"It's up to us," Bean says

In celebration of Lyndon B. Johnson’s 100th birthday and the 40th anniversary of the Apollo 11 mission, the LBJ Library hosted a discussion on the past, present and future of space exploration at UT Austin.

The panel of guest speakers, headlined by retired astronaut and UT graduate Alan Bean, detailed the challenges facing NASA in their quest to revisit the moon, Mars and beyond.

“If we’re going to get anything done in our corner of the universe, it’s up to us,” Bean said. “Hopefully many people in this room will see us go back to the moon and to Mars.”

Bean, the fourth man to set foot on the moon, said NASA plans to have a sustained presence on the moon to serve as a launching pad for Mars visits.

“We want to make everything we do on the surface [of the moon] be related to Mars exploration,” said Matthew Leonard, deputy manager of the Lunar Surface System Project.

Read the story in The Daily Texan HERE