Joe is Vanguard's global chief economist and head of Vanguard Investment Strategy Group. He's also a member of the senior portfolio management team in Vanguard Fixed Income Group.
Apollo missions took about three days to reach the moon. But the quickest trip to the moon was the New Horizons probe, which zipped past the moon in just 8 hours 35 minutes on its way to Pluto. However, the spacecraft didn't even slow down or approach lunar orbit. Tidal forces.
Using a chemical propulsion system, it took the Apollo astronauts about 2.5 days to get to the moon, traveling at speeds faster than 39,000 km/h (more than 24,000 mph). The space shuttle uses a chemical propulsion system based upon both liquid and solid propellants.