Last man on the moon: NASA has no goals, no mission, no timetable

What we're doing now is 'space exploitation,' not 'space exploration,' laments Gene Cernan, the last of the moonwalkers

March 21, 2015 11:00AM ET

by Timothy Bella @TimBella

Every March, tens of thousands of people from around the globe flock to Austin, Texas, to learn and connect over panels, parties and tacos at South By Southwest's interactive, film and music conferences. America Tonight's SXDiaries Q&A series highlights interesting and inspiring figures at SXSW.

It’s been 43 years since astronaut Gene Cernan became the last man to walk on the moon – joining an exclusive club of just 12 men to do that. A witness to the excitement of the space race era, Cernan hopes celestial exploration will once again become a priority in America.

Now 81, Cernan’s life is chronicled in the documentary “Last Man on the Moon.” In an interview with America Tonight at South By Southwest, Cernan spoke about the effect President John F. Kennedy had on his life, astronauts who were killed in the pursuit of space travel and whether the U.S. can ever recapture its romanticism about space exploration. Questions and answers have been edited for brevity and clarity.

You were a naval officer when President Kennedy outlined his plans for space exploration. What did his vision for the space program mean for you and the country at the time?

You have to understand that it was the terrible '60s. You had campus unrest, civil strife and the beginning of what would become a very unpopular war in Vietnam. And the Russians owned space. Of course, we had a space program going. Then, Russian astronaut Yuri Gagarin went one time around the earth. That was pretty spectacular. Within three weeks of his flight, we sent Al Shepard up. The fact of life is we probably could have sent Al Shepard up before Gagarin. He was an instantaneous hero. The country was reaching out and needed something, and by God, we did it. At least we got a start.

Kennedy, God bless his soul, within the month of May [1961] grasped the moment. There had been a lot of talk of going to the moon. This was in 1961 and Kennedy challenged American people to do what most thought – including me – was impossible. We had 16 minutes of space flight experience. We didn’t know beans about going to the moon.

Gene Cernan, pictured in his space suit, before the Apollo 10 mission in 1969.

I’ve often wondered whether he was a visionary, a dreamer or politically astute enough to realize the nation needed something to hang their head on. He was probably all three. Once he made that challenge, in light of what the Soviets were doing, the response from America was overwhelming. Rather than believe it couldn’t be done, the country thought there was no reason why we couldn’t do it. He said, “We’re not just going to go to the moon, but we’re going before the end of the decade,” which gave us eight and a half years. What he didn’t say, but what he certainly implied, was we’re going to do it before the other guys. And that’s when I like to think American exceptionalism took over.

For all the space successes of that era, the program and the country paid a price in human lives. You lost several colleagues and friends along the way. What memories of those tragedies have stayed with you?

We didn’t talk about the fact that we might lose somebody on our way to the moon. We didn’t talk about it. We legislated it out. We’re not going to let it happen. [Astronaut] Alan Bean said we knew we’d lose someone along the way.

The first thing I was very close to was the Gemini 9 accident when [Elliot See and Charles Bassett] crashed into the McDonnell Aircraft building in St. Louis, which was the factory where they were making the Gemini. Tom Stafford and I were their backups. Most accidents you can say after the fact shouldn’t have happened and this one shouldn’t have happened either. They tried to expedite flying visually in what was really not visual weather.

I saw pictures they found of that plane and accident. It was very graphic. I was standing right next to that wreckage.

What [President Kennedy] didn’t say, but what he certainly implied, was we’re going to do it before the other guys. And that’s when I like to think American exceptionalism took over.

Gene Cernan

The other one that was a real tragedy was the Apollo 1 accident. Roger Chaffee was my neighbor. Our kids played together and we went hunting together. The thing that hurt about this accident, not withstanding the loss of three of our good friends, is that we hadn’t even gotten off the pad. We figured if we’re going to lose people, we’re going to lose them on the way to the moon, but not on a pad. Burying those guys in Arlington, I didn’t know if we were burying the entire Apollo program in addition to our friends and colleagues.

We had the tickertape parades in our hometowns, but we paid dearly with the loss of our colleagues. Those tickertape parades were not free.

As the years have passed and other national issues have taken priority, funding for the space program has plummeted and the romanticism for space exploration has become a thing of the past. Can we ever recapture that sense of romanticism?

Gene Cernan's view from the moon a few decades ago. Cernan hopes space exploration will be a national priority in the future.

Gene Cernan/NASA/dapd

It’s not good enough to stay home. Man was made to explore. Curiosity is the essence of our existence: Who are we? Where are we? Where do we come from? What else is out there? Going back to [Christopher] Columbus, it’s our nature as human beings to explore. I’m a great advocate of space exploration. What we are doing now is space exploitation, which is good. The space station is a laboratory, and I don’t know what we’ll learn. That’s science – and that’s the exploitation of space. But we’re doing that at the expense of exploration of space.

A few years ago, we had a program called Constellation, which was going to take us to the moon and that same hardware could have taken us to Mars. I believe we could have been to the moon by 2020 and Mars by 2030. Now, you have to add a generation, at least, to those numbers.

Now, where are we today? What does your generation or your kids have to look forward to? We can’t even put an American in space made in an American rocket. We have to go to somebody else. And if somebody else says we’re not going to do it anymore, then we have a $10 billion space station we can’t get to. That’s an untenable situation. You cannot explain why we shouldn’t be there now.

The problem is we don’t have a mission in NASA. There are no goals, no mission and no timetable. We can talk about the moon. We can talk about going to Mars. We can talk about landing on an asteroid, which is not very smart to me. But there’s no plan, no hardware, no goal or no mission. So, America is wandering out there somewhere in space with nothing to do and nowhere to go. We need that Kennedy-like leadership again that challenges the young kids. I want to inspire those young kids. The more dreamers we have, the more doers we have. All my generation has to do is give them the opportunity that someone gave me.