Wednesday, January 11, 2012

Should the Moon Be Protected Like a National Park?

Now here is something I have really thought a lot about in the past: What steps should the US take to preserve it's Apollo sites on the Moon? There is a fascinating discussion in this Dvice blog article. Here is the way they posit the question:

  • the six Apollo landing sites with their landing stages and leftover equipment and astronaut footprints may be hallowed ground to NASA and the U.S., but other moon-bound visitors may not feel the same.
I mean I flinched even when Apollo astronauts cut stuff off the old Surveyor landers and that had only been there for less than what 2 years or so before they got there?  So you can understand that I start getting nervous when considering so old grey hair humpin around on 11's site picking up mementos to take home.....ewwwwwwwwww!

As it was pointed out:

  • Does it makes sense to be so sentimental when all we've taken is one small step toward the rest of the stars?


Via The New York Times




4 comments:

Anonymous said...

I agree, But... short of putting a dome over these sites, with a meteor shield or detector and way to stop said meteors its inevitable these sites will disappear, course humanity will probably lose its present civilization before that happens, as all past such have, so the point is moot eh?

henryii said...

wish mankind had that view of earthly things from 1000's of yrs ago.
egypt,peru,china,ect all had beautiful things left behind from the ancient ones.
no one owns the moon and they are not going there to claim a piece of the 1st visitors-----yet.
they have other things on their minds.
but as history shows us it will only take time before someone picks up a piece to take with em.fiesseb

Beam Me Up said...

I would think Anon that the sites, if left pristine would still be recognizable tens of thousands of years later, whereas with human access you could measure it in a few decades. You know...maybe a sign..."all the rest is your's but this place you can not go" I ruined that didn't I?

Beam Me Up said...

So true Henryii!! Look at the sphinx! In modern times used for target practice but in the past, with looters and tribal chieftains systematically defacing the monument. The one thing in ANY of the sites on the moon can be said to be limited access due to their distance. Space tourists will happen but I don't see wholesale access to the moon by your average space tourist. I wonder if that exclusion though would attract the very people we hope would be excluded.....