he Apollo programme is arguably Beginning at the height of the space race between the United States and the USSR, its primary goal was to carry out a programme of scientific explorations of the Moon. In 1957 and 1961 respectively, the Soviet Union had scored two of the key victories in the space race when they launched Sputnik 1, the first satellite, and Yuri Gagarin, the first human, into space. The next target was obvious, to land a man on the Moon and in 1969 Apollo 11 saw Neil Armstrong become the first person to set foot on the lunar surface in one of the most decisive triumphs for the United States. But what now? The following six missions (with the exception of the calamitous Apollo 13) would all see NASA extend its goals and explore the Moon further. The last of the missions, Apollo 17, while perhaps best remembered for being the last, had a number of important scientific achievements. With the first of the Artemis programme missions set to launch in November, 50 years after the historic Apollo 17, the significance of this, the final Moon landing, deserves greater exploration.
