Which brings up another point that the HBs seem to ignore: there was not just one moon landing. That's quite an effective hoax to go on for mission after mission.

I remember back when the whole hoax mentality thing was getting started, that the prevailing thought was that only Apollo 11 was faked. That changed to include all missions for most of them. It boggles my mind to think anyone could be so dense or poorly educated as to buy into that belief.

I'd like to see a class-action slander lawsuit brought against the moon hoax CT purveyors -- especially the ones making money from it. But no, the courts are too busy with fast-food coffee burn cases.

Mike

__________________
Plan as though you will live forever, but live as though you may die tomorrow.

Such a lawsuit would just give these CT purveyors more publicity and lead to their claims being constantly repeated in media reports of the case. Why give them more attention?

__________________
"One does not require alien ruins in order to absorb a profound sense of wonder and mystery from the moon. That our civilization had actually visited it is miracle enough." Jason Roberts

You know, I've always been a little hazy about the sequence of flights of the bits of kit that comprised the Apollo programme leading up to Apollo 7. After that I think I had it right. My own fault really for not doing more research! Anyway, that really helps! Thanks!

It all goes to show you can always learn something new here!

__________________
The most exciting phrase to hear in science, the one that heralds new discoveries, is not Eureka! (I found it!) but rather, 'hmm.... that's funny...'
- Isaac Asimov

Are we alone in the Universe? Are we the only intelligent life? Who knows? But the universe is so BIG, it somehow seems such a waste of space if we are ....

Thanks! Fixed.

I for one have never understood why Apollo 1 was not called Apollo 3, as it was the third flight of Apollo hardware.

Jon

Aside from the obvious lunacy of NASA trying to perpetrate a moon landing hoax after 40 years and knowing that Russia, India and perhaps China could soon land a probe next to any of the Apollo landing sites, I decided to use my image processing skills and to take a stab at seeing what really is present in the LROC images of the Apollo landing sites:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sEFiITxMiBE

__________________
Check out my web page of my own processed versions of Apollo mission photos: Apollo ISD Photos

I'd love to see a mock court case presented as a miniseries by, say, the Discovery Channel entitled something like "NASA On Trial: Did We Go To The Moon?", if only to allow for an exchange like the following:

ATTORNEY: "Colonel Aldrin, where were you on the night of July 20, 1969, at 11 pm Central Time?"
ALDRIN: "I was walking on the Moon."

__________________
Everything I need to know I learned through Googling.

"...and Col Aldrin, could you present your evidence?"

Followed by truckloads of evidence, films, books, photographs, manuals, science reports... being dumped at the judge's bench, ala Miracle on 34th St.

Maybe a whole Saturn V?

__________________
Gillian

"Now everyone was giving her that kind of look UFOlogists get when they suddenly say, 'Hey, if you shade your eyes you can see it is just a flock of geese after all.'"

"You can't erase icing."

"I can't believe it doesn't work! I found it on the internet, man!"

This is really an important idea.

First, one must understand that anyone who sets out to perpetrate a hoax really has no guarantee that the hoax will succeed. Just as with any other illegal or dishonest activity, there is the real chance that the Moon landing hoaxers would get caught early on -- perhaps even in the act.

The alleged motive for faking the Moon landings as opposed to actually accomplishing them is often given as the acknowledged impossibility or unlikelihood that a real mission would succeed. To fail to land on the Moon after a legitimate attempt is embarrassing, but it is not illegal. To claim to have done it (with taxpayer money) and instead to have faked it is tax fraud on a monumental scale. Hence anyone contemplating faking the Apollo missions must consider the dire consequences if he were found out, as opposed to the less dire consequences of falling short during a bona fide effort.

Second, the timetable for further lunar exploration was not known at the time the alleged hoax was contemplated, although the tempo of future space exploration was presumed to be high. The subsequent lack of interest in space was not foreseen. But it means that the hoax perpetrators would not be able to count on any statute of limitations or presumption that they would be dead or retired before any hoax was discovered. They would have to consider the possibility that the hoax would be uncovered relatively quickly.

__________________
"Facts are stubborn things." --John Adams
Clavius Moon Base

Ah but failure doing it for real means the death of the astronauts, which would be ultra bad. No, no. Instead, they must fake it for their safety and threaten to kill them if they blow the whistle.

Remember, astronauts dying during a legitimate rocket launch = bad. Astronauts being murdered by purification squads = okay.

Oh and the astronauts were put into the rocket for launch into EPO so that if it blew up on launch, they wouldn't have to deal with the awkwardness of having living astronauts that were supposed to be dead. Somehow this doesn't contradict the first point.

Apollo 204 was the name of the space vehicle number. It was only after the fire they decided to go for something that sounds more glamorous.

I thought it was Grissom who was insisting on calling it Apollo 1 before the launch. If so why 1, rather than 3?

Jon

The big question is why not Apollo 2? After all, he flew Mercury-Redstone 4, Gemini 3. Apollo 2 would have been the logical next step.

Because he wanted to be number one?

__________________
"Any Sufficiently Analyzed Magic is Indistinguishable from SCIENCE!" -Agatha Heterodyne

"Any technology, no matter how primitive, is magic to those who don't understand it." -Florence Ambrose

Grissom was a complainer. If he saw something he didn't like, or didn't trust, about the spacecraft he was going to ride, he would say so. Just the kind of person you want on your maiden voyage, where clamming up about the jinx and kinks encountered could jeopardize later missions.

__________________

CROSS: "Come on now, Colonel. Are we just supposed to take your word for it?"

ALDRIN: "[Expletive deleted] right you are!"

__________________
Relight the Firefly!

"It is quite clear that Occam's razor does not sharpen in your pyramid." (Nicolas)

"Still, a man hears what he wants to hear and disregards the rest." (Paul Simon)

Exactly. Gus Grissom gets a bad rap, especially in the wake of the inaccurate portrayal in The Right Stuff.

Grissom was lauded posthumously by his colleagues as "an astronaut's astronaut." A more accurate understanding of his Mercury flight supports the belief that Grissom was intolerant of inattentive engineering. There is a reason NASA chose Grissom to shake down both the Gemini and Apollo spacecraft.

__________________
"Facts are stubborn things." --John Adams
Clavius Moon Base

The OP should watch Mythbuster videos on youtube regarding the subject.

Welcome to the board, Yongkykun. Coincidentally, the poster above you was a consultant for that Mythbusters episode.

__________________
"One does not require alien ruins in order to absorb a profound sense of wonder and mystery from the moon. That our civilization had actually visited it is miracle enough." Jason Roberts

Except he flew Gemini 3 (first manned flight, third orbital flight) without issue.

Although I do note that when intervewed for In the Shadow of the Moon John Young said that Grissom did not complain as much as he could have done.

Jon

I don't think you could bring a whole Saturn V into the courtroom. You could take the jurors on a field trip to see one, I suppose.

__________________
"One does not require alien ruins in order to absorb a profound sense of wonder and mystery from the moon. That our civilization had actually visited it is miracle enough." Jason Roberts

Not to mention expert testimony from both Jodrell Banks radio telescopes, Russia and many others that they did.

__________________

It's funny in my head; what can I say?

__________________
Gillian

"Now everyone was giving her that kind of look UFOlogists get when they suddenly say, 'Hey, if you shade your eyes you can see it is just a flock of geese after all.'"

"You can't erase icing."

"I can't believe it doesn't work! I found it on the internet, man!"

Set up your courtroom in the VAB!

__________________
"I'd take the awe of understanding over the awe of ignorance any day." - Douglas Adams

"Certainly, in the topsy-turvy world of heavy rock, having a good solid piece of wood in your hand is often useful." - Ian Faith

Hindsight is 20/20 and all, but maybe he should have. Complained more that is. The Apollo 1 (or 204 if you prefer) was more then a little FUBAR, and was full of problems, problems ignored in the race to the moon until they killed three excellent men.

__________________

Even better, the jurors need to see the scene of the "crime". We should take them to the moon.

__________________
At night the stars put on a show for free (Carole King)

One Earth, One Sky - IYA 2009
All moderation in purple

... and members of BAUT ...

__________________
The most exciting phrase to hear in science, the one that heralds new discoveries, is not Eureka! (I found it!) but rather, 'hmm.... that's funny...'
- Isaac Asimov

Are we alone in the Universe? Are we the only intelligent life? Who knows? But the universe is so BIG, it somehow seems such a waste of space if we are ....