Things I Bet You Never Have Seen Before: High Speed Film of Apollo 11

I know, we have all seen the launch of Apollo 11 on its way towards history.  But I am willing to bet that most (myself included) have never seen footage of the launch taken at extremely high speed from various points around the craft.

In this great piece of film we see the frames from camera E8 on pad 39b shooting at 500 frames a second for about 8 minutes of watching but is in truth only about 30 seconds of real-time!

The film shows ignition of the 5 f-1 engines and lift-off.  The narration is wonderful in describing what it is we are seeing (quite frankly you could have told me it was the gates of hell opening and I would have had to consider it, just from the hellish amounts of flame and smoke ) .

I am stunned by just how much material is out there, but this short is an excellent jumping off point.

Enjoy!

A Posthumous Happy Birthday to Neil Armstrong

Neil Armstrong (August 5, 1930 – August 25, 2012)

     Although he passed away last year, let's take a moment to remember Neil Armstrong on what would have been his 83rd birthday.   Everyone knows Armstrong's part in what is arguably humanity's greatest achievement.  Earlier, he was the command pilot of Gemini 8, which "suffered the first critical in-space system failure of a U.S. spacecraft which threatened the lives of the astronauts."  Armstrong represents all that is great in humanity and the hope that the future will hold many giant leaps for mankind.

So to my fellow Ohioan, Happy Birthday.

Sometimes NASA can be such Dicks.....

Harsh, I know, but let me bring you up to speed:

40+ years ago, upon its' return, the material that the Apollo 11 crew collected from the Moon was categorized and packaged for later study at various universities.  One of these was the Space Sciences Laboratory in Latimer Hall on the UC Berkeley campus.  After Berkeley studied the dust samples, they were packaged for return to NASA.  the ensuing hub-bub, a vacuum jar containing   vials of the moon-dust was accidentally moved to storage, where they sat until Berkeley Lab archivist Karen Nelson found the Moon dust — about 20 vials.  Nelson says there is no record of how they wound up in a university storage warehouse.  

Upon hearing about the find, NASA promptly requested the return of the samples. 

Am I missing something here?  Believe me, this is not the only sample NASA lost contact with samples.  How many times have we heard of people who have found or have in their possession whole rocks!  Now they are worried about dust?  Really? 

Any way, the article is short, click HERE to go to the whole article. 

RIP: Neal Armstrong

The commander and the first human to ever set foot on another world died 8/25/12 from complications from heart surgery. He was 82 years old.

Armstrong made his history making foot print July 21, 1969, this however was not his first space record. During his first mission in space, he performed the first manned docking of two spacecraft, during the Gemini 8 mission in 1966, with pilot David Scott.

Apollo 11 was his second and last space flight.

Armstrong's surgery took place on August 7, 2012, to relieve blocked coronary arteries. He died on August 25, following complications from the surgery. President Barack Obama released a statement calling Armstrong "among the greatest of American heroes – not just of his time, but of all time

Armstrong Reported in Good Shape After Heart Surgery

nbcnew.com reports that Neil Armstrong is "doing great" after cardiac bypass surgery. This, according to his wife Carol Armstrong.

The 82 year old Armstrong entered the hospital earlier this week after a routine stress test revealed
four blockages in his coronary arteries.

Armstrong is said to be in great spirits and doctors expect him to recover from the

43 Years Ago Today (July 20th) A History Making Day

At 10:56 p.m. ET, on July 20, 1969 these history making words were spoken. "That’s one small step for a man — one giant leap for mankind." This put astronaut Neal Armstrong in the fore front of one of the most historic achievements of the 20th century and there would be little argument towards saying one of the most historic ever!

Xnewsman of course has to keep me on track, so he sent in this article from msn.com  that really brings back the excitement and awe of the moment. For my part this I was reading this Dvice article here which showed the stunning photograph which was the first that Neal took after jumping 3 feet to the surface. And this next one I had never seen before! I love Apollo 8's shot of the Earth from lunar orbit, but from the surface looking straight up the side of the LEM towards Earth! What a stunning photo! You have to check out the Dvice gallery I was looking at because they take a shot of the Luna accent module Eagle preparing to dock with the command module with the Earth in the background! Heart stopping it is so beautiful! Thanks for the update Xnewsman!

Apollo 11's Saturn V F1 Engine(s) Found!

The F-1 rocket engine designed in the 60s is still able to amaze and out perform engines far far younger. Consider it could produce one and a half million pounds of thrust, 32 million horsepower, and it was capable of gulping down 6,000 pounds of rocket fuel consisting of rocket grade kerosene and liquid oxygen every second. The huge Saturn V launcher fielded five of these behemoths! What many have forgotten is that the Saturn V was ONLY the first stage! On launch, the Saturn Vs main engines fired all at once, burned for about 2 minutes and 41 seconds. This would lift the whole stack to an altitude of 42 miles. The first stage was then jettisoned, where it fell back to Earth into the ocean.

Amazon founder and space entrepreneur Jeff Bezos has announced that the Apollo 11 rocket engines have been found on the bottom of the Atlantic ocean. They are now lying laying in water 14,000 feet deep.

Bezos says:

• we're making plans to attempt to raise one or more of them from the ocean floor. We don't know yet what condition these engines might be in - they hit the ocean at high velocity and have been in salt water for more than 40 years. On the other hand, they're made of tough stuff, so we'll see

Bezos points out that the engines are still the property of NASA and they will make the final decision as to where the recovered engines go, however he hopes that if there is more than one recovered, NASA would be gracious enough to allow one to go to the Seattle Museum of Flight.

Saturn V wiki  

Bezos Expeditions