers. For those who become astronauts, lunar exploration will be commonplace, as missions to the Moon are launched regularly (1 per year, according to plan).
Check out the full episode below, and the video accompanying it:
Stories by Williams 