40 years later

Forty years ago today, Neil Armstrong first set foot on the surface of the Moon. It was a spectacular technological achievement, and a victory for America in the Space Race against the Soviet Union. Not before or perhaps even since, has such a triumph inspired as the Moon landing did in 1969.

But there are some that continue to insist that this amazing feat did not actually occur, and the footage that so many hail as authentic was really shot in a desert or on some soundstage rather than the Lunar surface. A government conspiracy of nearly unimaginable magnitude is necessitated to cover the tracks of this colossal hoax.

So, on the 40th anniversary of the landing of man on the Moon, I thought it would be appropriate to look at a few of the most common hoax arguments regarding the Moon landing and evaluate them in accordance with the facts.

There are no stars in any of the Moon photographs. This is because the pictures were taken in a studio rather than the Lunar surface, where stars would have been visible.

Cameras, set for daylight exposure, did not detect the relatively faint points of light from the surrounding star field. Additionally, it was "day" on the Moon (the astronauts were on the light side) and the light of the Sun would most likely overpower the faint light of stars, just as it does during day on the Earth.

The flag planted by the astronauts in the Lunar environment waves as if being blown in the wind, despite the lack of atmospheric wind. This is most likely caused by the massive air-conditioners needed to keep the astronauts cool in their bulky suits while in the studio.

Numerous tests (including one by the Mythbusters) prove that the "flag waving" is easily explained by free swinging of the corner of the flag in a low-gravity environment, as a pendulum would. The waving only occurs after the astronauts move the flag, casting further doubt that the flag was fluttering in the air currents of a studio air conditioner. Additionally, analysis of over 30 minutes of Moon footage shows no further movement of the flag whatsoever.

The Moon rocks match exactly rock samples taken from Antarctica.

While there is a ring of truth to this argument, it still doesn't support any moon hoax theory. Lunar meteorites are not an unheard of phenomenon- Lunar impacts eject rocks from the surface of the Moon, and some of these rocks survive entry into the atmosphere and crash to Earth. Furthermore, some of these rocks have been found in places like Antarctica. However, there are only about 66 lbs. of Lunar meteorites known to exist since the first was identified in 1982. The largest robotic Moon rock/soil return thus far is 326 grams by 3 Soviet Luna missions. The total weight of recovered Moon rocks from the Apollo missions is 840 lbs. Under a hoax scenario, either more than 12X the official number of Lunar meteorites exist as hoax Moon rocks, or at least 300 robotic rock return missions (based on the most modern plans for robotic rock collection) must have been flown to account for all the rocks collected.

The hoax proponents allege that the Moon landing was staged. There are, however, a myriad of problems with this suggestion. Just one example: low gravity and the vacuum of space causes dust to settle differently than it would in the Earth's atmosphere, and the footage from the Moon landings shows physical behavior of dust inconsistent with the Earth's gravity and atmosphere. Implicit in this suggestion is that there are at least a sizeable number of people who hatched and continue to hide the most massive government conspiracy in the history of the United States at a time when it is no longer critical we maintain the illusion of having gone to the Moon. The argument for faking the Moon landing made some sense during the time of the Soviet Union- it makes no sense now.

Allegations of missing telemetry data tapes and original video recordings abound, and sadly, a great deal of the original data from the Apollo 11 landing has been lost, though copies remain. But this is not proof of anything substantial, just that someone wasn't smart enough to preserve the tapes or observant enough to check what was being erased. Even if this argument did disprove the Apollo 11 landing, it doesn't hold water with regard to later missions for which all or almost all original data and video is accounted for.

Apollo 16 astronaut Charlie Duke states: "We've been to the Moon nine times. Why would we fake it nine times, if we faked it?" Perhaps to throw us all off the scent of the massive government conspiracy? In the end, I find that allegations of a Moon landing hoax are probably some of the least logically consistent and most poorly-supported ideas I have ever come across. Suspicion of the government is often cited as a presuppositional motive for the 6% of Americans that still hold to some Moon hoax view. I can sympathize with this idea, but not in this case- there's just too little evidence, and I can't believe that so many people have kept quiet, lying about one of the greatest events in human history, for so long with no exception.

My approach has been to rationally and scientifically evaluate the arguments...Buzz Aldrin took another approach when he was accused of lying about landing on the Moon by Bart Sibrel, maker of the film A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Moon. Here's Aldrin's response:

40 years ago today we took one small step for man...how much longer before the next giant leap for mankind?

***Check out my brother Andrew's Apollo 11 blog here. He includes an excellent video clip also.