Tranquility Base, Revisited

We’re watching the real time feed of the Apollo 11 coverage. It’s awesome! I’m personally immersed and it’s surprisingly easy to pretend that this is going on right now. It’s nice to remember a time that America did great things. Mostly we’ve seen shots like this one. There’s clearly an alien or a stagehand or something moving around behind the faux lander.

Occasionally we see the simulation of what’s happening inside the capsule. I hate to admit that it looks hilarious. There might be an actual astronaut inside one of the fake suits. That would explain the muffled explanation.

Meanwhile, Armstrong is about to go EVA. They spent a startlingly long time waiting for the cabin to depressurize. And I’m wondering if there’s a guy in a moon man costume somewhere. That’s secret of a successful simulation. Preparation. Will there be moon men? Probably not, but you have to be ready for the unexpected.

Armstrong’s backing out of the lander, still seeing simulations.

Real picture. Very fuzzy. Cronkite thinks Armstrong’s stepped on the Moon. It’s not completely clear to me.

There it is. “One small step for man, one giant leap for mankind.” Followed by a description of the sand. And the environment.

Now we’re seeing Armstrong bounding around in the low gravity. “That looks like fun” says Cronkite. Later he compares it to walking on a trampoline.

And Aldrin’s on the surface. Soon they’re going to move the camera.

Here’s a shot from the new camera position, with both astronauts.

And they’ve now planted the flag. The point is made that this is NOT the traditional claiming of territory; this is just a statement that we have been there and a reminder of what we’ve accomplished.

Finally, for this post, Armstrong and Aldrin get a congratulatory call from President Nixon. They haven’t been on the moon for an hour yet. If you haven’t watched this yourself, I can’t recommend it more strongly.

Now I’m going to just relax and enjoy. I hope you do too.