The triumph and near-tragedy of the first Moon landing

If you want a great experience and have 15 minutes to spare, http://www.firstmenonthemoon.com/ has synced up the key radio channels, the video, and the transcripts of the radio traffic (with explainers for acronyms) in real time. I tense up every time as they hit the various go/no go calls.

Fun facts not mentioned in the article:

* The lunar module was off course because the astronauts failed to completely vent the tunnel between Eagle and Columbia and the resulting puff of air altered their trajectory.

* Apollo 10 was short-fueled to keep the crew from mutineering and attempting to land.

* Apollo 11 ended the crew's careers as astronauts: they were national and international heroes, and no sensible bureaucrat was willing to risk them.

If you are interested in more details of the guidance and control system of the Apollo missions, I highly recommend the book Digital Apollo by David A Mindell.

Someone a while back on hackernews recommended the above book and it was absolutely fascinating and it's written remarkably well, very engaging. I am now a professional GNC engineer :) The book also delves into the gradual evolution of fly by wire flight controls starting with the X-15.

So, so lucky we didn't kill anybody except the first three guys on the pad. There were so many opportunities to suffocate, poison, burn, freeze, strand, atomize, crush, or drown a crew. Their bravery, and the work of the engineers to get them home safe, is more stunning now than ever.

The cockpit transcripts are really worth a read. When I first read them they were interesting, but then I realized they were open loop. Aldrin is reporting instrument values he would want to know if he were piloting the ship -- but he's not looking out the window!. Meanwhile Armstrong is looking down out the window steering, assuming that Aldrin is telling him what he needs and so is asking little.

Those guys really practiced and really knew each other well. What a team!

The transcripts: https://www.hq.nasa.gov/alsj/a11/a11transscript_cm.htm

Also: I was a little kid and really excited by the moon landing, but couldn't appreciate how complicated it was. Later, as a teen, I figured it was pretty much pressing a button. But in my mid 30s I read these transcripts (and had an engineering education) and then saw a photo of Armstrong re-entering the command module after ascending from the moon. He was 37 at the time, about my age when I saw the photo. And the grin on his face... I'll never forget that.

Oh, also, Russ Olsen does a wonderful talk about the moon landing and the engineering involved:

https://youtu.be/4Sso4HtvJsw

> Normally, in this time period, that is, from P64 onward, we'd be evaluating the landing site and starting LPD activity. However, the concern here was not with the landing area we were going into, but rather whether we could continue at all. Consequently, our attention was directed toward clearing the program alarms, keeping the machine flying, and assuring ourselves that control was adequate to continue without requiring an abort. Most of our attention was directed inside the cockpit during this time period and in my view this would account for our inability to study the landing site and final landing location during final descent[14].

> Nevertheless, Armstrong had time to notice that the LPD indicated "we were landing just short of a large rocky crater with very large rocks covering a high percentage of the surface"[15]....

This guy is pretty good!

First Man: The Life of Neil A. Armstrong by James R. Hansen is worth reading in its entirety if one is at all interested in this stuff. (Although it looks like they're making it into a movie for 2018.) It is a history written by an engineer who knew how to ask the right questions, which helps.

Always love seeing this, and recently watched a good film about the human computers who helped getting humans on the moon: Hidden Figures https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hidden_Figures

More details on program alarms and other problems (eg. overcompensated throttle control, not fixed until Apollo 14): https://www.doneyles.com/LM/Tales.html

It's been 45 years since anyone has been more than 300 miles away from Earth. totally pathetic.

Reminds me of the speech that Nixon would've given had the Apollo 11 astronauts been stranded on the Moon:

"Fate has ordained that the men who went to the moon to explore in peace will stay on the moon to rest in peace.

These brave men, Neil Armstrong and Edwin Aldrin, know that there is no hope for their recovery. But they also know that there is hope for mankind in their sacrifice.

These two men are laying down their lives in mankind's most noble goal: the search for truth and understanding.

They will be mourned by their families and friends; they will be mourned by the nation; they will be mourned by the people of the world; they will be mourned by a Mother Earth that dared send two of her sons into the unknown.

In their exploration, they stirred the people of the world to feel as one; in their sacrifice, they bind more tightly the brotherhood of man.

In ancient days, men looked at the stars and saw their heroes in the constellations. In modern times, we do much the same, but our heroes are epic men of flesh and blood.

Others will follow, and surely find their way home. Man's search will not be denied. But these men were the first, and they will remain the foremost in our hearts.

For every human being who looks up at the moon in the nights to come will know that there is some corner of another world that is forever mankind."

http://www.lettersofnote.com/2010/11/in-event-of-moon-disast...

To this day the stories of the moon landings are the greatest adventures in the galaxy.

To think that they hadn't had the tech to fake it...