A friend of mine posted a photo elsewhere of Neil Armstrong supposedly having briefly de-helmeted while standing on the Moon, to see what effect this would have.

I think my friend must be joking.

I have NEVER heard of this prior, nor seen the photo. Google yields no results.

I was a little kid during Apollo, know quite a few things about the program though not exhaustively. But I do question this.

? Can anyone advise? Thanks.

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After spending all that money, time and training getting to the Moon, does anyone really think he'd just put himself in needless danger like that on a whim? Human vacuum exposure experiments were performed on Earth, in vacuum chambers, prior to Apollo. Under rigidly controlled circumstances, not "Oh, let's pop that helmet off and see what happens".

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There are publicity shots of Armstrong among other standing in a space suit and holding a helmet. It wouldn't be too hard to photoshop one of these onto an existing Apollo 11 landing site image.

I can tell you, having watched the footage and listened live to the radio chatter of that moon walk that the described event did not happen. Your friend is either joking, or fell for a hoax.

Ask him for a link to the image, and start a new thread in the Conspiracy Theories section after you get it. The members here will give a good quick analysis of the image.

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Just to lend weight to Noclevername's post: it was known in 1965 exactly what happens to someone who is briskly decompressed while wearing a spacesuit. It carries a very high risk of death if you try it on your own (you have about 10 seconds in which to reassemble and repressurize your suit before you lose consciousness) and there would be absolutely no point in conducting the experiment under such uncontrolled conditions anyway.

Grant Hutchison

In short it would have disabled him in a few seconds. And killed him in a few more.

Neil raised his gold visor for a short period of time. He did not remove his pressure helmet.

He is visible in the movie film that was shot from the cabin of the LM, you can clearly see his face.

Most of the time the Apollo astronauts left their gold visors down, so you could not see their faces while they were on EVA.

That's what I'm definitely thinking.

Will do. I have the photo (linked to a web address...which strangely enough began "redirecting" me elsewhere; I didn't take the time for the complete "redirection") and comments.

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“I shall always be convinced that a watch proves a watchmaker, and that a universe proves a God” ~Voltaire

Discussion continued in this thread.

Fred

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Discussion of human survival in a vacuum in this thread: Walking on mars with or without spacesuit

And later came Soyuz 11 which decompressed and killed all three.

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