At 7am, when most of Australia was just waking up, Rhianna Lyons was already in a television studio explaining humanity’s first return to the Moon in over 50 years. 

By lunchtime, she was racing back to Canberra’s Deep Space Communication Complex for another live radio interview. The rest of the day became a whirlwind of similar Zoom interviews, television appearances and guiding student tour groups through the station – all while NASA’s Artemis mission continued streaming on a screen beside her desk. 

“It was crazy for me,” she said. “Being a spokesperson, I had a minimum of three media interviews a day.” 

For 10 hectic days during Artemis II’s mission, Lyons became one of the public faces of Australia’s role in the mission. Yet, while millions watched astronauts circle the Moon, very few realised the impact of Australia’s role in the mission’s success. 

“We’re like a post office,” Lyons explained. “We don’t open the data, but we make sure it gets where it needs to go.” 

Hidden just outside Canberra, the CSIRO-managed tracking station forms part of NASA’s Deep Space Network, a trio of giant communication facilities located in Australia, Spain, and the United States. During the Artemis mission, the station helped carry critical communications between mission control and the crew aboard Orion. 

“I like to describe it as we were there to make sure that when the astronauts needed to call home, home was able to pick up,” Lyons said. 

The work itself is often invisible. Engineers monitor antenna signals, trackers guide giant dishes across the sky, and teams work around the clock to ensure everything runs smoothly at all times. If nothing goes wrong, the public rarely notices Australia’s contributions. 

“The worst thing possible is if, in a critical moment in the mission, there’s one antenna tracking it and that antenna breaks down,” she said. “A lot of our work shifted to preservation – making sure everything was still going smoothly.” 

That quiet reliability has defined Australia’s role in space exploration for decades. From supporting the Apollo missions to helping power Artemis, Australia has long operated in the background of humanity’s biggest journeys beyond Earth. 

“There’s this big misconception that Australia is not involved in space,” Lyons said. “That could not be further from the truth.” 

For Lyons, however, space was never just about rockets or astronauts. In fact, her love of space started with an unfinished documentary in primary school. 

“I remember being hooked on it,” she said. “The teacher said we weren’t going to finish it, and I was like, ‘No, you can’t do that to me!’” 

Growing up in Newcastle, she immersed herself in science fiction (she’s a big fan of Star Wars), watched The Dish, borrowed books from the library and eventually moved to Canberra to study astronomy and astrophysics at the Australian National University. Alongside her studies she worked at Questacon and attended the London International Youth Science Forum in 2024 at only 21 years old. This is where she discovered a second passion – translating science for ordinary people.  

“I love space and I love talking,” she laughed. 

Outside of major missions like Artemis II, Lyons spends the majority of her time guiding school groups through the visitor centre, helping young Australians see themselves in science and technology careers. She speaks passionately about breaking down the idea that science only belongs to certain types of people. 

“I think science is for everybody,” she said. “People get told you either do art or science, English or maths, but there’s so much intersection between science and everything else.” 

This belief became even more important during Artemis. As public interest in the mission exploded, Lyons found herself helping audiences understand not just the technical side of the Moon mission, but why it mattered emotionally. 

And for Lyons – and much of the world’s population – Artemis represented something bigger than another space launch. It felt like a return to collective wonder. 

“It removes the borders,” Lyons explained. “It’s not just America going to the Moon, it’s America with a Canadian astronaut in a European space agency module, with Australia and Spain tracking on that collaborative element.” 

At a time when global news often feels dominated by division and crisis, Lyons believes Artemis offered something rare – a story people could unite behind. 

Part of that excitement came from the astronauts themselves. Artemis II’s crew reflected a more diverse generation of space exploration, one Lyons says allowed more people to imagine themselves among the stars.  

“I think the world kind of needed Artemis. Every single person can see themselves in space,” she said. 

Australia’s role in space exploration has often unfolded in an essential, but quiet way. Lyons points out that while many Australians know the story of The Dish and the Parkes radio telescope supporting Apollo 11, very few realise Australia continued supporting later Apollo missions, and has remained involved in international space operations ever since.  

“They go, yeah, we got the images for Apollo 11. No, we supported all the subsequent Apollo missions as well,” Lyons said. ”And I think that now with Artemis and showcasing Australia’s involvement with it is really highlighting the fact that Australia’s space industry is growing and it’s growing fast.” 

“Our station has been here for over 60 years … we’ve always been a quiet contributor,” she added. 

Now, with Artemis reigniting global fascination with the Moon, Lyons hopes Australia’s contribution becomes more widely recognised, particularly by young people considering futures in science.  

“It’s really cool seeing kids dressing up as astronauts again being like ‘I’m gonna go to the Moon,’” she said.  

As for Lyons herself, she has no plans to become an astronaut, despite constantly being asked the question. 

“If they go ‘Hey, do you want to go to the moon tomorrow?’ sign me up. Put me up there. I will be the first one in line,” she said. “But I don’t think astronaut life is for me.” 

Instead, she’d rather keep her feet on the ground and help bridge the gap between complex science and the public watching from home. 

And as the world looks toward future Artemis missions and the prospect of humans once again walking on the lunar surface, Lyons’ main wish is for people to remember the countries working quietly in the background to make it possible. 

“I hope years from now people will look back at Artemis and know Australia played a part,” she said. “And Australia played their part really, really well.”