Humans are en route to the moon for the first time in 54 years – and Australia’s Dish

[Imr]

On the day of the Apollo moon landing, 21 July 1969, wind gusts of up to 110km/h buffeted the Parkes radio telescope as it sat in a sheep paddock in regional New South Wales.

It is meant to shut down when the winds hit 35km/h, but the operators risked it all to help broadcast Neil Armstrong walking on the moon.

The 64-metre Parkes telescope was immortalised in one of Australia’s favourite films, The Dish, with Sam Neill playing the chief scientist.

And now it’s set for a new role tracking the Artemis II mission which launched from Florida on Thursday. Four astronauts onboard the spacecraft Orion will orbit the Earth before heading to the moon, then slingshot back to Earth to splash down in the Pacific.

It’s the first crewed lunar mission since Apollo 17, more than 50 years ago, when Captain Eugene A Cernan spent 73 hours on the moon’s surface.

The Dish, which was given its Wiradjuri name Murriyang in 2020, has volunteered to track Orion and send data to Nasa. It is hoping to demonstrate its capabilities for what Nasa’s Kevin Coggins describes as “building a resilient, public-private ecosystem that will support the Golden Age of Innovation and exploration”.

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