At 3:56 of the footage, the statement heard round the world and preserved for an eternity. Something bigger than Jobs announcing the iPhone.
I watched that live and then walked out to my waiting Douglas C-47 – talk about a generational jump!
Someone send this to Margaret Atwood who to this day is unconvinced.
This is one of many efforts, often by amateurs, to preserve the legacy of the space program.
One reason is that the records obtained by the early spacecraft or the astronauts might not be accessible with current methods. Spare parts for the original machines that were used for them may no longer be available.
One such undertaking is the re-mastering of photos taken during the Lunar Orbiter program:
There’s a scientific reason for doing this. Processing and re-mastering those tapes and films may reveal details that weren’t immediately apparent when they were first seen.
Those pictures provided a view of the moon several decades ago. Since then, there have several spacecraft that have gone there, so those original photos provide a basis for comparison with what’s been observed more recently. Of particular interest are changes in surface features, such as new craters or boulders rolling down slopes.
The cancellation of the Arrow is yet another example of Canada’s fear of success. We had the people, we had the capabilities. What was lacking was the will.
The Arrow was obsolete before it was even built. The problem isn’t Canada’s fear of success, it’s that we lionize failure.
First fly-by-wire all weather long range Mach 2 interceptor with thrust to weight ratio of 1 in 1958. Low wing loading. Change an engine in 30 minutes. Internal storage of all missiles. Obsolete. Right.
My late father was buddies with an ex-RCAF fighter jock. The chap flew F-86s during the 1950s and he had a chance to sit in the Arrow simulator. He was impressed.
By the way, apparently there’s someone in NE B. C. who actually has one of the Iroquois engines.
MichiCanuck, the point is that the Diefenbaker government believed that it was made obsolete by the advent of the ballistic missile. The CF-105 was intended to intercept Soviet bombers. That’s why Canada went and bought Bomarc missiles (despite the fact that they were utterly useless.)
cgh:
Many thought that fighters were obsolete in the 50s and early 60s, including many in the USAF. The Vietnam war gave them a rude shock. The irony is that Canada not only bought (eventually) nuclear tipped Bomarc ramjet missiles, they also bought used, clunky and truly obsolete F-101 Voodoos (which the USAF wanted to dump).
It turns out that Avro was offering CF-105s for about the same as what the Canadian government wound up paying for the CF-101s. The Arrow would have easily outperformed the F-4 (the only plane that flew sideways as well as it did forward), was amenable to many more roles than the CF-104, more capable than the CF-5 and was a much better plane than the MiG-25 Foxbat, the plane that scared the Americans so much that they finally built a good fighter, the F-15.
Imagine a derived Arrow with canards, an upgraded set of turbofans for supercruise capability and a radar absorbing coating. It would be operational today.
Much like all things military in Canada one should always watch the politics and the money, nothing is ever as it it seems, that applies to the Arrow.
Done without the metric system
Much of the basic work which made it possible wasn’t. Dr. Wehrner von Braun and his Soviet counterpart Sergei Korolev, both of whom did pioneering work in rocketry, worked in metric. Mind you, both of them made use of Dr. Robert Goddard’s patents.
Thanks for sharing that.
I saw the movie “Destination Moon” about a manned rocket trip to the moon in 1950. It really made an impression on my young mind back then. Wondered if I would live to see such an event in real life. Only had to wait 19 years for that to actually happen. Now looking back at it for over 50 years.
Destination Moon remains one of the best SF movies ever made, partly because of its special effects and partly because Robert Heilein worked on it and ensured that it was accurate.
It was prescient in many ways. It foresaw that the Cold War was the reason for going there. It predicted that the lunar effort would be largely dependent upon the efforts of the private sector. It also looked ahead and saw that it would be done on behalf of all mankind. While it successfully guessed that the news media would be covering parts of it live, it didn’t anticipate that television would be part of it. Don’t forget that while the transistor had just been invented by the old Bell Labs, the integrated circuit was still several years in the future.
That’s one movie I really should add to my personal collection.
The whole crew was white. Could’t they bring a transgender black lesbian along? (And leave her there).
An enduring lesson for all modern IT aviators, the computer was going to land them in a boulder field. Neil of course selected another touch down point and landed the craft manually.
That’s a bit misleading. Although the computer directed the Lunar Module to a specific site, there was no previous indication that there were any obstructions or hazards. The resolution of ground-based telescopes and radar, as well as photos taken by unmanned spacecraft orbiting the moon, wasn’t all that good at the time.
Keep in mind as well that Apollo 11’s primary objective was to land safely, regardless of how far from the intended they might have been. Pete Conrad and Al Bean on Apollo 12 demonstrated that precision landing was possible when they set Intrepid down within walking distance of the Surveyor 3 probe.
The issue of potential landing hazards was brought up again when the site for Apollo 15 was to be chosen. The two final candidates were the crater Marius, located on Oceanus Procellarum, and Hadley Rille. Marius had a lot of support because the Hadley region, near the lunar Appenines, was regarded as too rough. All indications were that the site was covered with boulders. It wasn’t until commander Dave Scott reassured the committee making the decision that he and Lunar Module Pilot Jim Irwin could easily land Falcon in a safe location that Hadley was selected.
As it turned out, the fears of a field covered with boulders were misplaced, and it was a good decision. Scott and Irwin found a sample of anorthosite, dubbed the “Genesis Rock”, which was believed to be part of the original lunar crust.
“the computer directed the Lunar Module to a specific site, there was no previous indication that there were any obstructions or hazards.” But there were.
Quite, my point entirely.
NASA wanted to have an landing area as free of obstructions as possible. Setting Eagle down safely was Armstrong and Aldrin’s objective so they would not have been sent to a site where there might have been difficulty. Keep in mind that a successful landing was by no means certain.
From what I recall from the accounts I read and heard, they were on the correct trajectory. At specific times in the flight plan, they would check for familiar landmarks to ensure that they were on the right flight path as well as establish where they were.
Nobody expected that there would be boulders where they were supposed to land because nothing in the photos that were taken of the site or from the radar images that were previously made hinted that there were any. That’s when Armstrong took over control and landed the LM long.
You keep missing the point, the technology can’t be excused because it didn’t have all the information, non operational engineers especially want to rely on it ….that’s why technology keeps killing people in aviation, people are forced unwisely to rely on half smart IT.
The computer did what it was programmed to do and execute certain mission actions at specific times, based on applicable inputs, serving as a third LM crew member.
In theory, I suppose, it could have performed the landing all by itself. This was around the time that commercial airlines experimented with computer-controlled touchdowns.
There was one time when the landing computer went wobbly and that was during Apollo 14. Prior to the initiation of powered descent, there were indications that Antares‘s computer was getting an abort signal. Initially, it was believed that a loose ball of solder had entered the abort switch and closed the circuit. Mitchell tapped on the panel which appeared to solve the problem, but it happened again.
But both the crew and mission control were concerned that it would keep happening, particularly during the landing sequence. NASA got in touch with the group at MIT that wrote the program and they quickly came up with a hack that got around that problem.
You apparently don’t understand the problem at all, 10:12 post.
I’ll leave it there.
I like how Neil is brightly lit within a dark, dark shadow. The wonders of film and Kubrick.
With a good telescope you can see the lunar module’s remaining superstructure untouched after so many years. 🙂
At 3:56 of the footage, the statement heard round the world and preserved for an eternity. Something bigger than Jobs announcing the iPhone.
I watched that live and then walked out to my waiting Douglas C-47 – talk about a generational jump!
Someone send this to Margaret Atwood who to this day is unconvinced.
This is one of many efforts, often by amateurs, to preserve the legacy of the space program.
One reason is that the records obtained by the early spacecraft or the astronauts might not be accessible with current methods. Spare parts for the original machines that were used for them may no longer be available.
One such undertaking is the re-mastering of photos taken during the Lunar Orbiter program:
https://sservi.nasa.gov/articles/lunar-orbiter-images-remastered/
There’s a scientific reason for doing this. Processing and re-mastering those tapes and films may reveal details that weren’t immediately apparent when they were first seen.
Those pictures provided a view of the moon several decades ago. Since then, there have several spacecraft that have gone there, so those original photos provide a basis for comparison with what’s been observed more recently. Of particular interest are changes in surface features, such as new craters or boulders rolling down slopes.
Somewhat related:
https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20200615-the-record-breaking-jet-which-still-haunts-a-country
The cancellation of the Arrow is yet another example of Canada’s fear of success. We had the people, we had the capabilities. What was lacking was the will.
The Arrow was obsolete before it was even built. The problem isn’t Canada’s fear of success, it’s that we lionize failure.
First fly-by-wire all weather long range Mach 2 interceptor with thrust to weight ratio of 1 in 1958. Low wing loading. Change an engine in 30 minutes. Internal storage of all missiles. Obsolete. Right.
My late father was buddies with an ex-RCAF fighter jock. The chap flew F-86s during the 1950s and he had a chance to sit in the Arrow simulator. He was impressed.
By the way, apparently there’s someone in NE B. C. who actually has one of the Iroquois engines.
MichiCanuck, the point is that the Diefenbaker government believed that it was made obsolete by the advent of the ballistic missile. The CF-105 was intended to intercept Soviet bombers. That’s why Canada went and bought Bomarc missiles (despite the fact that they were utterly useless.)
cgh:
Many thought that fighters were obsolete in the 50s and early 60s, including many in the USAF. The Vietnam war gave them a rude shock. The irony is that Canada not only bought (eventually) nuclear tipped Bomarc ramjet missiles, they also bought used, clunky and truly obsolete F-101 Voodoos (which the USAF wanted to dump).
It turns out that Avro was offering CF-105s for about the same as what the Canadian government wound up paying for the CF-101s. The Arrow would have easily outperformed the F-4 (the only plane that flew sideways as well as it did forward), was amenable to many more roles than the CF-104, more capable than the CF-5 and was a much better plane than the MiG-25 Foxbat, the plane that scared the Americans so much that they finally built a good fighter, the F-15.
Imagine a derived Arrow with canards, an upgraded set of turbofans for supercruise capability and a radar absorbing coating. It would be operational today.
Much like all things military in Canada one should always watch the politics and the money, nothing is ever as it it seems, that applies to the Arrow.
Done without the metric system
Much of the basic work which made it possible wasn’t. Dr. Wehrner von Braun and his Soviet counterpart Sergei Korolev, both of whom did pioneering work in rocketry, worked in metric. Mind you, both of them made use of Dr. Robert Goddard’s patents.
Thanks for sharing that.
I saw the movie “Destination Moon” about a manned rocket trip to the moon in 1950. It really made an impression on my young mind back then. Wondered if I would live to see such an event in real life. Only had to wait 19 years for that to actually happen. Now looking back at it for over 50 years.
Destination Moon remains one of the best SF movies ever made, partly because of its special effects and partly because Robert Heilein worked on it and ensured that it was accurate.
It was prescient in many ways. It foresaw that the Cold War was the reason for going there. It predicted that the lunar effort would be largely dependent upon the efforts of the private sector. It also looked ahead and saw that it would be done on behalf of all mankind. While it successfully guessed that the news media would be covering parts of it live, it didn’t anticipate that television would be part of it. Don’t forget that while the transistor had just been invented by the old Bell Labs, the integrated circuit was still several years in the future.
That’s one movie I really should add to my personal collection.
The whole crew was white. Could’t they bring a transgender black lesbian along? (And leave her there).
An enduring lesson for all modern IT aviators, the computer was going to land them in a boulder field. Neil of course selected another touch down point and landed the craft manually.
That’s a bit misleading. Although the computer directed the Lunar Module to a specific site, there was no previous indication that there were any obstructions or hazards. The resolution of ground-based telescopes and radar, as well as photos taken by unmanned spacecraft orbiting the moon, wasn’t all that good at the time.
Keep in mind as well that Apollo 11’s primary objective was to land safely, regardless of how far from the intended they might have been. Pete Conrad and Al Bean on Apollo 12 demonstrated that precision landing was possible when they set Intrepid down within walking distance of the Surveyor 3 probe.
The issue of potential landing hazards was brought up again when the site for Apollo 15 was to be chosen. The two final candidates were the crater Marius, located on Oceanus Procellarum, and Hadley Rille. Marius had a lot of support because the Hadley region, near the lunar Appenines, was regarded as too rough. All indications were that the site was covered with boulders. It wasn’t until commander Dave Scott reassured the committee making the decision that he and Lunar Module Pilot Jim Irwin could easily land Falcon in a safe location that Hadley was selected.
As it turned out, the fears of a field covered with boulders were misplaced, and it was a good decision. Scott and Irwin found a sample of anorthosite, dubbed the “Genesis Rock”, which was believed to be part of the original lunar crust.
“the computer directed the Lunar Module to a specific site, there was no previous indication that there were any obstructions or hazards.” But there were.
Quite, my point entirely.
NASA wanted to have an landing area as free of obstructions as possible. Setting Eagle down safely was Armstrong and Aldrin’s objective so they would not have been sent to a site where there might have been difficulty. Keep in mind that a successful landing was by no means certain.
From what I recall from the accounts I read and heard, they were on the correct trajectory. At specific times in the flight plan, they would check for familiar landmarks to ensure that they were on the right flight path as well as establish where they were.
Nobody expected that there would be boulders where they were supposed to land because nothing in the photos that were taken of the site or from the radar images that were previously made hinted that there were any. That’s when Armstrong took over control and landed the LM long.
You keep missing the point, the technology can’t be excused because it didn’t have all the information, non operational engineers especially want to rely on it ….that’s why technology keeps killing people in aviation, people are forced unwisely to rely on half smart IT.
The computer did what it was programmed to do and execute certain mission actions at specific times, based on applicable inputs, serving as a third LM crew member.
In theory, I suppose, it could have performed the landing all by itself. This was around the time that commercial airlines experimented with computer-controlled touchdowns.
There was one time when the landing computer went wobbly and that was during Apollo 14. Prior to the initiation of powered descent, there were indications that Antares‘s computer was getting an abort signal. Initially, it was believed that a loose ball of solder had entered the abort switch and closed the circuit. Mitchell tapped on the panel which appeared to solve the problem, but it happened again.
But both the crew and mission control were concerned that it would keep happening, particularly during the landing sequence. NASA got in touch with the group at MIT that wrote the program and they quickly came up with a hack that got around that problem.
You apparently don’t understand the problem at all, 10:12 post.
I’ll leave it there.
I like how Neil is brightly lit within a dark, dark shadow. The wonders of film and Kubrick.
With a good telescope you can see the lunar module’s remaining superstructure untouched after so many years. 🙂
Apollo11 still used star charts to navigate.
https://www.information-age.com/apollo-11s-first-moon-landing-technology-star-charts-and-the-nasa-coders-123484071/
First computer I used in business was a TIAC 4000 (Texas Instruments Automatic Computer) and it had an unbelievable 4k of ram. LOL