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Kennedy Space Center Director Plans to Send a New Generation to the Moon — and Beyond

Daughter of Apollo engineer takes her father’s dream to new heights


spinner image kennedy space center director jane petro
NASA Kennedy Space Center Director Janet Petro.
Cory Huston/NASA

Janet Petro’s father told her she could be anything she wanted to be and do anything she wanted to do — as long as she did it all the way.

“Put your whole mind and spirit into it, and do it right” is what he always said.

Andrew Petro did it right. In 1961, the Chrysler auto engineer took on America’s most ambitious goal: landing a man on the moon. He switched his skill for building cars into building consoles for space capsules, and he moved his young family from Detroit to a tiny island town called Satellite Beach, Florida, 30 miles south of the new Kennedy Space Center.

Now his daughter is working to send a new generation back to the moon — and onward to Mars.

Janet Petro, 63, became the director of the Kennedy Space Center in 2021, the first woman to hold the job. A West Point graduate and engineer, she plays a critical role in the Artemis mission, which promises not only to land astronauts back on the moon in 2025 but also to create an environment where humans can learn enough to live on Mars — and do so — by 2040.

“My father was the Apollo generation, and here I am leading the Artemis. Amazing!” Petro said. 

The name “Artemis” is meaningful: In Greek mythology, she is the goddess of the moon, the twin sister of Apollo, god of the sun.

NASA describes Artemis this way: “This mission will prepare humanity for the long journey to Mars, and it will help us establish a sustainable lunar economy. NASA is working with international and commercial partners to carry out the mission.”

Petro is essentially the CEO of the world’s “premier multi-user spaceport,” which is so busy that 90-plus launches are set for this year. Last year brought 57 launches, including the historic Artemis 1, the first step in man’s return to the moon. (Humans last walked on the moon on Dec. 19, 1972, during Apollo 17.)

spinner image an astronaut on the moon
NASA

Artemis 1 launched on Nov. 16, sending the unmanned Orion spacecraft 1.4 million miles into space and back — “farther out in space and farther past the moon than we ever went before,” Petro said. Orion’s systems performed well, and the capsule made a safe reentry, splashing down in the Pacific Ocean 25 days after launch. 

Artemis 2, slated for November 2024, will carry a crew of four in a flyby around the moon. Three of the four astronauts have spent extended time on the International Space Station: commander Reid Wiseman, pilot Victor Glover and mission specialist Christina Koch, who lived on the space station for nearly a year. The fourth, Jeremy Hansen, a Canadian astronaut, will make his first flight. Glover is African American, so this flight will be the first time a woman and a person of color will circle the moon.

Artemis 3 aims to land a man and woman on the south pole of the moon in 2025. Scientists believe there are signs of water at the south pole — making it more hospitable for humans.

“We’ll be staying there for longer periods and doing more research and mining to see what resources are on the surface of the moon that could help us sustain our presence there,” Petro said.

Consider the distance for a moment: The space station is in a low orbit, about 250 miles above Earth. The moon is almost 240,000 miles away, and Mars — the 2040 goal — is 140 million miles away.

As NASA reaches farther into space, tourism and business in low orbit will keep growing. In a NASA podcast commemorating her first year on the job, Petro called this “the most vibrant and robust time in history” at the Kennedy Space Center.

Her father died in 1986, at age 52. He had helped build the Mercury, Gemini, Apollo and space shuttle missions. He was deputy director of engineering for Lockheed Space Operations when he died. Janet was 26, an Army officer, flying helicopters in Germany. She flew home as soon as she found out her dad was sick. 

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Petro’s career may lead us to the cosmos, but her family values are planted in the sandy but solid ground of Satellite Beach, where she once played softball and her parents square-danced and the town motto reflected their aspirations: “Where Progress Prevails.”

It’s still like a coastal version of Andy Griffith’s Mayberry, if Andy had worn a pocket protector instead of a sheriff’s badge. There’s even a spot on A1A known as “Your Hometown Barber Shop,” where Keith Rake displays memorabilia from every NASA and SpaceX crew member he’s trimmed. “He’s famous for his flat-tops,” his wife, Shirley, noted.

Petro lives a half-mile from her childhood home. Her son, Andrew Canavan, a chiropractor named for her dad, lives five houses away from her. Her daughter, Hannah, a chemical engineer, is close by, in Orlando. Her grandkids, Caleb and Ava, go to the same schools Janet attended. Caleb turns 12 on July 20 — the same day that Neil Armstrong walked on the moon in 1969.

Petro watched that historic moment on her TV screen when she was 9. Last November, she gathered her family to watch the launch of Artemis 1 from the roof of her office building at Kennedy Space Center. The view is spectacular from there, and each time she looks out, she thinks of the man who taught her to put her whole mind and spirit into everything she does.

“There are still people around who knew my dad. They tell me, ‘Your dad would be so proud of you.’ I would love to be able to ask him, ‘What do you think about our return to the moon?’

“He’d be incredibly impressed by how far we’ve come,” Petro surmised. “And he’d probably say, ‘Gee, what took you so long?’ ”

Share Your Experience: Have you ever considered being a space tourist or living on Mars? Let us know in the comments section below.

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