Moon Landing It Happened
Sometimes , conspiracy theorists can be very convincing with their negative arguments. The case expounded against the authenticity of the Apollo 11 moon landing and those that followed is thought provoking. However, look for the reasons to accept that it happened and the positives far outweigh those beliefs of the doubting Thomases.
Apollo 11 was the culmination of three years of flight testing which along the way incorporated all aspects of the history making moon landing. The intense preparation involving hundreds of people began in tragic circumstances. Three senior military officers died when a fire broke out in their sealed capsule during a launch pad test. As tragic as it was , every mission which followed carried a greater risk than the fatal Apollo 1. Yet the quest for space continued with the primary objective being the moon. Out of respect for those killed , there were no designated Apollo 2 or Apollo 3 missions.
When Apollo 4 , the first unmanned Saturn V flight left the ground the estimated cost of the program was in excess of $US23bn. In light of the meticulous preparation by NASA to ensure minimal risk to the landing crew, the price tag could conceivably be justified. To suggest that the United States would waste so much money to stage a show for the Russians is preposterous. One would say quite an expensive fireworks display for those who watched the launches from ground zero at Cape Kennedy. Where do the skeptics think those craft went?
One thing is for sure, if the whole thing had been staged at Universal Studios or in the Mojave Desert the world’s astronomers and radio operators both amateur and professional would have been right on to it.
Hundreds of US pilots undergo rigorous training for years to realize a dream of being handpicked for a NASA space flight. Some are scientists in their own right. It borders on insulting to think that they would be party to such a demeaning scam. Even less plausible is the thought that forty years later not one of them would have spoken up if there was anything non genuine about the Apollo program.
As for the computer technology in 1969, lets not forget that UNIVAC1, the first commercial computer to attract public attention in the US was delivered to the Census Bureau in 1952. By 1966 Hewlett- Packard had entered the general purpose computer market with the HP2115 offering computational power previously found only in large computers. By 1972 the microprocessor had made its debut. Considering all this it seems reasonable to believe that technology available for military and scientific applications would have been sufficiently advanced to enable a rocket to find its way to the moon.
The actual Moon Walk was watched by audiences world wide. Children sat in classrooms, work stopped in the factories.and on the street , people peered through shop windows to get a glimpse of shadowy images on black and white screens. Armstrong and Aldrin took those first steps and skipped across the lunar surface. It was one of the great achievements in the history of humankind and is etched in my memory as though it happened yesterday.
