45th anniversary of man's first moon walk

Davey Jones

Davey Jones

Well-known Member
Location
Florida
CRIPES!!!!! 45 years ago today?
I was in my thirties,where the heck did time go?

I believe that this nation should commit itself to achieving the goal, before this decade is out, of landing a man on the Moon and returning him safely to the Earth. No single space project in this period will be more impressive to mankind, or more important in the long-range exploration of space; and none will be so difficult or expensive to accomplish."

- President John F. Kennedy in 1961 in an address to Congress
 

I remember that day very well. I was so excited and I was glued to the TV watching and listening to every second.
For different reasons I had to listen to the re-entry drama of Appollo 13. I was praying the whole time.

I was a science teacher and we were given reels of film taken by Apollo 10 and Apollo 11, including the landing and moon walks and I showed them to my students for years after the event. To me it was one of the outstanding moments in the history of mankind.
 

Davey Jones said:
... I believe that this nation should commit itself to achieving the goal, before this decade is out, of landing a man on the Moon and returning him safely to the Earth. No single space project in this period will be more impressive to mankind, or more important in the long-range exploration of space; and none will be so difficult or expensive to accomplish."

- President John F. Kennedy in 1961 in an address to Congress
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Too bad they never published the remarks he made AFTER that speech ...

... and I don't care HOW shoddy the equipment is, how untested it is or how dangerous this mission will be. I will NOT be out-done by those damn Russkies! So we have a few cabin fires, we lose a few astronauts - what is that, in comparison to the glory of being FIRST?
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Davey Jones said:
I never heard of that one and dont believe he ever said that BUT.....

Where did you find that remark?
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Inside of my head, back and to the left.

... but he might have said that, and subsequent events proved that there WAS a very large price paid for that moon landing, right?

It also set up the corporate culture that allowed the Challenger disaster - hiding vital data and going forth toward the goal without regard for human life. All because Kennedy wanted to satisfy his ego ...
 
RE:"All because Kennedy wanted to satisfy his ego"

ALL Presidents want to satisfy their egos,why do you think they wanted to run for President?

Sure we lost some American lives because of their egos but if you compare the last 4 Presidents and lives lost,Kennedy is at the bottom of that list.
 
Davey Jones said:
RE:"All because Kennedy wanted to satisfy his ego"

ALL Presidents want to satisfy their egos,why do you think they wanted to run for President?

Sure we lost some American lives because of their egos but if you compare the last 4 Presidents and lives lost,Kennedy is at the bottom of that list.
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True, but as far as lost lives in the space program it's still all down to Johnny-boy. He set the pace that has been followed, more or less, by all the following Prezeedents.

His decision to enter into the race that the USSR had begun was probably in part influenced by the Bay of Pigs fiasco - he had to "save face" (NOT just an Oriental thing!). In fact, Kennedy put much of the onus of the space program on Johnson ...

“Do we have a chance of beating the Soviets by putting a laboratory in space, or by a trip around the moon, or by a rocket to
go to the moon and back with a man? Is there any other space program which promises dramatic results in which we could
win?”


John F. Kennedy memo to Lyndon B. Johnson

April 20, 1961
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So to Kennedy it wasn't about furthering mankind's knowledge or boldly going where no man had gone before - it was about winning a friggin' race! The only reason he chose the moon as his target was because NASA told him that was a race we could win. It was done in the midst of the Cold War, to stick our tongues out at the Soviets - no better nor more altruistic reason than that.
 
There is a question that to my knowledge, (which is limited), hasn't been answered.

Why does the flag that was planted at the moon walk wave? I thought there wasn't any air up there, much less wind to blow the flag.

I know that many said that issue proved the landing was a fake. I have never doubted that we really did go, but I still have never heard of an explanation for the flag waving.

I would appreciate it if someone could enlighten me. :magnify:
 
Does it wave?

Just as the absence of an atmosphere made it important to find a way to shield the astronauts from meteoroids racing through space, it presented engineers with another challenge, although this one was easier to solve. On each of the missions that landed, astronauts erected an American flag. Of course, engineers knew the flag would hang limp in the airless environment, but they wanted it outstretched to display the stars and stripes. So in addition to the vertical pole that supported the side of the flag, they included a horizontal arm along the top of the flag to hold it out. Sometimes the astronauts did not fully extend that arm, so the flag would not be stretched flat. That would leave some ripples in the fabric, making the flag appear in photographs as if it were waving in the breeze, even when it was perfectly motionless. In fact, if you ever saw video of the flags when the astronauts weren't touching them, you would see that they were completely still.

As the astronauts took off from the moon in their lunar module, the rocket engine's exhaust blowing across the surface sometimes made the flag wave briefly or even, in the case of Apollo 11, fall over. Later missions placed the flag farther from the spacecraft.

http://spaceplace.nasa.gov/review/dr-marc-earth/moon-meteroids.html
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I believe that this nation should commit itself to achieving the goal, before this decade is out, of landing a man on the Moon and returning him safely to the Earth. No single space project in this period will be more impressive to mankind, or more important in the long-range exploration of space; and none will be so difficult or expensive to accomplish."

- President John F. Kennedy in 1961 in an address to Congress
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man this caught NASA with its pants down. they were no where near ready for this. all we had was sub orbital rocket engines. oh mr Von Braun we need more powerful engines. NOW !!!

 
h654DC537
 
Read the speech Nixon prepared in case the Apollo 11 astronauts died on the moon
http://io9.com/5880226/read-the-spe...ase-the-apollo-11-astronauts-died-on-the-moon

"The Apollo 11 mission was not without uncertainty. NASA feared that Armstrong and Aldrin would not be able to launch the lunar module from the moon to join the command module. If the module failed to launch, Armstrong and Aldrin would have been stuck on the moon, condemned to run out of air hundreds of thousands of kilometers from home."

 
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