h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

a) The flag waves only in response to the flag being touched by the astronauts. You see it wave as they try to set it up, then it continues waving for a while after they let it go because there is no air to damp the movement.

b) Most of the noise of a rocket engine is caused by the sockwaves in the air displaced by the rapidly expanding fuel. Of course, on the moon, no air is present, hence the only noise that would be audible inside the module would be vibrations carried through the module itself. Also, the microphones used to transmit the astronauts' dialogue were virtually inside their mouths. Listening to the film of the landing, you can definitely hear a background noise during the landing which stops when they switch off the engine. Similarly, during the ascent, there is a very definite sound associated with the lift off. As it should be, this sound is louder because the ascent stage is part of the same structure that houses the astronauts.

c) cross-hairs on the photos only disappear behind bright objects. It is simply a case of emulsion bleeding across the fine dark lines, hence obscuring them. There are plenty of cases where cross-hairs disappear behind a bright section of an object to reappear ober the dimmer parts. There's a great one on Clavius.org that shows a cross which is clearly present on the red stripes of the American flag, but disappears from the white stripes! Did someone put the white stripes on afterwards?!

d) Well, obviously the Russians etc didn't leap to expose the hoax because NASA actually DID land on the moon.

e) Multi-million dollar movies can't correctly portray a few seconds of lunar footage without some giveaways. No way could NASA have faked half a dozen missions with hundreds of photos and hours of video footage from each.

f) Nothing Earth based has sufficient resolution to pick out an object like a lunar lander, only a few metres across, from a distance of several hundred thousand kilometres. The Hubble telescope, even if it did have such resolving power, cannot be moved fast enough to track the moon as it orbits the Earth. The only way to see the lander is to send something else to the moon to have a look.

g) There is a big difference between spending a day or two on the moon and establishing a base there. Solar radiation is a big risk for a continuous presence on the moon, and it would be necessary to provide sufficient shielding. There is also the balance between the cost of maintaining such a base, and the benefits it would provide.

Sadly people like a good story better than the truth. I am beginning to think that it doesn’t matter what you say but how you say it; a fact the media picked up on a long time ago.

I know that that statement can back up both arguments, but it's something to think about while watching dramatised 'investigations' on TV.

Oh yeah, I think they did land on the moon, and it makes me feel good.

Good riposte JT.

I was about to post more or less the same thing.

Traveller in Time with
"You have a huge backlog indeed "

who me?

Was just curious about whether the moon landing hoax had been discussed here...

(i've been trying to discuss it with a moron over here: http://pub23.bravenet.com/forum/1911968755/fetch/399878/).

Give us a hand?

Well reasoned arguments - good for the debate. Although I wrote the inital article, I swing from disbelief to belief depending on what programs I watch etc. At the moment I lean towards belief as I think the Russians would have blown the whistle on a hoax and many scientists have examined samples of moon rock reportedly brought back from the manned missions and this would be hard to fake (as far as I know!)

On the whole I think it would be easier to do it than to Fake it and cover it up all these years...

I am inclined to agree. Human nature being what it is, and the number of people that would have to have been involved in such a cover up, it is unlikely they would all have kept quite for all these years. There were a number of suspicious deaths at the time,but if fear had kept the rest quiet I think someone would have left evidence and a statement to be opened after their death by now.
Another interesting point (for me anyway)is that last year I saw a documentary in which Van Allen himself (or was it someone quoting Van Allen?) stated that the astronaughts would not have suffered from the radiation belt as they were not exposed for long enough.

Number of suspicious deaths?

Were there?

Unfortunately I cannot remember the details, but I saw a documentary that said there were several astronaughts that died in accidents and also another man that died if I remember correctly in a car crash just before he was due to publish a report on the NASA space program that would have been highly controversial, and the report then went missing.

I am sorry I don't have the details.

Ah, shame. Details would be good....

Maybe someone else who reads this might have more information.