Exactly 48 Years Ago History Was Launched

July 16th, 1969 arguably the most important and ambitious human endeavor in history was launched. Apollo 11 took off from Kennedy Space center at 6:32 AM GMT, carrying the first humans that would step foot on the moon.




Just 4 days later, Neil Armstrong would take his small step in front of a world wide audience.



I wasn't alive then, but I'm sure this is one of those events people live through that they will never forget where they were when they watched it happen. I hope in my lifetime I will get to see the first human step on Mars.

Yea I know, this will probably turn into a "moon landing was a hoax" thread. That's OK this is a conspiracy site and that Saturn V rocket did take off with enough fuel to get to the Moon...

Not to rain on your parade but really, significant?
In what way?

What came out of landing on the moon, a warm fuzzy feeling, jokes,about expensive pens?
I believe orbiting satellites was far more important

Maybe 50 years later it has become ho hum, maybe I don't get it

originally posted by: Raggedyman
Not to rain on your parade but really, significant?
In what way?

You don't think a human walking on a surface other than the Earth is significant accomplishment? To me hopefully it means the beginning of the human race venturing into the cosmos. Pretty big deal.

a reply to: Raggedyman

NASA Nazi's Are Still Alive- yes come ww3 we will find out just what they do have up there

I saw Saturn 5 engines at the Air and Space Museum DC. They are magnificent!

I also saw the Lunar Eagle module (or its identical copy). Where are the fuel tanks containing the necessary amount of fuel to lift off from the Moon? The moon's gravity is about about 16.6% that on Earth's surface. How is possible the lunar module, without 16.6% capacity of Saturn 5 gigantic engines, to lift off successfully? I know there are explanations, but they are hillarious. Why don't those explanations work for space launches here on the earth then?

I do not deny the lunar landing. Only, we were not told the entire truth. That is, antigravity engines were used then. They were engineered in secret labs and continue to be produced for secret projects, that are seen as UFO, such as the leaked Aurora triangle.

a reply to: Raggedyman

The volume of effort and support from everyone involved and the science, technology, mathematics, etc that you can trace back to the wheel is what the achievement of sending a human to the moon means.
Technology is a one path mindset, it either falls behind and gets replaced, or it maintains a steady set course forward. It never goes backwards. It can stay stagnant, or 'lost' but never backwards.
That rocket you see, is the masterpiece of human technology in terms of transportation and exploration. As old and as dated as it is. It got us there, and back. Nothing has done something since.

a reply to: FauxMulder

I saw it on TV, and my uncle worked at Cape Canaveral as a computer programmer. He led the team that successfully executed the first fully automated launch of the Saturn V rocket, which was the rocket that powered the liftoff of the Apollo crafts, including 11.

He worked at NASA during the Mercury, Gemini and Apollo missions and retired during the early days of Skylab. He died in the mid-90's. There are so many questions I would ask him if I could!

a reply to: FauxMulder

I was home with the measles and watched it on tv.

originally posted by: FauxMulder
You don't think a human walking on a surface other than the Earth is significant accomplishment? To me hopefully it means the beginning of the human race venturing into the cosmos. Pretty big deal.

When I was a kid, I was pretty nicely brainwashed by all the propaganda of the manned space program. But now I look at the Moon landing as a kind of outrageous stunt, like the end of the era of barnstormers and "world record breaking" airplane flights. Charles Lindbergh stuff.

But as I've said before, leave it to science to get us all excited about some fascinating technological adventure, only to throw cold water on it with actual facts derived from further scientific study. And the actual facts of the matter is that space is really, really, unfathomably huge and dangerous and deadly to human beings, we are incredibly tiny and weak, our technology is improving rapidly but still shockingly crude, and we'll likely be dead as a species long before we develop a technology that will get us from Earth to another habitable planet that won't take thousands of years.

So, yeah, it was cool. Nearly impossible. But nothing that is going to change what happens to essentially all of us here on Earth.

So, yeah, it was cool. Nearly impossible. But nothing that is going to change what happens to essentially all of us here on Earth.

That's the thing. It has, whether you like it or not. And it can, but we let our petty politics get in the way of becoming a surviving species in the cosmos.

originally posted by: Raggedyman
Not to rain on your parade but really, significant?
In what way?

What came out of landing on the moon, a warm fuzzy feeling, jokes,about expensive pens?
I believe orbiting satellites was far more important

Maybe 50 years later it has become ho hum, maybe I don't get it

It was the first time in 4.5 billion years that life left earth and touched the moon... Ya your smart phone is way more important...lol

a reply to: FauxMulder

I was alive, and I watched it on a big ol' black and white console TV, with my parents, my sibs, and my grandmother--whose own grandmother had come over from Ireland in a sailing vessel.

To this day, my greatest memory of the night is the looks on my parents faces, and my grandmother. To this day I'm not sure what the looks conveyed. Wonder? These were the two generations that saw the dawn of flight, my grandmother has/had a picture of the Wright Flyer flying over her hometown in Iowa when she was a very young girl, and the dawn of the Atomic age, and the computer age.

Times of wonderful advancements, but this one, in their eyes, trumped all of 'em. It was another world, and man was stompin' around on it. In 1969, who didn't visualize colonies in space? We've started on that track with the ISS--still have a ways to go, but it'll come. Or colonies on Mars? That will come, too...not in my lifetime perhaps, but it'll come in my nieces time. Or in your young children's time. That process, too, has started. With Sojourn, and Pathfinder...and Viking, and Mariner. Eventually? The stars, there too, the first paths are being blazed--Voyager, and Pioneer.

Someone asked what's been gained from the Space Program, or maybe the landing on the moon specifically... Dreams. Dreams that are, slowly, becoming or will become reality.

Earth was never meant to be our home forever, and ever, 'til the end of time. It was meant to be a nest. To protect us 'til we're ready to leave it. Like fledgling eagles stay safe in the nest for a while, practicing the art of flying in relative safety near to the nest they were born in, so that they may return to a safe haven 'til--one day--the skies beckon. It'll be the same for man...eventually that day will come when we leave this sheltering nest and stretch our own wings. One day, Earth will be where we came from, but it won't, any longer, be home. Home will be out there.

All because, once upon a time, a clunky ol' spaceship landed on the moon for a few days. Designed by other folks who, maybe as little boys and girls, once saw a Wright Flyer fly over their home, or watched Charles Lindbergh fly across the Atlantic to Paris. Or any number of endevours that stretched the bounds of human achievement.

All because of dreams.

a reply to: FauxMulder

A very big deal!

I was born after this great achievement. But I can only dream and wonder as I sit here in my central Florida home, looking east to where smaller rockets still launch this day. I sit and wonder how cool it would have been to see these giants rise up across the same sky I look at every day.... One day maybe again.

originally posted by: 2012newstart
... How is possible the lunar module, without 16.6% capacity of Saturn 5 gigantic engines, to lift off successfully?

errrr, because physics.

Saturn V launch mass: 2,970,000 kg
Apollo Lunar Module Ascent Stage launch mass: 4,700 kg

Spot the difference?

a reply to: woodward2

Not to mention 1/6 gravity??

That might have a little somethin' to do with it...

a reply to: woodward2

Moon gravity = 1/6 of Earth so 4,700 Kg actually weigh 783 Kg on the moon

a reply to: seagull

Awesomely well said

I don't think I could add anything to that

originally posted by: woodward2
errrr, because physics.

Yeah, man. The Moon is up in the sky, right? So when the Lunar Module launched, all it basically had to do was FALL DOWN toward the Earth!

a reply to: Raggedyman

You're also the fellow that didn't think D-Day was too important.

Maybe significant historical moments aren't your area of expertise.