While ISS astronauts do a spacewalk this Christmas eve, I thought that this would be the best tribute I could make for them, and for all of my readers, contributors, and moderators.
Audio and some stunning new video follow.
![480px-NASA-Apollo8-Dec24-Earthrise[1]](http://wattsupwiththat.files.wordpress.com/2013/12/480px-nasa-apollo8-dec24-earthrise1.jpg?quality=83)
They recited:
Bill Anders
“We are now approaching lunar sunrise, and for all the people back on Earth, the crew of Apollo 8 has a message that we would like to send to you.
‘In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth.
And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep.
And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters. And God said, Let there be light: and there was light.
And God saw the light, that it was good: and God divided the light from the darkness.'”
Jim Lovell
“And God called the light Day, and the darkness he called Night. And the evening and the morning were the first day.
And God said, Let there be a firmament in the midst of the waters, and let it divide the waters from the waters.
And God made the firmament, and divided the waters which were under the firmament from the waters which were above the firmament: and it was so.
And God called the firmament Heaven. And the evening and the morning were the second day.”
Frank Borman
And God said, Let the waters under the heaven be gathered together unto one place, and let the dry land appear: and it was so.
And God called the dry land Earth; and the gathering together of the waters called he Seas: and God saw that it was good.’
And from the crew of Apollo 8, we close with good night, good luck, a Merry Christmas – and God bless all of you, all of you on the good Earth.”
Here is the historic audio clip of the text above:
That happened 45 years ago today, when the Apollo 8 astronauts suddenly noticed the Earth “rising” over the lunar horizon. Despite all of the planning for the mission, this event was a complete surprise, and they scrambled to load color film and get cameras ready.
NASA’s Scientific Visualization Studio has created a marvelous recreation of the event, using 3D modeling, original audio from the onboard recorder, and the actual photographs of the moment on December 24, 1968, when the astronauts on the Apollo 8 mission orbiting the moon were unexpectedly confronted with an “Earthrise” and worked together to snap some of the most viewed photography in history. This is an excerpt from the full public-domain video, narrated by the Apollo mission historian Andy Chaikin:
The full visualization is here.
In 2007, an HD camera aboard Japan’s Kaguya satellite videotaped earth ‘rising’ and ‘setting.’ Set to music by Peter Rundquist, the images bring home the lonely, extraordinary nature of this “pale blue dot.”
h/t to Andrew Revkin for that video
Discover more from Watts Up With That?
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.
Suppose one were observing the Moon from a very distant location but with high resolution and in the same orbital plane as the Earth–Moon system. Suppose further that the Earth was invisible [with an albedo of, say, zero – a black body]
As you observe the moon with its wobbly movement through space around the Sun, you would, over a sufficient period of time, see all its surface along with its occasional eclipse by the unseen Earth.
How would one explain then that one eventually sees all of the Moon’s surface, other than that, from the chosen frame of reference, the moon rotates on its axis?
The moon does not spin – it is immobile. Everything else in the universe spins & moves.
Mark and two Cats says:
December 25, 2013 at 5:26 pm
> The moon does not spin – it is immobile. Everything else in the universe spins & moves.
Cats know they are the center of the universe and everything spins around them.
The audience of this website tends to be an educated and critical one. I have 3 questions which, if answered satisfactorily, might deliver me from being an ignorant “moon denier”, which I would certainly appreciate:
1) How come the Apollo Ascent Module clearly exceeds its maximum theoretical acceleration within the first second of flight as seen in e.g. the Apollo 17 footage (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9HQfauGJaTs)? To elaborate: The publicized data — 4.7 t of gross mass and 16 kN of maximum thrust — would allow for 1.78m/s^2 of upwards acceleration, leaving the vehicle at 0.89m of height after 1s, at best. The footage shows a height in excess of twice that.
2) How come there are pictures of the moon rover showing tire prints neither in front nor behind the vehicle, all the while foot prints are clearly visible (e.g. http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/ed/Apollo15LunarRover.jpg)?
=========================
# 1
What is the film speed, or they just really wanted to make sure and gave ‘er all they had.
# 2
The rover is still there, prove it ain’t.
Janice Moore says:
December 25, 2013 at 12:45 pm
I almost replied, but I was busy hunting down tourist photos of Earth. Thanks for having alternative priorities.
My mother died after a long bout with cancer and a lot of caregiving from my father. Dad was adrift for a while with nothing to make himself feel useful until he decided climbing the 48 mountains in New Hampshire that are over 4,000 feet tall. Then he turned it into an engineering project with a handheld tape recorder, diaries, maps, etc. It’s a pity that GPS receivers weren’t available then.
Snowstake, one thing you may run into is a feeling of guilt if you leave home to go to a museum or even a shopping mall. You’ve spent a long time at home caring for your wife. Mourning is difficult enough under the best circumstances. You can go out, you don’t have to be back in a couple hours. You’ve been cared for your wife for those 18 months, now it’s time to care for yourself.
Merry Christmas, such as it is this year.
May God bless you and yours, Anthony and the moderation crew. God bless the contributors to the phenomenal site.
From the home state of Duck Commander and the Robertson’s, Merry Christmas.
@u.k.(us):
). Again: how?
#1: Film speed seems to be the default, and there are many, many copies in circulation of the same speed. Besides, the audio supports that this footage is indeed supposed to depict events in real time. 1.78m/s^2 is the theoretical maximum acceleration at full throttle (besides the “RS-18” is not throttleable anyway!), and it is quite clearly exceeded by a large (>2) margin. How?
#2: I’m not talking about whether the rover is there or not, I’m saying that there are no tire tracks either in front or behind it, which, considering the boot prints are well defined, seems rather impossible (Compare to this picture:
Imagine if you were on the far side of the moon (from earth) and looked up at local midnight, and noted which constellations of the zodiac were visible, allow time to pass to the next local midnight (about one month later) observe slightly different constellations of the zodiac, and rinse repeat for the whole year, noting that you have now observed all the signs of the zodiac.
Or imagine you are the moon and your friend is the earth. Your friend sits in a chair in the middle of a square room. You face south, facing your friend, then move so you are facing west also facing your friend, then face north also facing your friend, and then move to face east also still facing your friend, and last face south again still facing your friend.
The only way to do this is to revolve around your friend and rotate around your own axis both with the same period.
Or lastly, if the moon didn’t rotate on it’s axis, we would not see the phases of the moon.
The moon rotates is the only conclusion that fits the data.
http://lro.gsfc.nasa.gov/
http://www.universetoday.com/19699/does-the-moon-rotate/
Cheers!
bruce1337 says:
). Again: how?
December 25, 2013 at 6:47 pm
#2: I’m not talking about whether the rover is there or not, I’m saying that there are no tire tracks either in front or behind it, which, considering the boot prints are well defined, seems rather impossible (Compare to this picture:
=================
If I go back to your previous link/pic:
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/ed/Apollo15LunarRover.jpg
I could argue that the left front tire of the rover was leaving prints in the moon dust, while the other 3 tires were on rocky surfaces.
No ?
bob droege says:
December 25, 2013 at 6:57 pm
Or lastly, if the moon didn’t rotate on it’s axis, we would not see the phases of the moon.
Whether you see a new moon or a quarter moon or a full moon depends only on the angle between the moon and the earth and the sun, whether the angle is 10 degrees or 90 degrees or 180 degrees. It has nothing to do with the moon’s rotation on its axis. However it has everything to do with the revolution of the moon around the common gravitational center of the moon and the earth which happens to be about 1000 miles below the surface of the earth.
There appear to be other anomalies to me. On the airless moon one would expect to see stronger shadow lines and darker shadows than the photo shows. i.e. note that the shadow of the front wheel axle hub onto the front wheel looks very much like an effect of atmosphere. A close look shows several examples of this blended shadow where one would expect a strong demarcation shadow..
I’m probably wrong in this but I’d suggest that this photo was a posed photo of the duplicate LEM that remained on Earth and was possibly carried to the particular location (hence no tire tracks).This would also explain the atmospheric shadow effects.
F. Ross says:
December 25, 2013 at 7:50 pm
=====================
Normally I might let it slide, but somehow you sucked me into your comment.
You should have left me out…. or pasted the full context of what you are replying to.
It happens 🙂
“1) How come the Apollo Ascent Module clearly exceeds its maximum theoretical acceleration within the first second of flight as seen in e.g. the Apollo 17 footage (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9HQfauGJaTs)? To elaborate: The publicized data — 4.7 t of gross mass and 16 kN of maximum thrust — would allow for 1.78m/s^2 of upwards acceleration, leaving the vehicle at 0.89m of height after 1s, at best. The footage shows a height in excess of twice that.”
Was there any mechanical assist on takeoff?
Interesting!?
Moon doubters misbehaving and moon louts raving.
Both revert to or incorporate ad hominems as key parts of their conspiracy and loony arguments. Even on this rather special holiday when others seek to share hope and cheer.
I have to wonder if the sks infants and Lewpy are out trolling for their favorite conspiracy theories. I also note that the more evidence laid against their conspiracies the more adamant, indignant and irate they become.
Holiday cheer to all!
Befuddlement and confusion to moon conspiracists and simpletons.
noaaprogrammer says:
December 25, 2013 at 8:08 pm
“Was there any mechanical assist on takeoff?”
===========
Does it count when the astronauts all jump off their seats to lighten the load 🙂
u.k.(us) says:
December 25, 2013 at 8:05 pm
Sorry for any confusion but I abbreviated your post to respond only to the photo at the link you posted as ” 2) http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/ed/Apollo15LunarRover.jpg “
@u.s.(uk)
“I could argue that the left front tire of the rover was leaving prints in the moon dust, while the other 3 tires were on rocky surfaces.
No ?”
Of course you could. The picture just doesn’t lend itself particularly well to the argument — the surface looks equally ‘dusty’ all around.
@noaaprogrammer
“Was there any mechanical assist on takeoff?”
None that I know of, and none that seems to be at all documented. Just one RS-18 unthrottleable, hypergolic rocket engine…
Werner Brozak says
“Whether you see a new moon or a quarter moon or a full moon depends only on the angle between the moon and the earth and the sun, whether the angle is 10 degrees or 90 degrees or 180 degrees. It has nothing to do with the moon’s rotation on its axis. However it has everything to do with the revolution of the moon around the common gravitational center of the moon and the earth which happens to be about 1000 miles below the surface of the earth.”
But between successive full moons seen from earth, the moon has rotated 30 degrees, yet the same side of the moon is fully lit, The only way for this to happen is if the moon rotates.
Maybe I should have said if the moon doesn’t rotate, we would see what’s called the dark side of the moon, which isn’t dark.
To the moon rotation people,
The moon acts as though it were tethered to the earth with one side of it always facing the earth. Suppose the same was true with the earth to the sun. How many days would there be in a year? The answer: 0. The sun would always shine on one side of the earth and never on the other… days wolud cease to exist. How many days would be in a year if a spot on the earth always faced the same direction relative to say, the center of our galaxy? Then there would be one day per year. I submit that if you are correct, and the moon rotates once per revolution, then there are 366 days in a year because the “tethered situation described above you count as 1, not 0!
Prove me wrong, I had this argument when I was in 6th grade with my teacher. I lost, but above was the argument I came up with.
Question 1) Why should we answer that? Are you claiming that the launch did not take place? That thousands who watched the liftoff and flight are participating in a scam? Long before one tries to game lift off measurements by you-tube, one needs to come to grips with their was a significant live audience, including many serious reporters/journalists who would’ve loved a ripe scandal.
Question 2) Have you actually watched all rover film and personally viewed all rover prints? Why should any of us spend time chasing down archived imagery just to satisfy you when you’ve not bothered to visit Houston, Canaveral/Kennedy, National air and space museum or the Library of Congress to actually research old films and pics? Be ready to allocate days to weeks in just watching/looking. Personally, I remember seeing tracks when watching newsreels, but why trust me? Go, and look yourself! The data is there.
Question 3) Why does the army and marines go to lengths to find beaches and terrain exactly like those they are going to fight over? Why are there small towns and cities built just for military and police to practice fighting in? Training! Training! Training! What do you think? That we shipped a bunch of yahoos into space to stumble around, joke and try for silly dunk shot ops? For the same reason, potential astronauts practice moving in suits under water and get pseudo negative gravity airtime, for training!
And yes, the astronauts training was that regimented and strict. Every footstep, every motion was choreographed for maximum use/effect for science and minimal danger to the astronauts. The astronauts could’ve thrown switches correctly in the near perfect sequence and order while blindfolded. Silly mistakes, wrong switches, slips, stumbles, trips, falls would easily have cost a life.
Perhaps the easiest way for you to drop the moon question is for you to apply for astronaut duty yourself. A small trip to the mars and you do all of science a terrific favor.
What I am trying to say is that if you say there are 365 days in a year because the earth rotates 365 times per revolution then you are defining a rotation in such a way that says that the moon does not rotate relative to the earth.
bruce1337 says:
December 25, 2013 at 8:38 pm
“Of course you could. The picture just doesn’t lend itself particularly well to the argument — the surface looks equally ‘dusty’ all around.”
==========
‘cept it is not.
Or there would be tracks.
You think they brushed out all the tracks except the left front ?
Why ?
I hope I keep someone up all f*%#ing night!
You fellows who think the moon doesn’t rotate, take your pick:
http://www.universetoday.com/19699/does-the-moon-rotate/
http://www.universetoday.com/19965/rotation-of-the-moon/
http://curious.astro.cornell.edu/question.php?number=142
http://space.about.com/od/moon/a/Does-The-Moon-Rotate.htm
Feel free to use Google to expand your options. Cheers!