Unfortunately, they neglect to mention that in order to achieve orbit at all, the Shuttle has to go 17,000 miles an hour. In addition, the Shuttle carries a payload big enough to launch satellites into geosynchronous orbit, 42,000 miles away. That’s 100 times farther out using a much smaller upper stage than Apollo had, which should stun the moon hoaxers.

What it comes down to is this: orbital mechanics isn’t a straightforward thing, and it relies more on mass and velocity and careful calculation than it does on distance. That’s why the “Mars Direct”:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mars_Direct plan only requires an Apollo-class launch vehicle to go all the way to Mars.