Meet Kevin Fong, Creator of '13 Minutes to the Moon'

Last summer, as the world celebrated the 50th anniversary of the Apollo 11 Moon landing, Kevin Fong commemorated the historic moment by creating “13 Minutes to the Moon.” This BBC Worldwide podcast tells the story of the men and women who made the Moon landing possible, framed by the drama of the final 13 minutes of descent before touchdown on the lunar surface.

To continue commemorating the historic anniversary of NASA's Apollo program,  Fong is launching season two of the podcast, highlighting the epic story of Apollo 13 as told by the people who flew and saved the mission.

The new season launched on March 9 during the lead-up to the 50th anniversary of Apollo 13, which launched on April 11, 1970, and splashed down six days later on April 17.

As the 50th anniversary of the Apollo 11 Moon landing approached, Kevin Fong set off on a road trip across America to tell the story of the mission that changed the world … and in a format that hadn’t yet been explored.

Fong knew that the story of NASA astronauts Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin would be told countless times over in news clips and articles, but what he wanted to do was provide a definitive account on how difficult the effort truly was, giving a sense of the struggles and triumphs the NASA team experienced to fulfill the ambitions of a president.

“There is a temptation to fall back on the heroic narrative of Armstrong using manual pilot to the surface of the Moon,” Fong said. “But when you look at Project Apollo, the success was not just a result of the crew or the team in mission control; it stemmed from this army of hundreds of thousands of people working over the course of a decade.”

With a story this impactful to tell, the first challenge for Fong was determining how to distill the mission down into something that was entertaining, informative and did justice to the Apollo veterans he spoke to.

Fong at a live podcast recording at Rice University. Credit: Rice University

A decision was made to discuss the complexities and various parts of the Apollo 11 — framed by the final 13 minutes prior to touchdown on the Moon.

“We started to look and ask, ‘What is it about Apollo 11 that had never happened before and was not unique after it?’” Fong said. “The answer was that final 13 minutes of descent, the point from deorbit to the touchdown on the surface. Apollo 10 hovers around 50,000 feet, but from that point down is what Armstrong described as being rampant with the unknown.”

Once he had the idea in mind, Fong left his home in the United Kingdom and spent five weeks traveling across the United States to interview people who were involved in all levels of Apollo.

Talking to people across the organization was important not only to commemorate the anniversary, but to also preserve the organizational memory, spanning beyond the astronauts and comprising the entire effort. Time was of the essence to capture the details of the program before it left the public consciousness with the passing of a generation.

“In some small way, all 400,000 people involved in that project found themselves standing on the Moon that night in the summer of ’69,” Fong said. “It was important to tell the story correctly — possibly for the last time with the people [who] were there that made it happen.”

Along the journey, Fong spoke to dozens of men and women, but one of his fondest memories is interviewing Steve Bales, the guidance officer during the lunar landing. Bales had made the call to go forward with the landing as the warning alarms blared.

Fong was inspired by the story of Bales growing up the son of a janitor and beautician in a small Iowa farming community, chasing a far-fetched dream: a degree and career in aerospace engineering. Bales would end up being the flight controller who made a key decision enabling the completion of the mission.

Interviews like the one with Bales provided the content that made the story so engaging. But Fong was also able to immerse the audience in other ways, such as partnering with composer Hans Zimmer to create a piece of music for the show that “felt like it could fall apart at any moment.”

The show was an instant hit, garnering more than 7 million global downloads; however, one of the most compelling statistics underlining the show’s popularity is that nearly half of the audience is less than 35 years old. By attracting an audience that was not alive to see the Moon landing, Fong is enticing a whole new generation to become enthralled with NASA’s momentous past accomplishments, further igniting a passion for exploration and science. For these young people, it’s not too late to be a part of history.

“The message of Apollo is very simple: If you can take human beings and fire them into the space at 25,000 mph, land them on the surface of the Moon and bring them home, then anything must be possible,” Fong said. “We are limited only by our own imagination.”

Season two of “13 Minutes to the Moon” launched March 9. The podcast can be found and the BBC Worldwide website or by clicking here.