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Topic starter
2019-07-20 9:18 am
As we mark 50 years since Apollo 11 landed on the moon and as we seem to have several forum members (including myself) who were around to see this remarkable event I was wondering what your memories of the moon mission were?
My father worked in the space and aeronautics industry, and he contributed to the Gemini, Apollo, and Space Shuttle programs (he was the chief reliability engineer for the original CanadaArm, used in the Space Shuttle). So I have always been fascinated by the space program, anyone's space program - US, ESA, Russia, Japan, India, China, and others. And, thanks to my Dad, I even met a couple of astronauts when I was a teenager.
We were visiting my grandparents in northern Manitoba, in a small town called Flin Flon that my mother was born and raised in. It was in my grandparents summer cottage in a place called Phantom Lake that three generations of my family watched Armstrong take that famous step. I was 9 years old and can remember it like it was yesterday.
If you want to go back half a century and relive the moment there is a cool website called Apollo 11 in Real Time that is reenacting the events of the flight as if we were in 1969 again.
So do you have any memories of Apolo 11 and the "One Small Step"?
Bill
"Never trust a computer you can’t throw out a window." — Steve Wozniak
2019-07-20 9:37 am
I was in the USAF and stationed at Kadena Air Force Base on Okinawa. I watched the live feed to Armed Forces Television on a 9 inch B&W Sony TV along side my wife who was there on Okinawa with me. We were both spell bound! And the thing we remember the most was the static that interrupted Armstrong's famous line and the controversy that followed about what he really said. Up until the day he died I think he didn't agree what was written down in history.
SteveG
DroneBot Workshop reacted
Topic starter
2019-07-20 9:48 am
And the thing we remember the most was the static that interrupted Armstrong's famous line and the controversy that followed about what he really said. Up until the day he died I think he didn't agree what was written down in history.
I assume you're speaking of the "One small step for man" vs "One small step for a man" controversy?
I imagine being in the Air Force you felt a special pride as both Aldrin and Collins were also former Air Force members (Armstrong was in the Navy).
"Never trust a computer you can’t throw out a window." — Steve Wozniak
2019-07-20 9:49 am
Here is a trivia question!
Can anyone name the piece of equipment, invented by a professor at Cambridge University UK, without which the moon mission would not have taken place in 1969?
A clue, this piece equipment was about as big as a small washing machine and was still in late development stages when used, the invention lay almost dormant for 30 years, but we are going to see one hell of a lot more of these in the future.
No prizes, just a "like" from me!
Topic starter
2019-07-20 9:56 am
Can anyone name the piece of equipment, invented by a professor at Cambridge University UK, without which the moon mission would not have taken place in 1969?
The hydrogen-oxygen fuel cells!
?
"Never trust a computer you can’t throw out a window." — Steve Wozniak
Pugwash reacted
2019-07-20 10:03 am
Well done, I won't ask how long Wikipedia needed for that one. ?
It was, in fact, such genius, they had both hydrogen and oxygen tanks on board, and could feed the water to the drinking water tanks. Brilliant!
Solar cells were still a generation away and Lithium-based batteries two generations. And they sure as hell wouldn't be taking Lead-acid batteries with them.
2019-07-20 10:09 am
And where was I when it happened? In my final year at Grammar (High) School, suffering from serious headaches. The UK introduced SI units into schools one year earlier.
Bye-bye BTUs, kCals have arrived. But we got used to it!
DroneBot Workshop reacted
Topic starter
2019-07-20 10:50 am
Well done, I won't ask how long Wikipedia needed for that one.
Google actually!
?
"Never trust a computer you can’t throw out a window." — Steve Wozniak
2019-07-20 1:34 pm
Have any of you stumbled across the following YouTube video playlist from CuriousMarc about the rebuild of the Apollo guidance computer?
Apollo Guidance Compter Rebuild
Rather interesting, long, and detailed.
SteveG
2019-07-20 10:25 pm
I vaguely remember watching TV hoping to see some action but here in the UK it was mainly a bunch of 'sky at night chaps' running out of things to talk about as everything was taking its time. It was getting late and nothing looked imminent so I went to bed. The walk actually too place around 4 am UK time so I would have dropped off long before if I stayed up anyway. And back then there was no breakfast TV or video recorders so I had to watch it the news the next evening.
2019-07-21 9:25 am
I was sat on the balcony last night with a Vodka & Tonic, contemplating Moon Landings and stuff when the ISS passed 160km overhead and it reminded me again, how close we really are to space.
In all the interviews I have seen with the Apollo astronauts, all of them have expressed what a humbling experience looking back at their home planet was from the surface of the moon, whereas the ISS astronauts only report the sheer majesty of planet Earth, the difference can probably be put down to proximity.
For us earthbounds, the closest we can get to that humbling feeling, and if you haven't done it yet, get it on your bucket list, is to go into the desert at night and just look up. Apart from being amazed, you will also be confronted with your own insignificance.
I spent a few days in the Western Desert in Egypt, at 22:00 the generators were switched off and apart from a few petroleum lamps and candles, the village went totally dark. Then I would walk out a couple of hundred yards/meters into the desert and just look up. The experts say that the naked eye can only resolve about 5000 - 10000 stars, but it feels like millions.
And everybody that I have spoken too, that have experienced the same, tell me that it is something that they will never forget for the rest of their lives and the most beautiful thing they have ever seen.
There I go again waxing philosophical!! ?
2019-07-21 1:06 pm
I was 8 years old and absolutely fascinated by space and technology (go figure)
Me and my brother sat, in wonder, awe, and other cool words, in front of the TV. There was no VCR at the time, so I sat right up next to the TV, holding the microphone of a reel to reel tape recorder up to the speaker
No idea what happened to those tapes
8 years later I was in BOCES electronics class in high school and taking apart a Starsky and Hutch RC car, and modifying it into a remote car starter
My mother told me to grow up and stop playing with toys
I didn't listen
2019-07-21 5:04 pm
And what will we find on Mars?
Maybe!!