Ever since the first moon landing back in 1969 there has been healthy debate and doubt as to whether the entire event was a staged hoax by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA). Most people kept quiet about it because to question our government somehow seemed unpatriotic but given the many unanswered questions after the Kennedy assassination of 1963, and resultant anger, people were quicker to question the official narrative of the moon landings.
Watching the moon landing broadcast live on television the evening of July 20th of 1969 I had some immediate suspicions. Two thoughts that immediately hit me:
- “How is there a camera already on the moon to film Neil Armstrong’s first steps on the moon?”
- “Where are all of the stars in the sky? Scientists and experts had promised that without an atmosphere, the stars in the sky would be brilliant.”
Then, in 1976 a new book came out by Bill Kaysing, “We Never Went to the Moon: America’s 30 Billion Dollar Swindle,” which seemingly was a green light to question the official government narrative.
Things really heated up after the Kaysing’s book was released. Many “conspiracy theorists” confronted the three lunar astronauts Commander Neil Armstrong, Command Module Pilot Michael Collins and Lunar Module Pilot Edwin “Buzz” Aldrin personally. In 2002 astronaut Buzz Aldrin lost it and punched a conspiracy theorist Bart Sibrel in the face after he told Aldrin, “You’re a coward and a liar and a thief.” This was Sibrel’s response after Aldrin refused to answer questions about the moon landing.
“72‑year‑old Buzz Aldrin punches a moon landing conspiracy theorist in the face” – The History Channel
I had two very personal and most interesting experiences with our supposed moon landing most people never got to have. I once got to actually meet Neil Armstrong as he was the uncle to a student I went to high school with.
Another experience I had was as a college student at Northern Illinois University sometime between 1973 and 1975 when the Apollo 15 Lunar Display came to visit our college campus. As an engineering technology major, I just had to see that lunar rover for myself. While I did not get to sit in the rover which was a backup to the one left on the moon, I did get to see some of the “moon rocks” in a glass case and talk to some NASA personnel. All three LRV (lunar roving vehicles) were left on the moon after Apollo missions 15, 16, and 17.
And while the Internet offers no proof my two accounts above are true and happened, this was long before the Internet so you can find these 2 news stories in local library archives. My summary of both event were and are as follows:
- Neil Armstrong was a very nice, intelligent, and brave man. Whether he walked on the moon or not, I do not know.
- I had the hots to see that lunar rover because 4-wheel drive and electric vehicles were not at all common in the mid-1970s. The woven wire wheels made to deal with the heat and terrain of the moon were absolutely outstanding engineering examples!
“Fact Check: Neil Armstrong refusing to swear on the Bible is not proof that moon landing was fake” – Reuters
So while most of the media on the Internet seems to defend NASA and the moon landings using very persuasive narrators to push the narrative and shame those who do not buy into it, I once had the opportunity to talk to a gentleman who was an equally most rabid defender of the position “we never went to the moon”. Unlike these other talking heads, he was very credible.
I will protect his privacy even though he has now long passed. His arguments we never went to the moon were much the same as those of Bill Kaysing but, as a commercial Boeing 747 pilot, he told me some things about his life experiences and logic I never thought about before. Here are a few I remember:
- Flight crews wear sunscreen to block the UAV rays they are exposed to at high altitudes due to a lack of atmosphere. Logically, lunar astronauts would have been cooked.
- We have more computing power in our smart phones today than NASA had on both the ground and in space in 1969. The computing power simply was not there to navigate to the moon and back.
- No stars seen in the sky was the biggest red flag even though the earth clearly showed from the moon. The story goes the stars were left out as that would have exposed the hoax.
Oh, and by the way, my pilot friend flew a Navy spy plane before he was a commercial pilot.
“Elon Musk: ‘People Don’t Realize the Mistake of The Moon Landing’” – Voyager
In the video above the narrator paraphrases words he attributes to Elon Musk without mentioning the podcast by name.
“During a recent podcast Elon Musk… commented the technology and skill the United States deployed to make that mission successful was way ahead of its time. It should have been impossible to have humans walking on the moon as early as 1969. But the United States government decided it needed to happen so they did everything possible to ensure it did. According to Elon Musk such an event is like reaching into the future and bringing technology to the present it is not the natural pace of technology development this time.”
Is this Elon Musk saying in his own polite way, “It never happened.”?
CONCLUSION:
The reason why the moon landing story is coming up again is there is some talk and fear that President Donald Trump working with advice from Elon Musk will gut the budget of NASA.
“Don’t let Trump and Musk gut NASA” – Space News
So to conclude this and pay homage to my late, great, American pilot friend I now assume is in Heaven, this is for you old pal…
“Real Video of Night Sky from Mars (Captured by Curiosity Rover)” – Only Facts
yes, you can see the stars if you are up in space and they are as spectacular as you and I imagined! Score one for us “crazy conspiracy theorists.”
Copyright © 2024 by Mark S. Schwendau
