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Space Science

30 Years Since Last Man on the Moon 422

Posted by Hemos from the what's-the-point dept.
Honeydipper Dan writes "December 14 marks the 30th anniversary of the last man on the Moon . I haven't noticed any hoopla about this. Perhaps this event raises the subtext of why we haven't been back a little more than the first Moon landing's 30th anniversary did over 3 years ago. The Apollo 17 mission was a great success, however, and deserves to be remembered. It marked the first (and last) time a geologist was on the surface of the Moon. Meanwhile, NASA is commemorating the Wright brothers' flight of December 17, 1903, getting ready for next year's Centennial of Flight."
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30 Years Since Last Man on the Moon More

30 Years Since Last Man on the Moon

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  • Wasted chances (Score:5, Interesting)

    by drunkmonk ( 241978 ) on Friday December 13, 2002 @11:26PM (#4885208) Homepage
    Apollo 17 represents one of the largest missed chances in American scientific history. What would have been the "science" missions in the Apollo series (18-20) were scrapped because the American TV public didn't want to tune in anymore.

    Ugh. It burns me up every time I think about it.

    • Wasn't Nixon responsible? (Score:3, Interesting)

      by Goonie ( 8651 )
      I'm not really up with the history, but wasn't your good friend and mine Richard Nixon largely responsible for cutting the program, amongst the other acts of bastardry committed in his name?

      • Comment removed (Score:5, Informative)

        by account_deleted ( 4530225 ) on Friday December 13, 2002 @11:48PM (#4885299)
        Comment removed based on user account deletion
        • finally NASA cancelled Apollo 18 and 19 on 2 September 1970 because of congressional cuts in FY 1971 NASA appropriations.

          While I won't argue the historical facts, all I want to point out is this:

          That was right around the time of the height of 'Nam. Our money was NEEDED elsewhere.

          • Re:Wasn't Nixon responsible? (Score:4, Insightful)

            by rodgerd ( 402 ) on Saturday December 14, 2002 @12:47AM (#4885510) Homepage
            What, to add a few more years to a war the US had already lost and was illegally expanding into Laos and Cambodia?

            Gee, that sure was a good use of money. Propping up the corrupt South Vietnamese government, thousands more Americans and tens of thousands more Asians dead, and the US backing the Khmer Rouge. Much better than some stupid space program.
              • Gee, that sure was a good use of money. Propping up the corrupt South Vietnamese government, thousands more Americans and tens of thousands more Asians dead, and the US backing the Khmer Rouge. Much better than some stupid space program.


              Ask somebody from South Vietname how they feel about communists. We where there for a damn good reason.
            • Well, Nixon wouldn't have had the opportunity if Socialist-boy Johnson hadn't of expanded the war, while implementing a ton of social services and welfare programs back home. Not that the latter are/were all bad, but you can't finance a war and a psuedo-socialist state at the same time.

              In other words, LBJ and Nixon both "had control" of the conflict for 5 years. Approx halfway throught that time period, Nixon began to pull back.

              Don't make it seem like Nixon was just some war monger that took a dying conflict and made it worse. He was handed a hornets nest. Not that Nixon was a perfect guy, but he was arguably better than LBJ.

              Details on the timing of things (and where I double check my facts) are here:
              http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/vietnam/time/timeline 2.html [pbs.org]

        • Re:Wasn't Nixon responsible? (Score:5, Interesting)

          by BCW2 ( 168187 ) on Saturday December 14, 2002 @02:36AM (#4885767) Journal
          Jack Schmitt is on of the good guys. I first met him in Washinton, DC in February 1980. I stopped off to see if anything could be done about the pitiful state of military pay, I had just left the Navy. Since Jack was a rookie Senator from New Mexico, (my home state at the time) and was on the Armed services comitee. I went to his office. Bottom line, no appointment, an honest 40 min. of face time. An 11.5 % pay raise in October, and he got a campaign worker for 82. We lost, which really sucks. Jack was not only the lone scientist to walk on the moon but the only civilian. Never in the military at all. I've seen him twice in the last 20 years and he is still a friendly and interesting man. One of the good guys for sure.

      • Re:Wasn't Nixon responsible? (Score:5, Insightful)

        by Shelled ( 81123 ) on Friday December 13, 2002 @11:54PM (#4885324)
        No, wasn't it Senator William Proxmire with his hugely influential Golden Fleece Awards? Proxmire made a name for himself exposing the government's waste of taxpayer's dollars. The sixties and early seventies were a time of major societal upheaval and strong anti-technological sentiments, sending men to the moon rather than feeding the poor appeared to many as frivolous. Instead they did neither. Some of the decisions weren't too bright. NASA should have claimed the moon really was made of cheese.
        • The sixties and early seventies were a time of major societal upheaval and strong anti-technological sentiments, sending men to the moon rather than feeding the poor appeared to many as frivolous.

          I'm just reading Atlas Shrugged for the first time, and it's amazing that this novel was written in 1957. It's like Rand planned the next 40 years of history.
          • Rand was a bitter old crank; what exactly did she put in the novel that came true? Did all those square-jawed libertarian architects run away and start their own little society?

        • Resulting in the term "Proxmired" being applied... (Score:5, Interesting)

          by devphil ( 51341 ) on Saturday December 14, 2002 @05:41AM (#4886232) Homepage


          ... to these kinds of short-sighted actions. He was going after NASA, trimming a 100K here and a 100K there, while other programs were blowing millions of dollars.

          It also didn't help that the space program didn't directly benefit dairy farmers. (Proxmire was a senator for Wisconsin, IIRC.) Anything not directly giving money to dairy subsidies got attacked or otherwise "investigated" by Proxmire.

    • Re:Wasted chances (Score:5, Informative)

      by Wyatt Earp ( 1029 ) on Saturday December 14, 2002 @01:29AM (#4885610)
      Walter Mondale always had it out for NASA.

      http://www.ad-astra.net/cgi-bin/BBS/SpacePolicy/ re ad/30103

      "The worse thing about Mondale is his unrelenting, unbending opposition to the exploration of space. This opposition was dramatized in the wonderful HBO series on the Apollo Program when Mondale pops up as a charector making political hay after the Apollo Fire. While he did not openly oppose the Apollo Program, it being a done deal by the time he entered the Senate, Mondale's views on human space flight were no secret, even then. After Apollo 11 he helped to lead fights against any and all efforts to expand human presence in space. The crippling of the human space program can in part be laid at his door."

      "'A Webb aid remembers him (Webb) asking Mondale, "In all due humility, Senator, what have we done wrong? Why are you so down on us?" Webb wanted to know why Mondale was upset and what he could do to rectify the situation. He and other visitors from NASA were standing in front of Mondale's desk. The Senator leaned back in his chair and instructed Webb, "I intend to ride this for every nickle's worth of political power I can get out of it. I don't give a hoot in hell about the space program or your future," a NASA official with Webb recalls Mondale saying.'"

      We can blame Vietnam and Nixon for cuts to NASA, but remeber that the Senate and House are both under the control of the Democratic Party, and Senate and House Approprations are controlled by some New-Deal and Great Society Democrats who see the Space Race as a Republican persuit, even though the Moon Race was pushed by JFK. Mercury and the unmanned programs were from the previous Republican Administration.

      Tax revenues were dropping in 70-71, Vietnam was expensive, but it was drawing men and money away from developing new systems for the big show, Europe. A Cobra replacement was killed in the AH-56 Cheyenne, the M-60 replacement MBT-70 was canned, and a follow-on to B-52 was killed again. Vietnam was a slight draw, but development of heavy-lift like Saturn was very important to USAF so you can't really point to the war for a failure of continued moon shots.

  • The Space Shuttle (Score:5, Insightful)

    by zabieru ( 622547 ) on Friday December 13, 2002 @11:26PM (#4885211)
    Well, the Space Shuttle is one of the main reasons. It can't go to the Moon, and NASA billed it as the ultimate wonder ship, the future of space travel. So, they can't really go back to capsules. Nothing as heavy and general-purpose as the Space Shuttle can make it to the moon in a reasonable amount of time without costing an arm and a leg. Maybe if we had something like a NERVA engine, but we don't.
    • Maybe the space shuttle isn't the ultimate vehicle, but I'm sure a billion-dollar a shot one-time use rocket isn't either. I'm pretty certain the spacecraft of the future will look a lot closer to the space shuttle than to the Saturn V

      • Re:The Space Shuttle (Score:5, Insightful)

        by Bicoid ( 631498 ) on Saturday December 14, 2002 @12:08AM (#4885375)
        The Space Shuttle is perfect for what we're doing now, which is establishing a reasonable presence in orbit via satellites and space stations. This presence will eventually allow us to make more reasonable attempts at the moon, mars, etc. Right now, though, what would a manned moonshot accomplish? What the other moonshots did? The Apollo series were less scientific than they were a competition with the USSR. We just strapped people to a giant bomb and sent them off, they picked up some rocks and came back. That's not a scientific mission. If we want to actually learn about the moon, we need to either send permanent probes there, or we need to establish semi-permanent research colonies capable of sustaining a reasonably large team of scientists and supporting personnel for extended periods of time. The sheer quantity of materials and resources needed for this sort of operation would far exceed the amount of materials we can safely get to escape velocity using the equipment we have. In other words, we need to either assemble such a craft/station THERE using unmanned robotic probes, or we need to build it in orbit and then fly it to the moon.

        In other words, the reason we haven't gone to the moon since 72 is because our interests have changed. Instead of trying to one-up feats of the Soviet Union (insert obligatory In Soviet Russia joke here) we're trying to establish a presence that will serve as a platform for further research.

        Honestly, though, I don't see a credible moon presence until we either come up with a more efficient launch vehicle or we engineer a skyhook of some sort. Until then, expect NASA to focus entirely on putting things into orbit, especially geosynchonous orbit.

        • Re:The Space Shuttle (Score:5, Insightful)

          by Jaysyn ( 203771 ) on Saturday December 14, 2002 @12:22AM (#4885426) Homepage Journal
          There won't be a long term space presence anywhere until we can figure out how to keep our bones from turning to glass from lack of gravity.

          Jaysyn

          • You're right... until someone invents a magic gravity generator like on Star Trek, nobody will ever figure out a way to realistically counter the effects of zero gravity.

            Think I'll go watch 1968's 2001, and then maybe some Babylon 5... ;-)

          • Uh? (Score:3, Informative)

            by renoX ( 11677 )
            The lack of gravity in the ISS is not a bug: it's a feature!
            You can "reproduce" gravity by spinning the spaceship: while it would be more confortable for humans, one of the goal of being up there is to lear what happen to people and material in 0G environement..

            Beside on the moon there is gravity, just 1/6 of Earth's gravity, so the effect on the bone/muscle should be much lower.

        • Have To Disagree: Shuttle Takes Us Nowhere (Score:5, Insightful)

          by reallocate ( 142797 ) on Saturday December 14, 2002 @09:38AM (#4886670)
          I have to disagree. The Space Shuttle is a politically compromised vehicle with no place to go. It has failed to live up to its promise of reliable, cheap and frequent access to orbit. The capability to build and sustain a permanent human presence in Earth orbit should have come in the context of creating infrastructure to support missions to explore and exploit the Moon, Mars and the rest of the Solar System. Lacking the vision and the courage to actually commit to going someplace , we have instead conjured up the ISS, an expensive dead-end that appears to be little more than a more polished version of Mir.

          While scientific research is a major and obvious component of space exploration, it is not and should not be the major motivation. Space exploration and exploitation should be driven by familiar human drives of wealth, power, greed, curiosity, freedom, etc., that have always sustained human expansion.

          The greatest contribution the scientific and engineering community could make to space exploration right now is the development of propulsion technology that provides at least an order of magnitude increase in lift and speed capability. We aren't going anywhere as long as we're dependent on wimpy chemical rockets.

      • Re:The Space Shuttle (Score:3, Interesting)

        by zabieru ( 622547 )
        Actually, the majority of both US and international launches are by totem-pole style rockets. And it's not just because the patriarchy loves phallic symbols. Every time the Shuttle goes up it has to lift who knows how many tons of shuttle and astronaut and life-support. If all you need to do is drop a (relatively light) satelliete into its orbit, it doesn't make sense to lift all that. Remember how much it costs to lift a pound into orbit... I don't have my books here, but I worked it out once, and if you had a source of gold on Earth, for free, and all you had to do was lift it to orbit to sell it, you would lose money on fuel and non-replaceble parts. The Shuttle, by the way, costs a huge amount more per pound lifted, than say and Ariane. Its true use is not payload lifts, but orbital repair/science work/passenger runs.
        • I don't have my books here, but I worked it out once, and if you had a source of gold on Earth, for free, and all you had to do was lift it to orbit to sell it, you would lose money on fuel and non-replaceble parts.

          Gold isn't like the speed of light, you know. Its value does actually change based on context.

          What if you had a source of gold on earth, and a bunch of belt miners in space? What if the asteroid belt turns out to contain mind-boggling amounts of nifty materials that are rare or nonexistent on earth? And what if gold-plated sprockets were a vital component in belt-mining operations?

          Might not your terrestrial gold be traded for enough Wheatonium (named after legendary space nerd Wil Wheaton, of course) to pay for your mining and lift costs, and buy you yet another house in the Bahamas (or what's left of them, or whatever)?

          Far-fetched? Maybe. But the value of gold is worth no more and no less than whatever value someone is willing to give you for it. If there's someone in space who's willing to make it worth your while, then the Golden Rocket could be the most profitable endeavor ever, instead of the loss-leader you confidently claim it would be.

    • It's certainly within reason to expect that a multi-use shuttle-like vehicle optimised for moon use could be developed if need be... but I think the reason why there's been no investment in such an effort is because there isn't a pressing need to go back to the moon to do anything.

    • Re:The Space Shuttle (Score:4, Interesting)

      by Rolo Tomasi ( 538414 ) on Saturday December 14, 2002 @12:48AM (#4885511) Homepage Journal
      I don't think there is any practical problem that would prevent another moon mission. A moon rocket could be sent up in parts and assembled in space, using the ISS as a base of operations. The problem is that there aren't any scientific breakthroughs to be expected from landing more people on the moon and having them jump around for a few days. A permanent moon base OTOH would IMHO be a worhtwhile project, because it would give us the experience we'd need to start a mars mission. Maybe they could also set up a telescope, while they're at it.

      The problem is, nobody would want to pay for such a project. Do you think a presidential candidate would win if he announced that he wanted to raise taxes for a huge space program?

      • Re:The Space Shuttle (Score:3, Insightful)

        by sql*kitten ( 1359 )
        I don't think there is any practical problem that would prevent another moon mission. A moon rocket could be sent up in parts and assembled in space, using the ISS as a base of operations. The problem is that there aren't any scientific breakthroughs to be expected from landing more people on the moon and having them jump around for a few days. A permanent moon base OTOH would IMHO be a worhtwhile project, because it would give us the experience we'd need to start a mars mission. Maybe they could also set up a telescope, while they're at it.

        Exactly. The only motivation for getting back into space is economic, since practially all the science that can be done can be done remotely. That means mineral extraction, manufacturing that can benefit from low gravity and plenty of vaccuum, and space tourism. It's high time that the governments and scientists got out of the way and let commercial interests take over space exploration.

    • Re:The Space Shuttle (Score:4, Interesting)

      by Wyatt Earp ( 1029 ) on Saturday December 14, 2002 @01:37AM (#4885622)
      I was just reading about Shuttle in the Nov '02 Air International.

      They approach STS from the angle of a hypersonic research vehicle, and in that reguard with over a hundred launches and recoveries, it's very succesful in gathering data.

      It goes from Mach 24 to 200 kts and from orbit to a gliding landing with no power, that's pretty neat.

      "What Shuttle has done for aerothermal design and verification is greater than the controbution it has made to the space program, which at best has been a disappointment to some and a digression for many. The legacy of countless simulated landings, more than 100 safe Shuttle touchdowns without a serious malfunction and countless data points across 21 years of Mach 25 atomospheric penetration, has provided an opportunity for safe and efficient aerospace transportation up to and including orbital velocity. That, and not its service as a cargo freighter, is the greatest gift to the future - one embedded in winged flight and not in weightless orbit." - Page 328 Air International Nov 2002

  • Civils on the Moon (Score:2, Interesting)

    by boa13 ( 548222 )
    If I remember correctly, the first and last man on the Moon were the only ones to be civilian. All the others were from the military.

    I find this interesting, but perhaps I'm wrong, so please correct me. :)

  • IN SOVIET RUSSIA (Score:5, Funny)

    by CmdrTypo ( 603848 ) <cmdrtypo@@@yahoo...com> on Friday December 13, 2002 @11:28PM (#4885217)
    we celebrate 40th anniversary of first dog in space [space.com].

  • Competition Breeds Innovation (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward on Friday December 13, 2002 @11:29PM (#4885223)
    The collapse of the Soviet Union marked the end of real NASA achievement. Even the great advancements of the late 90's were just carry-overs from the CCCP vs NASA era. Until China or the EU becomes a real "threat" in the era of space exploration, we won't see any more moon landings.
    • The USA definitely has the technology to shoot down any Chinese or EU attempt to do anything in space that we see as a threat to our national security.

      The only thing China or the EU could do is threaten us in the business world with new innovations... but they already do that earth-bound.

  • Makes Me Wonder (Score:5, Insightful)

    by dirkdidit ( 550955 ) on Friday December 13, 2002 @11:29PM (#4885224) Homepage
    It's been 30 years since we've been on the moon and we haven't made an attempt to go back. I'd figure that the moon would be an excellent training ground for future missions to mars and long duration space flight, but I guess that's just my opinion.

    • That's arguable... (Score:5, Interesting)

      by Goonie ( 8651 ) <robert.merkel@be ... g ['ra.' in gap]> on Friday December 13, 2002 @11:43PM (#4885285) Homepage
      At least Robert Zubrin, the guy behind the Mars Society, doesn't think so, and his arguments are reasonably persuasive to me (but then, as far as space exploration goes I'm purely an armchair amateur).

      Basically, his argument is that the conditions on the Moon are so different from those on Mars that you may as well train on Earth. The Moon, for instance, has no atmosphere at all, while Mars has a thin carbon dioxide one. The daytime temperature on the Moon is around 100 Celsius, whereas on Mars it's somewhere between -50 and +10. The geological history of Mars and the Moon are totally different. The way you'd experiment with resource extraction from the local environment are completely different. The trip to the moon takes a couple of days. Using conventional rockets, the trip to Mars will take six months. All in all, the Moon and Mars are so different you may as well do your training and dry runs on Earth. It's a heck of a lot cheaper to build a large airtight building, fill it with the equivalent of the Martian atmosphere, and try your equipment there than it is to try it on the Moon.

      About the only thing the Moon does offer you is the experience of partial gravity, but if you really want to simulate that it might still be cheaper to put a spinning spacecraft in orbit - and you could simulate actual Mars gravity that way instead of the Moon's.

      • The Moon and Mars (Score:5, Informative)

        by Cujo ( 19106 ) on Saturday December 14, 2002 @12:03AM (#4885352) Homepage Journal

        As I see it, it;s not really the Moon vs. Mars, but a question of where to first. I'm familiar with Zubrin's arguments, but I think he dismisses the Moon too readily.

        Mars is more romantic, but the moon has a lot to offer that we have only begun to appreciate.

        here is what the moon has that we know about:

        • Materials close to Earth. Good stuff liek silicon and aluminum and oxygen.
        • Hydrogen in the form of water. Maybe enough to serve as a serious chemical fuel source.
        • A good platform from which to do some types of Earth observation.
        • A great plaform for all types of astronomy
        • A shallow gravity well.
        • An easier trip, energetically speaking than any place else in the solar system.

        There are a lot of question marks about how to proceed, but I really don't think we'll answer those questions with paper studies - we have to go there and try a few things.

        When I say "we" I despair that this can not include NASA in their present form. Or should I despair? Perhaps it's for the best.

      • Re:That's arguable... (Score:3, Interesting)

        by Guppy06 ( 410832 )
        "Basically, his argument is that the conditions on the Moon are so different from those on Mars that you may as well train on Earth."

        On the other hand, conditions on the Moon are remarkably similar to conditions for the trip to/from Mars (surrounded by hard vacuum, radiation, et al... the only real difference is the gravity). And, considering the constant "No nukes in space!" protests, preparing for the trip to/from Mars is more important than staying on Mars because you'll be on the journey for twice as long.

        That, and it's likely the best choice for launching future interplanetary missions. Low surface gravity (a V-2 could reach escape velocity), a stable orbit (no need to constantly fine-tune it), handy local resources, the advantages of being able to build the craft in a gravity well (easier than microgravity)...

        "Using conventional rockets, the trip to Mars will take six months."

        I could be wrong, but I thought the latest numbers were 15 months. Each way.

        "but if you really want to simulate that it might still be cheaper to put a spinning spacecraft in orbit"

        If we had the resources to make a space station with "spin gravity" that's has a large enough diameter to keep the occupants from getting nauseatingly dizzy, we wouldn't be talking about the "last man on the moon."

      • Re:That's arguable... (Score:4, Insightful)

        by ZigMonty ( 524212 ) <slashdot.zigmonty@postinbox@com> on Saturday December 14, 2002 @12:50AM (#4885521)
        That argument is strange.

        The reason for going to the Moon first is not that it is a perfect replica of Mars but that it is much easier to get to. Look, we haven't sent people further than LEO in 30 years. By the time we are ready to do so again (probably after 2010), all the people who knew how to do it will have retired and probably died.

        So you want, as our generation's first attempt at leaving Earth orbit, to go to Mars? That's certainly... ambitious. Don't you think that it might be wise to test our technology on something a little closer to home? If we have another Apollo 13 where the crew have about 3 days of life support left, where would you prefer them to be? About 3 days away from Earth or 6 months away? I'm not trying to say that we should wait until it is absolutely safe but for fuck's sake, it is damn hard to simply send people to the Moon. The Apollo astronauts risked their lives and it is amazing that none died on the way.

        Robert Zubrin seems to claim that there is nothing to learn by going to the Moon that would help us when we go to Mars. That's BS, pure and simple. Hell, why not make our first mission a trip to Europa? It seems to have a higher prospect for life. Or what about Alpha Centuari? What could we possible learn by going to Mars that would help us get to the stars? The environments are totally different! </sarcasm>

        Baby steps people, please, or we'll end up killing someone.

    • No one's going back to the moon anytime soon. In fact, I'd rather certain people totally forget the moon landing ever happened. Those people would be the ones who say "We can put a man on the moon, but we can't make cars that don't explode, or computers that don't crash, or a spouse who takes the garbage out."

  • Of course (Score:5, Funny)

    by JanusFury ( 452699 ) <kevin.gadd@gmail.COBOLcom minus language> on Friday December 13, 2002 @11:30PM (#4885228) Homepage Journal
    This is only a big deal if the government has pulled the wool over your eyes and made you believe that the moon landing wasn't a bunch of barbie dolls dressed up in tinfoil, in front of a painted moon backdrop, with a guy from NASA making rocket noises into a microphone!

    Now to spread the message to the rest of the world before the black hel!@#!@$()@!*$()W*DAWDWAOIFHWAOIFJWEDOIKAW

    NO CARRIER

    • the really Big Lie (Score:4, Funny)

      by bcrowell ( 177657 ) on Saturday December 14, 2002 @12:11AM (#4885390) Homepage
      But what about the really Big Lie? When are you going to realize that the moon-landing hoax is just the tip of the iceberg?
      • Meanwhile, NASA is commemorating the Wright brothers' flight of December 17, 1903, getting ready for next year's Centennial of Flight."
      Ha! Do you really believe in this stuff? If you look at the photos of the Wright Brothers' flight, you can see that they've obviously been faked with Adobe Photoshop. The shadows point in the wrong direction, and there are numerous other inconsistencies.
      • So I take then, good Sir, that the computer you are using, a computer far more advanced (you think) than anything those fradulent men at NASA claim to have used to land on the "moon" (the existence of which is an open question), exists, and that you have no doubt that your computer works...

        I mean, really, we accept all the works ever published being stored on magnetic tape that fits into the palm of your hand and we can't see shooting rockets at the moon? Really big fucking rockets? Conspiracy theorists are barking up the wrong tree...

        (Note to tired moderators, I recognize that all above posts are humor, as is this one.)

        ~Chazzf
    • You got it wrong!

      Not only have the Americans bee nto the moon, but they also made us believe that the Apollo program was cancelled to make us feel it was worthless to go there. That way they can continue the construction of their military space station* on the dark side of the moon.

      *Why did you think NASA cuts budget for ISS? They don't want to spend too much money to help a toy project that may compete with their military space base but they couldn't refuse to participate, so they went in and tried to sabotage the project from inside, making it look like the incompetence that they have been faking since the 70's**. They even bribed the Russian space agency, now that they also are capitalist pigs, so that people wouldn't put all the blame on them.

      **Why do you think that so many Mars missions failed in the last few decades? It's because they wanted to get ultra secret gear there and if people believe that what they sent there was destroyed it won't be suspicious like if they had sent something without a cover story and every astronomer would have asked what it was.

      Note: It's supposed to be funny but it's 5.20 AM, I didn't sleep yet and I'm French, so if it isn't funny I got some excuses, so give me a break, okay?

  • It's obvious why we haven't been back (Score:5, Funny)

    by Cylix ( 55374 ) on Friday December 13, 2002 @11:31PM (#4885237) Homepage Journal
    The last mission was a treaty mission with the martians. I know, I know, martians on the moon? Really it was the best neutral ground to perform negotiations. We simply gave up a few insignificant earthly possessions. This included but not limited to: cow and other livestock mutilations, rights to human extraction and experimentation, and artistic grants with respect to indentures in agricultural area's. With the latter in mind we had no idea it would get so out of hand.... something about an open sourced method they spoke about.

    In return for all of these great gifts the aliens gave us excellent insight into the mysterious and powerful microprocessor. While it has taken all of this time just to fully understand and develop from those early examples.

    However, it seems to be time to renew the contracts being as the aliens added the Moores Law clause. Damned tricky devils.

    Don't worry though, with our next encounter, we are a great deal more advanced now with regards to patent and contract law.

    The scorn of the universe really is the lawyer!

  • Last? I hope not! (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Xtifr ( 1323 ) on Friday December 13, 2002 @11:33PM (#4885242) Homepage
    I'd like to think that the "last man on the moon" is an event that won't happen for a few more tens of thousands of years. 30th anniv. of the most recent trip to the moon, I'd accept.

  • Not much to show = no hoopla ! (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Raiford ( 599622 ) on Friday December 13, 2002 @11:33PM (#4885243) Journal
    There is a reason for no hoopla. If you have been stuck in earth orbit for the last 30 years after visiting the nearest celestial body what do you have to brag about ? This has been one of the greatest technological losses or our time. And yes this technology has perished. Engineering is as much an art as it is a science and all of the engineers that were responsible for putting men on the moon have long since retired or died. There was no continuing mentorship of a next generation of engineers. The US Air Force does something that NASA doesn't. The military will go through the entire design to build process of a prototype fighter every 20 years wheather one is needed or not simply to avoid losing the knowledge of how to do it. The process of passing the experience on to a new generation is of more value than the product itself.

  • There's a good book called Moonseed by Stephen Baxter that involves the last moon landing. It's very interesting and the basic gist (to get you interested) is that Venus explodes in recent times and strange events start happenning on Earth.

  • It is a shame but... (Score:5, Insightful)

    by SmoothOperator ( 300942 ) on Friday December 13, 2002 @11:35PM (#4885248) Homepage
    I don't see how we (as citizens of all nations) will go to the moon again. Right now, the focus of the world is on war. Nobody wants to bring up expensive projects up: just look at the ISS, and how people are saying that it is a monstrous waste of money, for America, Russia, and everyone else who is involved. Going to the moon will not bring anything to America. As the saying goes, "been there, done that". It is no longer about a "race" with the Russians, there is nothing to prove.

    The only people who might want to prove something, are nations like Japan, China, India and perhaps the ESA. They haven't been to the moon, and they want to prove to the world that they are at a sufficiently advanced technological level that they can do it. Plus they have the bright minds to think of a brilliant and probably cost effective plan.

    As for America, I think that our generation (children of the boomers) is lost. We emerged from the greed-filled, "me-only" days of the late 20th century, but our attitudes have not changed. We still like our SUVs, our fast food, but at the same time we like to have our government "lean and cost-efficient". Perhaps our children will awake with a new sense of wonder and will realize the dream of returning to the moon, and perhaps of going beyond to Mars, etc.
    • So long as children watch television shows with characters that proclaim 'ME WANT COOKIE', I very much doubt anything will change.

    • Re:It is a shame but... (Score:3, Insightful)

      by Orne ( 144925 )
      They're saying it's a monstrous waste of money because it is a monstrous waste of money. It's been covered on Slashdot before, the ISS as it exists now (and its immediate future) does not support the kind of research that needs to be done to facilitate the further exploration of our solar system.

      Of course, I would differ with you... I argue that the baby-boomer generation is the "lost" one (who is it with the mid-life crisis buying those SUVs), and it is up to us to dream our way out of this nanny-state security blanket that they put us in, and get back to taking some risks & facing the future. It's not going to happen by giving up & pushing it off for another 30 years...

    • "the human adventure is only beginning..."

      I think space will always be able to inspire humanity, on different levels as our understanding of the universe has evolved along with our technology. Powerful political and economic incentives that favor the grossly inefficient military spending worldwide are powerful to be sure (and it's not just in wealthy industrialized nations that military spending siphons off resources from other potential uses.)

      Cornell economist Robert Frank [cornell.edu] draws an excellent analogy between military buildup and the prisoner's dilemma: it's better to for both countries to have low levels of armament than for both countries to have high levels of armament, but both countries would also prefer to be highly armed while their neighbor weakly armed. The outcome ends up in the worst possible situation, with resources being wasted by all parties --- both countries would be better off with a binding, enforcable arms treaty.

      The key point is that we always face a choice between guns & butter (or guns & space stations, or guns and health care, etc.) If space exploration is going to inspire a new generation, it needs to be more than an extension of the arms race between countries.

      annmariabell.com [annmariabell.com]

  • Well, what's the point? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Tuxinatorium ( 463682 ) on Friday December 13, 2002 @11:37PM (#4885257) Homepage
    Do we really need any more manned missions to the moon? What research can we do with live people that we can't do with cheaper, lighter remote probes? The only real purpose of sending men to the moon was an ego boost for the US during the cold war. Further manned missions to the moon would be an expensive and completely unnecessary venture, unless we finally get around to colonizing the moon. But then, what would be the point of that? Just for fun? Maybe build a huge observatory there that won't be obstructed by an atmosphere?

    • Re:Well, what's the point? (Score:5, Funny)

      by Zork the Almighty ( 599344 ) on Saturday December 14, 2002 @12:16AM (#4885406) Journal
      Maybe we could colonize the moon with a bunch of geeks. Let them build a civilization and develop technology and so on. Below are a sample of reasons why this would be worthwhile.

      1) As a backup society in case someone "presses the button" and destroys all life on Earth.
      2) If the earthlings kept it all a perfect secret, possibly by committing hari-kari, after a few generations we could re-enact H.G. Wells' "War of the Worlds" and scare the shit out of everybody. That would put Orson Wells infamous reading of it to shame.
      3) Future geek race would be the closest thing to an alien civilization we can make, it's a good substitute since we can't seem to find the real aliens. (they all got shot entering Texas?)
      4) Dumping ground for Slashdot trolls.

      So how do we convince them to go ? Many geeks lack any sort of attachment to society, so they may want to go. Or we could just tell them that the whole "man in the moon" thing was a mistake, it's actually a "woman in the moon" and she's aweful lonely. I don't know if anyone will buy that last one, but it's worth a shot.

  • 2003 should see at least a robotic return (Score:5, Informative)

    by apsmith ( 17989 ) on Friday December 13, 2002 @11:46PM (#4885293) Homepage
    Surprisingly, since Apollo 17 left 30 years ago there were not only no further manned missions, but also almost no further robotic missions. The Moon became a "been there done that" world, when in fact there are still a huge number of mysteries about it.

    Apollo could only scratch the surface: they had to be very careful about safe landing spots which favored the relatively rare Mare regions, they couldn't dig more than a couple of meters into the surface, they didn't go anywhere near the poles or the far side, which have quite different terrain and likely mineral deposits, etc. Despite some evidence of volcanic activity only Apollo 14 landed in one of the regions of volcanic interest, and the crew there were the least geologically educated of the lot so the samples taken were not terribly useful. etc. etc.

    We have more high-resolution pictures of Mars than we do of the Moon - the only really high-res shots (1 meter or better) were from the Apollo command modules as they circled, and those cover just narrow strips of the Moon's surface.

    Missions since Apollo amounted to a handful of Russian Luna missions through 1974, then a long gap, a Japanese experimental flight (HITEN) in the 1980's, and Clementine and Lunar Prospector in the 1990's. Clementine was run by the Dept. of Defense, not NASA, and Lunar Prospector was Alan Binder's baby at Lockheed Martin, done on the cheap for $60 million. That's basically the total NASA spending on the Moon since Apollo - less than 2% of the cost of the Mars missions that have failed!

    NASA's negelect of the Moon seems to be continuing, but scheduled for next year we have at least 1 government (ESA's SMART-1 [esa.int]) and 1 private (TransOrbital's TrailBlazer [transorbital.net]
    ) mission on track. The Japanese space agency also plans a Lunar-A mission that may launch next year. So things are starting to look up!

    And for those interested in a exploration and development of the Moon, why not join the Moon Society [moonsociety.org]!
  • I feel that NASA's relationship with the moon is like a little boy who gets a great toy for christmas, plays with it for a few months then throws it in the toy box with all his other wonderfull toys of years past. This is over simplification but hey im lazy.
    Remember people space still is a race, just not as hotly contested as before.

    • More like a kid that plays with the great toy, has great fun, and then has the toy snatched away, and forced to play with cheaper toys.

      So it's not really NASA's fault; it's really the government that slashed funding. But NASA has signed up for a mephistopholean pact for funding, that isn't doing it any good at all.

      For example, Challenger blew up because they built the SRBs in sections, but they would have been cheaper and more reliable built in one piece if supplied from a particular state; but they weren't because then they would have lost funding from one of the other states...

  • i was on the moon once (Score:4, Funny)

    by JeanBaptiste ( 537955 ) on Friday December 13, 2002 @11:58PM (#4885335)
    that was some good LSD.

  • If we can afford war, we can afford space (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Sean Clifford ( 322444 ) on Saturday December 14, 2002 @12:01AM (#4885348) Journal
    This really burns me up. The American government can spend upwards of $200 BILLION dollars to murder hundreds of thousands of civilians, install a government to do its bidding, and pillage the country for its natural resources.

    But we can't spend that same $200 BILLION to open up space. You want to distract folks from the shitty assed economy? Spend that money on a space program. "We'll colonise the Moon!"

    Pumping that much green into a space program and supporting programs (like EDUCATION) can fuel a renaissance in science and buck up the economy, realise orbital microwave power stations, and will spawn countless spin-off technologies.

    Isn't that something to get patriotic about? Something to unify the country about? Something that will make our neighbors look upon us as friends rather than some dillhole bully that's going to whack them and steal their stuff?

    • Re:If we can afford war, we can afford space (Score:5, Insightful)

      by EchoMirage ( 29419 ) on Saturday December 14, 2002 @12:49AM (#4885515)
      The American government can spend upwards of $200 BILLION dollars to murder hundreds of thousands of civilians, install a government to do its bidding, and pillage the country for its natural resources. But we can't spend that same $200 BILLION to open up space.

      This is a false dichotomy often used against a government's involvement in war. Unfortunately government spending is not an either-or proposition - if we decided not to go to war with Iraq, it doesn't automatically mean that we have $200 billion to spend on education or the space race.

      The U.S. government, for instance, allocates a certain amount of yearly resources to defense spending, regardless of the current political climate. During war or wannabe-war years, that spending increases, and is often deficit spending to address a perceived need. The government usually isn't willing to deficit spend on education or technology, unless absolutely necessary.

      Furthermore, you neglected to mention that the United States citizens themselves, not our elected officials, usually vote down spending for social issues (regardless of party affiliation, I might add). So even if it were an either-or dichotomy, we'd still have ourselves to blame.
    • First off, I'd love to see your evidence that the U.S. has "murder[ed] hundreds of thousands of civilians" and "pillage[d] the country for its natural resources". I'm assuming you're talking about Afghanistan, since it's current. Exactly what "resources" are we pillaging? There's not much there to take, except perhaps some oil, but there's no way to extract it as the country is in ruins -- ruins of self-inflicted wars since the Soviet's left two decades ago.

      Plus, I want to know where you got the "hundreds of thousands" figures. Man, we must've dropped some really neat bombs to kill that many people! We didn't drop anywhere near enough munitions to kill that many people unless they were all just clustered somewhere in the middle of the desert. Of course, you have proof of this, right? Who am I kidding, this is Slashdot, the land of making grandiose, unsupportable, unsubstantiated claims.

      Now, next I shall enlighten you a bit on how government budgets work. You simply can't take the entire defense spending of a nation and spend it elsewhere without some pretty severe effects. For example, you would immediately create a few million unemployed military people. And then all the industries that depend on military spending, from Boeing on down to the dry cleaners on military bases, would rapidly go out of business and lay off even more millions. Then their suppliers would tank, and so on and so forth. Anyone with the slightest understanding of economics would know that what you propose is folly of the highest possible order. And, let's not forget, with no military we would be defenseless, as well as having no further say-so at all in world events. Do you want folks like Saddam running the show? Didn't think so.
  • We haven't been back and that's just fine because we have problems at home to fix.

    On the other hand, I don't believe that's entirely right thinking. It might do us good to expand on other fronts a little and do some multitasking.
  • There is no forseeable need to go back to the moon in the immediate future.

    The point of the original "space race" was a competition between the USA and Russia for "control of space". In that, to say, in a war between the superpower the moon would have been a dangerous site if one side were able to place milliles on it. For that reason, it was essential we demonstrate our ability to reach the moon whenever we want to. Now, if anybody attempts to "take over" the moon, we are confident we have the ability to send up people to shut down that operation if need be.

    In its modern form, the reason why the US Government funds NASA is because in solving the problems faced by space missions, solutions are developed that have practical earth-bound operations. NASA's doesn't just do research for research's sake, they're doing research to hopefully discover things that improve the American way of life. Experiments that require microgravity can be done in earth orbit, why do we need to go back to the moon?

    While going to the moon is a cool idea, the idea turning the moon into a Disney-like tourist trap for the common man is something many earthlings find repulsive. Let's leave the moon alone and not mess with it when we don't need to.
    • You clearly don't know what you are talking about.

      Try searching google.com for Interferometer and come back when you are ready.

      Discovering other planets is very important, as it helps us understand if our solar system is familiar. We don't even know all we can about our moon, so how are we supposed to tell what is OUT THERE?

  • much cooler (Score:5, Interesting)

    by g4dget ( 579145 ) on Saturday December 14, 2002 @12:06AM (#4885367)
    Rather than spending a huge amount of money on getting a few people up there, I think remotely controlled mobile robots would be much cooler. The moon is close enough that we could have a fleet of mobile robots up there, equipped with manipulators and high resolution stereoscopic cameras, and a direct radio link to earth. You could probably make that cheap enough that for a few thousand dollars, anyone could rent one for half an hour and be "almost there".

    That's probably also how we should explore Mars: keep a control crew in orbit and only land mobile robots, controlled via telepresence from orbit.

  • Did anyone else see NACA above? (Score:5, Interesting)

    by twitter ( 104583 ) on Saturday December 14, 2002 @12:09AM (#4885378) Homepage Journal
    -ISS shutdown in progress.
    -Shuttle ages, replacement is where?
    -budget goes to zero as perpetual war "against terrorism" kicks off and nation becomes more "secure"
    -Centinial of flight!

    Welcome back National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics! The future is much where you left it.

  • Last man on the moon? (Score:3, Funny)

    by yobbo ( 324595 ) on Saturday December 14, 2002 @12:10AM (#4885386)
    "...that's no moon"

  • Why return? Science, energy, tourism... (Score:3, Interesting)

    by apsmith ( 17989 ) on Saturday December 14, 2002 @12:20AM (#4885421) Homepage
    There are a lot of scientific reasons to go back to the Moon - first a lot of questions about the Moon itself, and the early history of the solar system that can be learned from lunar cratering. Of most interest in this is the South Pole - Aitken basin, which is mostly on the far side; the south polar regions of this very deep basin have craters that may hold water ice and other cometary debris. But the basin material is itself of some geological interest, and a sample-return mission to this area was listed as one of the highest priorities in planetary science in the recent NRC decadal survey [planetary.org].

    Second, for science, is the potential of the Moon as a platform for observation of the rest of the universe. A lunar telescope has the same lack-of-atmosphere advantages of Hubble, but could be constructed much larger than is possible for a free-space telescope (with current technology) with use of in-situ materials. This is particularly important for infrared and ultraviolet/x-ray astronomy, for which much of the spectrum is almost completely attenuated in the Earth's atmosphere and space is the only real option. It makes a lot of sense to base the next generation of space telescopes on the Moon, though I have not seen much movement in this direction, other than some early-stage proposals.

    Space solar power is considered by many [sciencemag.org] to be the only long-term solution to Earth's energy needs that meets both global energy and environmental requirements over the next 50 years. Making use of lunar materials, possibly even generating the power on the Moon [aip.org], is the only realistic option for building these things on the scale needed. If this globe could ever manage to get its act together and move beyond carbon-based fuels to invest in the future [kuro5hin.org], the Moon has a major role to play.

    Finally, space tourism has been in the news, and private companies are starting to look at orbiting hotels [bigelowaerospace.com] and lunar excursions - for those who can pay of course. With the right price, demand can be expected to be huge :-) Retirement to the Moon's low gravity might become a major draw as well.

    So the Moon has a bright future - if we could just pay it a bit of attention with all the other distractions the world has to offer these days!

  • We need to go back! (Score:5, Interesting)

    by elliotj ( 519297 ) <slashdot AT elliotjohnson DOT com> on Saturday December 14, 2002 @12:24AM (#4885435) Homepage
    I've said it before here, and I'll say it again now: I think it's a disgrace that we've not been back to the Moon in 30 years.

    I find it really annoying to read about these chicken-shit science experiments they conduct on the Shuttle or ISS about things like plant reproduction in zero gravity. Whoop-dee-do. If we had made a concerted effort to build and maintain a moon base over the past 30 years, I bet we'd have learned way more than we have so far.

    The moon is there. It's an island in the sky. It's a natural satellite of our planet. It's begging to be populated.

    I will be very excited the day I see another man step foot on the moon. I hope I live that long.

  • Moon-Whiz (Score:3, Funny)

    by coloth ( 630330 ) on Saturday December 14, 2002 @12:32AM (#4885456)
    It is clear to me that moon exploration was abandoned not for political or scientific reasons, but because the critical resource sought--cheese--was found only in very small and unfonduable nuggets.

    The 1953 development of Cheez-Whiz sparked an explosion in industrial demand for malleable cheese. Due to the perceived economic cheesemine in orbit, the space program was accelerated, principally by the ironically un-cheesy JFK.

    By 1973, malleable cheese was reaching its zenith. Fondue pots outsold crockpots for the first--and last--time in US history.

    Unfortunately, even with a trained geologist aboard and a specially-designed slightly cheesy vehicle at their disposal, the Apollo 17 mission was unable to find any sufficiently malleable cheese to justify future missions.

    In a moderately successful effort to recoup their immense investment in cheese research, NASA leaked a derivative food-preparation technology to the market, leading to that year's introduction of the Cuisinart.

    Subsequent experiments in using the Cuisinart to process traditional cheese have proven relatively disappointing.

  • In the immortal words of George Mallory: "because it's there"

    Well, what would be the answer to the question "why do you want to climb a mountain again"? Because it's still there?

    The simple fact is that the Moon isn't all that interesting a place. We can do all the science we need with satellites and robotic probes. The idea of a 'moonbase' is preposterous if you think about it a bit. Why spend the enormous amounts of energy to escape the Earth's gravity well only to drop your payload into another one? Earth orbit is a much better place for a 'base' to stage missions to other parts of the solar system.

    Which really only leaves one reason to go to the moon: to prove that you can. Well, we did that already.

    Now Mars, thats a different story. There is good science to do there that we can't realistically do with today's robotic probes. While implausible, the idea of a permanent human settlement is at least a lot more likely than one on the Moon. And perhaps the best reason to go to Mars: because we've never been.

    Trouble is, we probably don't quite have the technology yet. But now would be a damn good time to start developing it.
    • so there's no materials there to build things out of (like radiation shielding, for which the more mass, the better, basically...)

      The reason for dropping in on the Moon is because the Moon has an enormous mass of material that is in a much shallower gravity well than Earth's (and twice as shallow as Mars' as well). The only reason for using lunar resources is to provide the materials needed for long-term habitation of deep space. That means mining, and industrial activity, on the Moon. It'll happen, count on it!

      And join the Moon Society [moonsociety.org] if you want to be a part of it :-)
      • The problem with radiation shielding isn't so much the mass, but the thickness.
        Hydrogen makes an excellent radiation shield, that is why research is being done into the shielding properties of polyethyelene. More mass, means more nuclei to bombard, and more danger to the astronauts.

        You need thick, low mass material to work as a shield.
  • NASA has the mission summary [nasa.gov] here.

    I noticed this anniversary was comming up because I just wrote a report about human based exploration. From what I found on the web, it seems radiation is what is stopping us from going to Mars. Near Earth we are protected by a magnetic feild, however the Moon, and Mars don't produce this field, so we need to take shielding with us. [A new movie is based on the molten metal core of Earth; I noticed it in the theater today before ST X] Polyethyelene is a very good radiation shield, because it has so much Hydrogen in it.
    I expect the next missions to the moon to be robotic. However we will go back and set up a lab there. It makes much more sense, than shooting for a 2 year mission to Mars with untested technology and ground crews.

  • Technological aberration (Score:5, Insightful)

    by cybercuzco ( 100904 ) on Saturday December 14, 2002 @12:41AM (#4885487) Homepage Journal
    The landings on the moon was a technological aberration that only occured at great expense in money, manpower and time. For example, if Queen victoria had thrown enough resources at Charles Babbage, they might have created a computer as powerful as the first electric computer. this would have been a technological achievement at the time as landing a man on the moon. Even if babbage and whatever people were on his team had succeeded, the technological underpinnings for a practical computer were not in place yet. Eniac may have been built in the 30s or late 20's instead due to the leaps from the project, but it wouldnt have started the revolution itself. The same can be said for the apollo program. Many technologies were advanced due to the program, fuel cells, computers, powder based drink mixes, but the ability to travel to other planets wasnt one of them. Also keep in mind that these things take time. The Americas werent colonized in 1493, or 1494 or 1524. The first real colonies came in the late 1500's and colonization began in earnest in the early 1600s, over 100 years after it was proven that america could be accessed reliably from europe by sea. Space is at least as hostile an environment to us now as the sea was to sailors in the 15th century. We will get into space, but i t will take time, and we will go there for the same reason europeans came to america: to get rich. Just as soon as they figure out how.
  • The reason we can't go back to the moon is simple. Our technology has advanced so much that the very equipment that was used to fake the moon landing is now so outdated that it would look absurd! If they tried it using new technologies, people would easily see the difference.

    It's like the Star Wars remakes. Technology has advanced so much that watching the two side-by-side the new ones, though cooler looking are still more unbelievable.

    Flame bait? Sure, but with on ounce of truth included.
    • The first Arab Oil Embargo subsequent to the Yom Kippur War.
    • Zero Population Growth became a religion among the population most likely to pioneer space and most likely to stop breeding if bound to Earth.
    • Birth control went big time.
    • The largest influx of nubile females in the history of the west spawned the Summer of Love and Sexual Revolution.
    • These soured into Disco and Women's Lib.
    • The US lost its first war.
    • Immigration laws were liberalized to a degree that seemed to demand the existing population move on to space (or somewhere).
    • Young boomer males who dreamed of developing space as youth started getting infected by a deadly virus while squealing like sows -- not in the rural hills of "Deliverance" as they had been warned -- but in the urban bathhouses as they had not been so warned.
    • We were very very worried by about former Nazis like Werner Von Braun leaving their hiding places in South American running the world with clones and hidden diamonds by exploiting dissatisfaction with poor economic conditions.
    • Stagflation defied economist theories.
    • Real estate prices inflated far faster than the wages of entry-level jobs for young couples.
    • Interest rates were set to skyrocket to 19% fixed rate for mortgages.
    • Divorce rates skyrocketed. ... and the last man on the moon stepped off.

  • Geologist on moon (Score:5, Funny)

    by Eric Smith ( 4379 ) on Saturday December 14, 2002 @01:40AM (#4885630) Homepage Journal
    What the heck good is it to put a geologist on the moon? Geology is "the scientific study of the origin, history, and structure of the earth".

    :-)

    • and the American Geophysical Union! Eugene Schumaker, comet finder extraordinaire and major player in the Apollo missions, spent his life with USGS.

      Journal of Geophysical Research-Planets is a major journal on the study of the composition and geological history of the Moon and planets in our solar system.

      So geology hasn't been restricted to study of the earth for quite a long time now :-)
  • Everybody knows it was a Hollywood soundstage! Nobody ever actually went to the moon....

    -psy
  • This entire 'landing on the moon' thing was all just a conspiracy. Proof:

    Moontruth [moontruth.com]
    Moon Landing Hoax [a1.nu]
    Moon Landings Faked [geocities.com]

    ...and probably the most important single piece of evidence, this clearly genuine movie of the moon landing [moontruth.com].

  • About risks (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Ektanoor ( 9949 ) on Saturday December 14, 2002 @08:29AM (#4886516) Journal
    Well, this idea is based on a dream I had recently. In one point we cannot trust dreams, but, sometimes it is a wonder that our brain is sometimes can be more rational in dreams than when we think about something.

    The dream is clearly a mixture of things that have happened recently. The fall of a few big meteorites, specially one that many people already remind as a second Tungusca event. The tragedy of Carmoddon Valley, Caucasus, where a glacier broke up and wiped out things and people in hours, to the extent that nearly nothing remains of them. This all added to tons of other things.

    The dream came up with news channels speaking about people viewing a huge object falling down, somewhere in Europe. Then TV starts to talk about some region in Germany where communications completely went off. Some hours after that, I and some other people were picked out and sent urgently to that place. It was a vision of Hell. A mix of fires, smoke, muddy hot water running through the streets of some medieval city. The locals seemed like being burned by radiation. I and one colleague go up a hill. There in the middle of broken pine trees and remains of a tourist center we look at the horizon. A huge flat hill lays over the sunset. A large piece of dark land, where, in certain spots one could see flames bursting up and smoke raising. My colleague says: "well we have been retreating from Space all this time, we left everything we could just because it was too risky to send people there. Now we see the price of saving us from that risk... How many people died now? How can you compare that for the small group of people that could have died for the sake of saving us from this shit?"

    Sincerly, in the morning, this thing made me think seriously about one fact: are we so sure that the risks we see, by sending people to outer Space, are justifiable enough? Aren't we risking the fact that something may take us by suprise and make a major tragedy? Well, we know about the dinossaurs and Tungusca. They look far in time and remote in place. But what about an event that happened in Central Asia in the late XVIII Century? There, a meteorite fell down near populated regions and cooked a whole piece of land. In the late 40's of the XXth Century another meteorite fell just a few kilometers from Shikote village, creating several craters of a few meters diameter. I wonder when lottery will come up into a city like Paris, New-York or Moscow (btw, according to certain analysis, Moscow partially lays inside a very ancient crater). We all see the risks of sending people and equipment to Space. But how far we are saving people and equipment and restricting the development of our knowledge about Space?

  • It's time to fess up... (Score:3, Funny)

    by Kanasta ( 70274 ) on Saturday December 14, 2002 @08:42AM (#4886548)
    we blew the moon up 30yrs ago accidentally. what's up there now is just a large plastic model we put there so nobody would find out.

  • Night launch of a Saturn V (Score:5, Interesting)

    by alispguru ( 72689 ) <bob@bane.me@com> on Saturday December 14, 2002 @09:44AM (#4886686) Journal
    I was there for the launch of Apollo 17. Four of us piled into a Pinto (I remember that vividly - I was the smallest of the group, and had to sit in the middle of the back seat!) and drove down from upstate South Carolina to see it go up.

    Apollo 17 was the first (and I believe only) night launch of a Saturn V - it went up just after midnight Florida time. There have been many Shuttle night launches, but that's not the same - the Shuttle has roughly the same thrust as the first stage of a Saturn V, but weighs much less, so by comparison it jumps off the pad.

    When Apollo 17 fired up, it was like an instant sunrise, and it stayed that way while the rocket slowly clambered up the tower. It must have confused wildlife for fifty miles around.

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