Man in Moon: A Lunar Blog

Icon: Neil Armstrong

2009-07-20T15:15:00.004+01:00

So, today is the day—the 40th anniversary of the moon landing and Neil Armstrong's first steps on an alien world. Right around now, the CSM and LM combination were in the first of 12 orbits of the moon prior to landing.Armstrong was an interesting choice as the man to take that "one giant leap." The crew rotations on the Apollo missions were decided upon by Deke Slayton, a man who faced

Web Site: WeChooseTheMoon.org

2009-07-16T14:50:00.005+01:00

This fantastic web site (thanks to Adam Newell for the tip!) has been created by the John F. Kennedy Presidential Library & Museum offering a graphically rich, minute-by-minute recreation of the Apollo 11 mission.Today has seen the launch of the Saturn V rocket carrying Neil Armstrong, Buzz Aldrin and Michael Collins to the moon recreated in all its glory. There's over a hundred hours to go yet (

Lift Off!

2009-07-16T14:47:00.003+01:00

Forty years ago, just after 14:30 UK time, Apollo 11 blasted off from Florida on it's trip to the moon...

Convention: Satellite 2

2009-06-23T14:16:00.003+01:00

Thanks to Paul Cockburn for pointing out this Glasgow event. It’s an SF convention, with Iain M. Banks as Guest of Honour, but it’s also celebrating the moon landing’s 40th anniversary (over the weekend of 25 and 26 July).Space related guests include US Apollo historian Frank O'Brien, who will be bringing some unique Apollo mission memorabilia while BBC Scotland’s David Woods will be giving a

Web Site: BBC Moon Landings Archive

2009-06-23T13:55:00.002+01:00

As an antidote to the rather poor new moon documentary fronted by James May, you could do a lot worse than check out the extensive BBC Moon Landings Archive now online.There’s a host of archive video material that offers unique insight into how the space program was covered on TV between 1969 and 1972, with a few other later moon-oriented documentaries. They range from three minutes (a Today

Review: James May on the Moon

2009-06-23T13:41:00.003+01:00

As mentioned previously, it’s annoying that the BBC’s flagship documentary celebrating the 40th anniversary of the 1969 moon landing is a ‘personality’ led piece that even puts presenter James May’s name before the subject ‘the Moon’. The piece becomes then not about it’s putative subject (‘the Moon’, remember?) but actually all about May’s own personal experiences. So we get May on the ‘vomit

Video: Faking the Facts

2009-06-19T13:50:00.004+01:00

In a time when some basic facts of the world are being questioned by politically or religiously motivated groups, it is troubling when people add to the confusion by producing fake documentaries to bolster a false premise. Yep, read that again…I may get into the whole ‘were the moon landings faked’ debate at a later point, but for the time being I’d like to direct your attention to Opération lune

Icon: Richard Nixon

2009-06-19T12:34:00.004+01:00

There’s something profoundly disappointing about the fact that it was Richard Nixon who presided over the entire Apollo period as US President. Dicky was always tricky, even before Watergate brought him down. The optimism and promise that defined Kennedy and the 1960s, and that helped in no small way to launch the Apollo program itself, was thoroughly dissipated by the 1970s and went into total

Web Site: Lunar Litter

2009-06-19T12:06:00.003+01:00

Ever wondered what mankind left behind on the moon, apart from footprints? The Lunar Legacy Project has the answer in their comprehensive ‘artifact list’ that itemises every item the various moonlanding missions left behind. There are 85 items (at least) at Tranquility Base (where Neil Armstrong set down) alone.Apart from the obvious (Apollo 11 Lunar Module Descent Stage, anyone?), there’s

TV: Anniversary Season Starts Sunday

2009-06-19T09:21:00.004+01:00

Ignoring the James May nonsense (see my post below), the BBC's celebratory moon TV season kicks off on Sunday night with this:The MoonSunday 21 June10:30pm - 11:30pmBBC4 Sean Pertwee recalls our fascination with the moon, which led up to Neil Armstrong's giant leap for

Launch: Lunar Probes Take Off!

2009-06-19T09:15:00.003+01:00

Today’s launch of two lunar probes by NASA promises to pave the way for the return of man to the moon: a long-overdue development.The Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) and a crater observation probe will gather data that may help NASA scientists and mission specialists to select a future landing point for a new manned mission. The data will also be used to select possible areas for long-term

TV: BBC Moon Season [July 2009]

2009-06-16T15:09:00.003+01:00

Apart from the two ‘documentaries’ fronted by James May, this season of programmes across various BBC channels looks very promising indeed.It’s a shame that so many documentaries these days have to be conceptualised as a ‘personal mission’ on behalf of some ‘celebrity’ presenter, rather than relying on the subject matter itself to sell the show. Why on (or off) Earth does James May have to “makes

Game: Lunar Lander (1979)

2009-06-16T14:21:00.003+01:00

Much remembered from my childhood is the 1979 Atari Lunar Lander videogame. Many hours during summer holidays were spent/wasted attempting to land a simple vector graphic version of the NASA Lunar Excursion Module [LEM] on an equally simple vector lunar landscape (when I wasn't playing Boot Hill). I dread to think how much money in 10p pieces must've gone into various Atari stand-alone consoles (

Movie: Moon (2009)

2009-06-16T13:16:00.003+01:00

All I've seen of this new movie (directed by Duncan Jones, son of David Bowie) so far is a trailer and a couple of clips. It seems very reminiscent of one of my all-time favourite movies, Silent Running (1972) with a hefty dose of 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968) thrown in. Conveniently, both those movies book-end the Apollo moonshot program itself... The star of Moon, Sam Rockwell, is an interesting

Man in Moon: Introduction

2009-06-16T11:29:00.000+01:00

It’s odd to think that the Apollo space program that culminated with the landing of a man on the moon on July 20 1969 is now ancient history. This year’s 40th anniversary is the ideal excuse for a series of dramas, documentaries and drama-documentaries, as well as a whole host of non-fiction books, celebrating the achievement of Neil Armstrong and the many others who helped get him to