Listen to this audio excerpt from Liliana Villarreal, Artemis Landing & Recovery Director:

Lili Villarreal fell in love with space exploration since she was a child when she and her family visited the Kennedy Space Center Visitors Complex in Florida. So it's no surprise when she had the opportunity to start NASA's Artemis mission to explore the moon and build the foundation for Mars' first crew mission.

She currently serves as Artemis Landing and Recovery Director, splashing astronauts and Orion spacecraft in the Pacific Ocean after their mission in space.

Villarreal, originally from Cartagena, Colombia, moved to Miami, Florida when she was 10 years old with the goal of one day entering the aerospace industry. In 2007, her dream came true and she became a member of the NASA team.

Prior to becoming Director of Landing and Recovery, Villarreal served as Deputy Director of Artemis I Mission, responsible for the integration, stacking and testing of SLS (Space Launch System) rockets and Orion spacecraft within the vehicle assembly building at the agency’s Kennedy Space Center.

"I kind of came for about a few years before I started working on Artemis I," Villarreal said. "It took a while to get into an operation like that, 'Oh my goodness, we have everything here, we start putting everything together. Every day is a different day. Every day we have to figure out, 'Okay,' Well, what's going on? How are we going to fix it?' This is the fun part of being an engineer here."

Throughout her career, she also had the opportunity to work in the operations department of the International Space Station Program.

Currently, she and her team are training in Artemis II, the first crew mission under Artemis, sending four astronauts on the moon and on the back. Part of the training includes rehearsal steps and procedures to make sure they are ready for crew flights. This includes conducting ongoing recovery tests, in which NASA and the U.S. Navy practice retrieving astronauts from the sea representative version of Orion and bringing them and the spacecraft back to the ship.

"I think this is what we do for humanity," Villarreal said. "It will be better humanity, and it's the stepping stone that ultimately we live in other worlds. I'm going to be a part of it. You're going to be a part of it. How cool is that?"