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- [00:00]
BBC Announcer
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- [00:07]
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Day or night. VRBoCare is here 247 to help make every part of your stay seamless. If anything comes up or you simply need a little guidance, support is ready whenever you reach out from the moment you book to the moment you head home. We're here to help things run smoothly because a great trip starts with the right support. And hey, a good playlist doesn't hurt either day or night. VRBoCare is here 247 to help make every part of your stay seamless. If anything comes up or you simply need a little guidance, support is ready whenever you reach out from the moment you book to the moment you head home. We're here to help things run smoothly because a great trip starts with the the right support. And hey, a good playlist doesn't hurt either.
- [01:08]
Victoria Derbyshire
Hello, Nick Watt.
- [01:09]
Nick Watt
Hello, Victoria Derbyshire.
- [01:11]
Victoria Derbyshire
This looks like sounds like. Feels like a news night takeover of newscast just for the weekend. Very, very busy weekend. Laura and Paddy are who knows where, but I hope they're having a lovely time.
- [01:24]
Nick Watt
They're on an important mission, possibly to
- [01:26]
Victoria Derbyshire
the moon, possibly unlikely. But we have had the return of the NASA astronauts who have become the first to travel around the moon and back.
- [01:35]
NASA Mission Control
Houston, integrity splashdown. Sending post landing command now.
- [01:39]
NASA Confirmation Officer
Splashdown confirmed.
- [01:41]
Jane Corbyn
Copy Splashdown.
- [01:42]
Victoria Derbyshire
Waiting on VLDR.
- [01:44]
NASA Confirmation Officer
Splashdown confirmed at 7:07pm Central Time, 5:07pm Pacific Time. From the pages of Jules Verne to a modern day mission to the moon, a new chapter of the exploration of our celestial neighbor is complete. Complete Integrity's astronauts back on Earth.
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Victoria Derbyshire
I really want to know who writes those scripts because they have planned those out so well in advance because they're so profound, aren't they?
- [02:10]
Nick Watt
They are. I was listening with great care and there was a. A thought that maybe we'd moved away from that era. I think it was in the Apollo mission they read out scripture. That wasn't scripture, but it was poetry.
- [02:22]
Victoria Derbyshire
It was.
- [02:23]
Nick Watt
So we had poetry over the Pacific Ocean, but at the same time this weekend, peace talks in Pakistan. As we speak right now between us and Iranian officials, we'll go through what you need to know about both on this episode of Newscast, Newscast, Newscast from the BBC.
- [02:41]
Tim Peake
Fat Boy Slim and me in the classroom doing our violin lessons.
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Nick Watt
I was the tattletale in the class.
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Newscast Sign-off Host
Can I have an apology, please?
- [02:46]
NASA Mission Control
I trust almost nobody that daddy has
- [02:49]
Tim Peake
to sometimes do strong language Next time
- [02:51]
Victoria Derbyshire
in mosque I feel delulu with no salulu.
- [02:54]
Nick Watt
Take me down to Downing Street.
- [02:56]
VRBoCare Advertiser
Let's go have a tour Blimey.
- [02:59]
Victoria Derbyshire
Hello, it's Victoria in the studio and
- [03:01]
Nick Watt
it's Nick in the studio.
- [03:03]
Victoria Derbyshire
And we are starting off with news from Pakistan because as we record at half past three on Saturday afternoon, the talks are on and we're very happy to have friend of newscast panorama filmmaker and foreign affairs and peace talk specialist Jane Corbyn with us in the newscast studio. Hello again.
- [03:19]
Jane Corbyn
Very good to be here.
- [03:21]
Victoria Derbyshire
So, Nick, what do we know in terms of the latest?
- [03:24]
Nick Watt
Well, what we've heard in the last few hours, Vic, on this Saturday afternoon is from Reuters. This is Idris Ali, who's the Reuters national security correspondent who covers the Pentagon, who's somebody we'll watch with great care on Newsnight. Now, Idris is reporting that a Pakistani source has told him that the three way talks are underway face to face involving the US delegation led by Vice President JD Vance, Steve Witkoff, who is President Trump's sort of great peace negotiator, and his son in Lord Jared Kushner. In the Iranian side, there is the speaker of the Iranian Parliament, who's described as a hardliner, but I'm told a flexible hardliner, if that's not a contradiction in terms. And the Iranian foreign minister and crucially, Pakistan's army chief, who of course Donald Trump says is his favorite field marshal. So in other words, this is actually happening.
- [04:17]
Victoria Derbyshire
Right. And Nick, you have covered peace processes, most notably Northern Ireland. Jane, you have covered multiple peace processes, notably the Oslo Accords. The significance of these talks actually happening with those key players?
- [04:33]
Jane Corbyn
Well, it's significant they're happening. It's significant they're happening in person and it's significant they seem to all be in the room together. We don't exactly know how it splits down. So all of those things are really significant. But on the other side, I would say that peace talks conducted in the glare of publicity, which of course this one is, are even more difficult to bring off than those conducted in secret. And this has been in the public eye right from the word go and continues to be. Each side will need to come out with something and that obviously leads to posturing. And what's really important in peace talks is that people forget the history, they forget the posturing, and they get down to the nitty gritty. That's what's important.
- [05:11]
Nick Watt
I mean, this is the highest led delegation between the United States and the Islamic Republic of Iran. I think, correct me if I'm wrong, Jane, since the revolution of 1979, this is a hugely significant moment. And what you often find in these peace talks is there's a lot that makes you think, think this is absolutely hopeless. Because as they're meeting in Islamabad, President Trump on Truth Social has been saying the Iranians got no cards to play unless they open up the Strait of Hummus, it's all over. And you think, well, that's pretty hopeless. But the fact that they're there makes you think there is a force driving this. And I have a theory, maybe this theory's wrong, which is both sides have lost, both sides have won, and therefore they have a shared interest. This has got to work, and this conflict has got to end for both of them.
- [06:07]
Victoria Derbyshire
Is that fair?
- [06:08]
Jane Corbyn
Yeah. And we also know that a week ago, JD Vance was up for 24 hours trying to get this thing off the ground. He was the key player on the American side. When people said, do you remember Monday or Tuesday, that was the deadline, it was going to be, you know, bombing bridges, bombing power stations. And we know that the Pakistanis with JD Vance really wrestled this thing to the ground, if you like. And therefore, I think the fact that a week on he is leading the American delegation has got to make us think, as you said, Nick, you know, both sides have lost, both sides have won. There is so much in it. And Mohammed Bakr Calibouf, yes, he's a hardliner. It's not that he's flexible, but he's a pragmatist. He's a realist. And the fact that he is leading the Iranian delegation, I think, is also very significant.
- [06:55]
Nick Watt
And what's interesting is we know that J.D. vance historically has been an absolute skeptic of foreign intervention. And there was a fascinating account that's coming out from a new book by Maggie Haberman and Jonathan Swan, who know the Trump House very well, work for the New York Times. And they had an account of this crucial meeting in the White House situation room on 11 February. The President's there, the vice president there, Benjamin Netanyahu is there. And Benjamin Netanyahu sets out the case for why this action should take be taken against Iran and how it would work and how it wouldn't work. And one of the big things, according to those two authors, was that the Iranian regime would be so beaten by this that they would not be able to close off the Strait of Hormuz. What is the big thing that has brought Donald Trump to the negotiating table? It's closing off the Strait of Hormuz, not because US Oil goes through there, but because if you close it off, up goes the price of oil, up goes inflation. That's why they're at the negotiating table.
- [07:59]
Jane Corbyn
Yeah. And it's ironic, isn't it? A lot of these people, like the foreign minister for Iran, was very involved in the nuclear negotiations that have been going on for, it seems, decades when they were first originally agreed. And yet at the end of the day, it's not the nuclear issue that has brought this to a head, as Nick says, it's the Straits of Hormuz. They will still have to decide what to do about the accusation that Iran seeks a weapon and that it has kilograms of enriched uranium. But the Straits of Hormuz has replaced the nuclear issue as if you like the bargaining chip that Iran holds in its hand and it's not going to let go.
- [08:35]
Victoria Derbyshire
Right. Can I just ask, what's the JD Vance being in the room? The Vice president as opposed to Secretary of State Marco Rubio. We know that JD Vance has been noticeably quiet in terms of overt support for this US Military action. But. But he's very much there as they try to negotiate peace. Is he looking ahead to, you know, Republican presidential candidate next time around? He doesn't want the war hung around his neck, but the peace, yes.
- [09:04]
Nick Watt
I think the official explanation for why JD Vance there is President Trump is saying this is showing how serious this delegation is. You have my deputy there, you have my peace negotiator there, you have my son in law there. These people speak for me.
- [09:19]
Victoria Derbyshire
Yeah.
- [09:19]
Nick Watt
But I wonder whether the real reason is that Donald Trump is binding J.D. vance into this process, a process that J.D. vance was clearly skeptical about. He's binding him into it. And is Donald Trump playing games ahead of the 2028 presidential election?
- [09:39]
Jane Corbyn
It could be a good cop, bad cop thing, couldn't it? This is what happens in negotiations. You've got Donald Trump, arguably the tough, the bad cop back home. You've got the good cop, the one that's been quieter, that's actually brought this about, has actually made it happen in Pakistan with Shabazz Sharif, the Pakistan Pakistani prime minister. So that's an important dynamic in any negotiation as well, is how they sit.
- [10:01]
Victoria Derbyshire
Right. You both have experience of covering these, what can be very complex, very sensitive, very long peace negotiations, peace talks. What is it like around the negotiating table? What can it be like?
- [10:18]
Jane Corbyn
Well, I think when they're in the room together, it's really important that people, the body language, they're in the room, the physical ability to see what's in the other person's eyes, even if you're not speaking the same language and you have to do it through interpreters, that's really important. I also think it's important to be in there for the long term, for the long slog. One of the original rounds of nuclear discussions that took place, negotiators went thinking they'd be there for three days. They were there for three weeks. I mean, are we in that situation? I very much doubt it here. Both sides are going to want to have to show something and come out public publicly with something to show, I would have thought, pretty quickly. And it will be in Pakistan's interest, even if they don't reach an agreement, to try to keep the thing going, to try and keep the ceasefire going. That's the important thing. Even if this very. These huge gaps on, obviously the Straits of Hormuz, on the nuclear issue, and of course on Israel and Lebanon, even if those remain unbridgeable, the key thing will be in those negotiations, in those face to face meetings will be to come out with something that keeps the process alive.
- [11:26]
Nick Watt
Yeah, I mean, the point about negotiations and the lesson of the Good Friday Agreement negotiations in Northern Ireland in 1998 is it can look hopeless. It can look like it's gonna fall apart. Tony Blair had to do sort of side letters to the late RC Unity to David Trimble on the decommissioning of IRA weapons. There were moments when you just thought the whole thing was gonna fall apart, but essentially what you had at that point was a whole series of forces coming together. Britain wanted this to work, the Irish Republic wanted this to work. And fundamentally, Sinn Fein had decided that what they called the armed struggle was not gonna get their ultimate objective. And the late David Trimble had decided the best way to preserve the union was to have stability and power sharing within Northern Ireland. And when you have those big picture decisions, then you would hope that you can drive it through, however difficult it may.
- [12:26]
Victoria Derbyshire
Do you think we have that here with this?
- [12:30]
Jane Corbyn
I'm not sure we do yet.
- [12:31]
Victoria Derbyshire
Okay, well, who doesn't really?
- [12:33]
Jane Corbyn
Similarly with Oslo, Israel, Palestine, as it was with the Good Friday Agreement, both sides were exhausted, exhausted by war, exhausted by conflict. And they came together and as you say, things were going on. It was the same with Oslo, Israeli, Palestinians, there were bombings, things were happening outside the negotiation room and they just put that to one side. That was the public face of the relationship and it was bad, had the private face was that they were getting somewhere. I'm not sure where we are with Iran and the US and obviously the. The wild card, if you like, of Israel, of course, Iran needs this. Look Whole layers of their government, their military have been taken out, but they have.
- [13:16]
Victoria Derbyshire
Not to mention the civilian population.
- [13:17]
Jane Corbyn
Not to mention the civilian population. They tend not to. But, you know, they have survived. It's an existential survival for them. And therefore, hence they believe that they have won for America. I think it's obviously very important for President Trump, with the economy threatened, with the midterm elections coming up. But I'm not sure that they're at that point that Nick talks about in Good Friday agreement and we had with Israel, Palestine. I'm not sure that they are prepared to back down on these enormous differences with Strait of Hormuz and nuclear, apart from, obviously, Israel and Lebanon.
- [13:56]
Nick Watt
So there's a series of things that could scupper this. So the speaker of the Iranian Parliament went into these negotiations saying, we have got to have our assets unfrozen by the United States. Israel has got to observe a ceasefire in Lebanon. On the first of those, the US said, we're not going to unfreeze your assets. And on the second of those, the United States is talking about Benjamin Netanyahu dialing down the action in Lebanon. But that hasn't happened. The third thing that could scupper it is where are they on Iran's nuclear program? So there's three things that could scupper it. The potential big picture, the sort of the big forces that could drive this through if it happens, is, number one, Donald Trump judging that the Strait of Hormuz must be open to preserve world economic stability. And the second thing is the Iranians have shown they can take a lot of pain, but can they really keep on taking this pain? Those are potentially the two big things that could overcome the three difficulties I was talking about.
- [15:01]
Jane Corbyn
But within, say, the Strait of Hormuz difficulty, you know, can they open it? We're reading reports that the waters are heavily mined. It's not going to be that easy to open it. And what does opening it mean? Does it mean that they exact tolls? The Iranians exact tolls, which they have been doing on shipping? Is that allowable? Or is it that Donald Trump is prepared to give way on some of these things and say, as he has already, that's for those countries whose oil passes through there to sort out. It's not America's problem, but it is everybody else's problem.
- [15:34]
Victoria Derbyshire
And you've got the UK Prime Minister and the coalition of countries that the Foreign Secretary brought together before Easter saying, look, has to be open, it has to be safe and it has to be free by the way, when we say toll free, it's not like £1 50 to go through such and such. It's 2 million.
- [15:51]
Jane Corbyn
And Oman, which is on the other side of the strait, I mean, if anyone's going to charge a toll, what does Oman get? Half of it. And. And the Iranians have already reached out to the Omanis and said, maybe we should share this. So there are all sorts of regional dynamics going on there as well.
- [16:05]
Nick Watt
Messages from Donald Trump, because he was asked about this Iranian idea of the tolls, and he went, hey, yeah, maybe we could do that. And then he came out and said, no, I should save it. There are reports, reports this afternoon that the US has sent warships through the state of Hormuz to test it.
- [16:19]
Victoria Derbyshire
Wow.
- [16:19]
Nick Watt
And the argument for doing it was testing free passage because it should be an international waterway. And why are they doing that? I don't know. Could it possibly be to sort of test the Iranians? So the Iranians, great thing they've come across is we've closed the Strait of Hormuz. Are the United States testing that?
- [16:37]
Jane Corbyn
Well, the Iranians might take a different attitude to a US warship passing through the Strait of Hormuz and to a commercial vessel. And of course, the key thing is the insurers. You know, when are the insurers going to be prepared to let vessels through with or without military escort, a warship escort? All of these are enormously complex questions which have to be determined.
- [16:59]
Victoria Derbyshire
So for newscasters listening today, how should they leave this episode of Newscast feeling on what's going on in Pakistan?
- [17:05]
Jane Corbyn
I think they should be quite hopeful, just simply because we've reached the point where both sides have got together at the highest levels in the room together. And we know it's a really, it's absolutely vital. Both sides have claimed that they've won, other sides have said that they've each lost, so they're right up against it. So I think we should be cautiously optimistic. But my real worry is the fact that it's taking place in the glare of publicity. And will they have the patience to continue with the nitty gritty of it to get somewhere? Those are the real worries, I think.
- [17:38]
Victoria Derbyshire
And on that point, obviously, Steve Witkoff, who is the envoy to Russia and Ukraine when it comes to some kind of negotiation, has visited all parts of the world a number of times, and that has got nowhere. But it may go back to your point earlier. President Putin probably doesn't want yet to settle, does he? So maybe that's the key bit there. But, you know, at one point, Steve Witkoff was in the heart of that and now he's not anymore.
- [18:04]
Nick Watt
Yes. I mean, he's obviously very close to Donald Trump personally, but obviously, remember, Donald Trump did say he was going to solve the Russia, Ukraine conflict.
- [18:12]
Jane Corbyn
24 hours. Yeah, 24 hours.
- [18:15]
Nick Watt
And Steve Witkoff failed to deliver on that one. So. Yes. What sort of track record of delivery has he got? Although I think. I think newscasters would have thought that it would probably take longer than 24 hours to sort that out.
- [18:26]
Victoria Derbyshire
Yeah, I think so too. Jane, very good to see you. Thank you so much as always. Thank you.
- [18:40]
BBC Announcer
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- [19:12]
Victoria Derbyshire
And now, as promised, news from the States. Hello. British astronaut Tim Peake. How are you?
- [19:18]
Tim Peake
Hello. Doing very well, thank you.
- [19:19]
Victoria Derbyshire
And what an exciting night. You are obviously one half of the presenting duo of the 13 Minutes Presents Artemis podcast, which has been going on for the duration of this incredibly exciting mission. And Nick, you were talking about this for most of Newsnight, Tim.
- [19:34]
Nick Watt
And Tim, I just wanted to ask you, I mean, I think I'm right in saying that you were the first Brit to go to the International Space Station. So you know what it's like to re enter the Earth at just over 24,000 miles an hour. Going through. I think it's 2,700 degrees Celsius. What on earth is that like?
- [19:54]
Tim Peake
It was phenomenal to watch that crew come back last night. It was a textbook mission and a textbook reentry coming back from the space station. Actually, we're a bit slower. We're doing only, only 17,500 miles an hour. But it's still, you know, pretty spectacular when you re enter the Earth's atmosphere. But this crew coming back from the moon, they've got that extra velocity. And the heat shield performed exactly as we had hoped. The canopies performed exactly as planned. So wonderful to see that crew safely back.
- [20:24]
Nick Watt
You sort of could see the capsule coming at great speed and then the various parachutes open and then as Vic says, it slows down. Then you have touchdown on the water and then the door opens. What on earth is that like when you can breathe the Earth's Air.
- [20:43]
Tim Peake
It's a pretty wonderful feeling because, you know, you've been inside this sealed environment recycling the air. You've been missing the smells, the scents, the wind, the temperature, the weather of planet Earth. So when the hatch opens and you get those first smells of fresh Earth air, it's actually really lovely to remind you that you're home.
- [21:05]
Victoria Derbyshire
Home, but also you're safe. You're physically safe. You've done it.
- [21:09]
Tim Peake
Absolutely. I mean, that's the. That's the big. The big moment is the relief that the mission's been a success and you're home safely. You're going to see your friends and family very soon. And of course, it's a. It's a big moment. There is no guarantee. Spaceflight is still very hard. We take risks on these missions, but if we don't take risks, we're never going to accomplish what we want to. So the moment those three main canopies opened for me, that was the point where I kind of breathed a sigh of relief. From that point onwards, everything's pretty straight, straightforward.
- [21:38]
Nick Watt
What is it like? You've had zero gravity. Maybe not good for pumping blood around the body. And here you are back with gravity. What's that like?
- [21:48]
Tim Peake
Well, it is a punishing transition, actually. It's way harder coming back to Earth than it is going into space. When you go into space, the body's having a brilliant time. It's actually really easy living in weightlessness. Your heart is having a fantastic time pumping blood around the body because it's so easy it doesn't have to fight the force of gravity. So your heart muscle actually shrinks if you don't exercise. But in your muscles as well. You're not having to support your frame and your muscle mass. So your muscles waste away if you don't do anything. And that means your bone density also atrophies. So we exercise on the space station regularly every day about two hours to try and stop these changes from happening. So when you come back to Earth into this gravity environment, it's quite punishing. You're being crushed back down by gravity again. You're balanced is a little bit off. Your vestibular system is not quite right. You might feel a little bit dizzy, nauseous. And so it's that first couple of hours transitioning back onto Earth that will be a bit uncomfortable for the crew.
- [22:46]
Victoria Derbyshire
We're a fair few hours on now from splashdown. What will the astronauts be doing right now?
- [22:55]
Tim Peake
Yeah, well, it is a very busy period. Having splashed down, they've been recovered back to the US Navy vessel that was waiting for them. They were then flown by helicopter to San Diego. They obviously had medical checks before that happened. And then from San Diego, they'll be taking a flight to the Johnson Space center in Houston where their families will be waiting for them. And that's going to happen at some point today.
- [23:17]
Nick Watt
Obviously, one of the big worries was that the heat shield from Artemis 1 was more damaged than they thought it had been. Although I think I'm right in saying that had astronauts been in that mission, it would have been okay. We obviously haven't had that inspection, but your instinct is this was textbook. Have we now solved that big worry over the protection of the heat shield?
- [23:42]
Tim Peake
I think we have. And to put this into context, actually what we were trying with Artemis I was something new. This skip re entry. And the reason for that is because it does make it easier on the crew. It turns it from that sort of 7G re entry the Apollo astronauts would have experienced to a much more comfortable 4G re entry. And you achieve that by dipping into the atmosphere, slowing yourself down a bit. The spacecraft actually generates a little bit of lift. So you use that lift to come back out of the atmosphere and then go back in a second time. And the whole process is more gentle on the vehicle, it's more gentle on the crew. And it also gives you flexibility to adjust your landing site. Because of that double dip, you can extend the range or reduce the range. So it's a new method of reentry. And what they realized is actually you're heating up that heat shield for a longer period of time, although you're not getting up to higher temperature, it's that length of heating. So they just readjust it, the Artemis 2 reentry, so that it didn't go fully out of the atmosphere and back in again. It just kind of lofted a little bit up and then back. So we're just playing around with those re entry techniques so that we can do it better. We can always go back to how it was done in Apollo era. That's no problem. So I'm really confident they're going to get some great information about how we can make these RE entries even better in the future.
- [25:04]
Nick Watt
So this was Artemis 2 that was having the first manned crew mission around the moon in 53 years. If I've got this right. Artemis 3 is to get used to docking. Is it with the lunar landers and Artemis 4 is boots on the ground on the moon. How do you think that target's going for boots back on the ground.
- [25:27]
Tim Peake
That's right, Nick. And that was a fairly recent announcement by the NASA administrator, Jared isaacman, because Artemis 3 was going to be boots back on the moon again. But what this is doing is actually increasing the cadence, keeping the momentum up of these launches and de risking that lunar landing again. So Artemis 3, as you correctly said, is going to basically rendezvous and dock with the lunar landing system. Now, there are two companies making those. One of them is SpaceX, using its new starship rocket, and one of them is Blue Origin. And both of those at some point are going to be used for lunar landers on future Artemis missions. So it could be one, it could be both. We'll see with Artemis 3 which one they dock to, but they'll be testing that system out. They'll also test out the new spacesuits that they're going to wear on the surface of the moon. So the Artemis 4, which is currently planned for 2028, although that's probably a bit optimistic, that will be boots back on the surface of the moon again.
- [26:25]
Nick Watt
And you and Dame Maggie were telling us last night on Newsnight that there's some serious bit of real estate on the moon. If I've got this right, it's down on the south, there's water. There's potentially a crater there. That's where you want to set up your big Holiday Inn and your big plant. There's. Tell us about, you know, it's not just getting there and planting a flag, it's actually setting up some sort of station. It's mining, it's that sort of thing. Tell us about what you could get from the moon.
- [26:52]
Tim Peake
Yes, well, I'm not sure Holiday Inn will be the top priority, but more of a lunar research base. But you're right. And it's quite interesting, isn't it, that it was only a few years ago that we were really able to confirm that there's a lot of water on the Moon in the form of water ice at both the north pole and the south pole. In some of these craters that never see sunlight, the temperatures are such that we've got water ice in the lunar regolith and in those craters. And wherever we find water, that's really useful for, you know, obviously for living, for creating oxygen in an atmosphere. And from hydrogen oxygen, you can create rocket fuel. And also at the south pole of the Moon, there are some areas around the rims of the craters which are in permanent sunshine. So you can put up your solar farm there and have 247 energy even during the 14 day cycle when normally one side of the moon is going to be incomplete, complete darkness. So to have that ability to have permanent sunshine is really useful too. So that's kind of where the target is at the moment. South pole of the Moon Lunar Research Base.
- [27:56]
Victoria Derbyshire
Amazing. And back to this Artemis. What kind of results are you looking forward to reading about from the experiments this crew have carried out?
- [28:07]
Tim Peake
Yeah, I mean that's amazing. I think we've learned so much more than we expected because the primary goal of this mission was to test the Orion spacecraft. It's the first time we had humans inside. You know, can we get the loo working? Can we get the temperature control right? What about the water dispenser, the food, the sleeping arrangements, everything that revolves around humans living in space. And the capsule has performed brilliantly and we've learned a lot. But then add in the science. That seven hour flyby around the lunar far side and having four human eyes taking so many thousands of photographs and reporting back has been amazing. They've seen parts of the moon that no human eyes have seen before and been able to photograph it. And in addition, the icing on the cake was getting a solar eclipse as well. So seeing the whole corona as that sun dipped behind the Moon, they were able to get some brilliant photographs. We spoke to Dr. Kelsey Young, who's NASA's science lead for this Artemis 2 mission, and she is delighted with the results so far. Now of course they've got the many hard weeks and months of analyzing all this data the crew are bringing.
- [29:15]
Victoria Derbyshire
Can we just talk about one of the most emotional moments of their whole mission in my view, while up there, the team proposed naming some of the craters that they could see. And one of the most poignant moments was when Jeremy Hansen, the mission specialist, suggested that one of the craters should be named Carol in tribute to Commander Reid Wiseman's late wife, who died of cancer in 2020 at just 46. Having have a listen.
- [29:46]
NASA Mission Control
There's a feature in a really neat place on the Moon and it is on the near side, far side boundary. In fact, it's just on the near side of that boundary. And so at certain times of the Moon's transit around Earth you can we will be able to see this from Earth. And so we lost a loved one. Her name was Carol, the spouse of Reed, the mother of Katie and Ellie. And if you want to find this one, you look at Glushko and it's just to the northwest of that at the same latitude as Ohm and it's a Bright spot on the moon and we would like to call it Carroll. And you spell that? C A, R R O lol.
- [30:41]
Victoria Derbyshire
It's so moving because then there is this hug between the crew members, a group hug. And you can hear the choking in his voice and it's, it's just, it's so poignant. You can hear that his voice breaking. And then you see this group hug as there is just silence as they all remember Carol. C A W are O double L. I mean it's absolutely extraordinary and I, I, it's just a reminder that as the, the joy that we've had from this mission also this, just this sadness about, you know, losing people we love.
- [31:18]
Tim Peake
Absolutely. It was one of the, well, the most emotional moment of the entire mission. Completely took me by surprise, I'm sure many people, because we were just celebrating the fact they'd become the furthest humans away from planet Earth. And Jeremy made that announcement and yes, a hugely emotional moment. Obvious, a very close knit family in the astronaut corps. And so losing Carol was a huge impact on everybody. But to have it so beautifully kind of, well, just that wonderful naming of the impact crater was absolutely such a lovely way to remember Carol. And then for mission control, just to allow that silence afterwards, I thought was a very special moment, very emotional for everybody and for involved.
- [32:05]
Nick Watt
It's interesting, Tim, because the moment that I sort of found very emotional and was thinking about this was in the final minutes before they came back to Earth. There were six minutes of silence, six minutes of no data. And that was absolutely what was meant to happen. And what I was thinking was in that moment, Commander Reid Wiseman's two daughters who lost their mother would have been looking at that, presumably hoping and praying that their father would make it. I remember, I just thought what a moment that must be for Commander Wiseman's daughters.
- [32:47]
Tim Peake
Yes, you're right. And it's a huge decision for any astronaut to fly into space. You're taking a large amount of risk and as a father myself, I've had to kind of justify that to myself and discuss that with my family. But you also have to be true to yourself and you have to be true to your family and set that example as to who you are and why you're doing these things. And it's a tough decision to make that you're going to put yourself in this position where you're taking a large risk. But we're all absolutely passionate about what we do and we've got the love and support of our families to be able to go and do these things. And I think we do have to keep pushing these boundaries. It's what we humans do. And when we come together, when we work together and you see what we've been able to achieve in the last 10 years, you know, the human species is truly remarkable. It's very easy to forget that with a lot of negativity that happens in the world. And I think sometimes to remember the positives of what we can achieve when we work together, when we put our minds together is truly exceptional.
- [33:53]
Victoria Derbyshire
Tim, thank you very much. Thank you. As well as your podcast, you can see Maggie and Tim on the BBC Two Horizons special Artemis to the Moon and back this Wednesday, 8pm on BBC Two and of course whenever you want to on iplayer. Thank you so much, Tim.
- [34:08]
Tim Peake
Thank you. It's lovely talking to you.
- [34:10]
Nick Watt
So, Vic, tomorrow morning you're presenting Sunday with Laura Kunsberg. I know you. You will be working like mad, reading every possible document. How's the prep going?
- [34:19]
Victoria Derbyshire
Well, can I tell you who is on the program? Leader of the Liberal Democrats, Davey for the government, we're streeting the Health Secretary, the Shadow Defense Secretary, James Cartlidge, also the deputy Prime Minister of Lebanon. Absolutely key to hear from him, we have Sir Alex Younger, former head of MI6, and Tucker Carlson, former Trump ally, I think we describe him as now. And also Mary Beard.
- [34:42]
Nick Watt
Great. Thanks, Vic.
- [34:43]
Victoria Derbyshire
Thank you. Take care.
- [34:45]
Nick Watt
Newscast, Newscast from the BBC.
- [34:48]
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