“Segue to the Challenger explosion: based on my experience, there should be detailed pictures of the death of Challenger somewhere. I wonder where.”

Are you talking about the 1986 Challenger that exploded during launch? Because there are numerous photos and videos of the launch, explosion, and debris. Click my name for details.

@Charles,

Same question. Also, what do you mean, “oath of secrecy?”

I’ve done my share of astrophotography. I was joking They would indeed need to setup the camera on a tripod of sorts to take any long exposure shots. It would have been cool tho, no atmospheric turbulence.

But they did take pictures of earth. That’s astrophotography no?

As for taking pictures of the moon from earth, the exposures can be quite short. If using a decent telephoto lens, a fraction of a second say 1/125 for 200 speed film should show some surface details. Similarly shots of the planets could be short exposures as well.

We’ve never seen the highest resolution film/video that there is.

Nor, out of respect to the families, have we heard the post-breakup audio. It exists and I know it exists because an immediate family member has heard it. It is not like that faked transcript that circulated and is on snopes.com, and that is all he will tell me — again, out of respect and also because of his oaths of secrecy.

Doesn’t any photography on the moon automatically fall under astrophotography?

Not so, my initial-sharing friend. If you are on the moon, then the moon is no longer a celestial object from your frame of reference. Besides, astrophotography generally requires large apertures and long exposures to collect enough light, and all of the photos taken on the moon’s surface were exposed for bright sunshine, i.e. small apertures and short exposures.

Thanks for pointing out the sun would be brighter too, but I did reference that in my post

As for astrophotography from the moon, that would have been really cool. Anyone know of any such pics? Doesn’t any photography on the moon automatically fall under astrophotography?

Just to be nitpicky, I think you meant “analog” instead of “digital”, no?

One of my friends happened to be the son of a sound man for Technicolor, who had the contract to film all pad activity. We were treated several times to behind-the-scenes footage of assorted unmanned disasters, as well as the uncut edition of the “Lighthouse Launch” featured on CBS News.

So my skepticism is based on the use of videotape for the recording of action. Film of the day provided spectacularly fine detail. If someone from Technicolor or another contractor wants to explain the supersession of film by digital media, please go ahead, but I’m sure film was the medium of record in 1969.

Segue to the Challenger explosion: based on my experience, there should be detailed pictures of the death of Challenger somewhere. I wonder where.

And then I realized that SI doesn’t have a monopoly on that unit abbreviation. Stupid nautical miles.

In 1956, the American company Ampex introduced the Ampex VRX-1000, the first commercially successful videotape recorder, which used the 2 inch Quadruplex videotape, but due to its then US$50,000 price tag, the Ampex VRX-1000 could only be afforded by the television networks or the largest independent stations.

A typical 4800 foot (1463 metres) reel of 2 inch Quad videotape had the capacity of approximately 1 hour of video material recorded at 15 inches/sec (381 mm/s).

http://www.smh.com.au/news/specials/science/this-is-the-question-eating-astronauts/2008/10/01/1222651169232.html

http://www.smh.com.au/news/specials/science/this-is-the-question-eating-astronauts/2008/10/01/1222651169232.html

In my experience there are several reasons to respond.

1. As Shane said, Moon Hoax Believers claim that official silence means they’re onto something (of course, they make the same claim if NASA responds).

2. Some people (both enthusiasts and those who actually worked on Apollo) don’t like it when people distort this particular part of the historical record, and want to set it straight.

3. Explaining to people *how we know Apollo happened* helps people learn more generally how we tell the real from the fake. It’s part of the process of teaching people critical thinking skills, which, hopefully, they’ll employ in other aspects of their lives (and stop seeing psychics or believing in creationism).

Every single one.

They were not faked. You think the Shuttle is awesome in person, you should have seen the Saturn C-5 (Saturn V) from about 4.5 nm — which is where I viewed Apollo 11′s liftoff.

Earth shaking, deafening, thunderous vibrations as it shattered the air on it lumbering way upward. The Shuttle just hurls itself. The Saturn V was brute force in comparison, muscling its way into the sky, in a defiant wrestling match with Earth. Each one was determined. Her thrust tails were far longer than the 365-foot rocket and you could clearly see the stagings as they happened with the naked eye.

But Saturns were graceful all the same, believe it or not.

Best part for me: Dad and my Grandfather would come home. In the week leading up to a moonshot, they were at work 24×7. They always had stories too, after some sleep and a hot shower.

Yeah, we went. I saw it.

Daniel

Accidents happen in the storage of data. It wasn’t the entire Apollo collection. What was lost was *some* data from Apollo 11. It was high quality video, and spacecraft data tapes. For most people, the data tapes are pretty much irrelevant. The video would be good to have, not because it shows anything we don’t already have, but because it would be of a higher quality than we currently have.

Skepticism is only part of the formula for reason. The other part is being able to discern lies and make progress toward some aspect of truth.

Remember, Satan is the Great Liar,,,or maybe that was George Bush,,,

GAry 7

Regarding the stars… Sure, they may be brighter by a magnitude, but the sun is also brighter by the same amount, so (assuming you set the camera to record the moon), you have to reduce your exposure time or aperture by one stop.

That’s my canned response to people who think no stars in the Apollo photos means they were fake: Set your camera on manual, adjust it to get a good photo of a parking lot on the brightest cloudless summer day you can find. Then, without changing the settings, take it out at night and click off some shots of the stars. By my quick estimate, there’s at least 18 stops difference between a star field and the midtones of the illuminated surface of the moon. Good luck finding film with that kind of latitude, even today!

So I think it’s safe to say any star-like things you see are cosmic ray hits or lens flare. (Except in photos specifically set to just show stars, if there are any.)

*sigh*

“Also, I’ve worked at a government facility, and to me it’s amazing they were able to keep track of everything they did! It’s too bad the tapes were lost, of all things, but it doesn’t surprise me that some things were lost, stolen, or just plain disappeared.”

Been there, done that. Government agencies all have rules and regulations governing how long they are required to keep records and things. Not too big a stretch to imagine that some lower-level guy (intern, apprentice, new guy) comes upon a bunch of boxes of tapes and stuff that are 15 or 20 years old and asks his super what to do with “a bunch of old junk”. Super says “if its more than a year old, the reg says we get rid of it”.

I can remember destroying all kinds of classified files in the old days that weren’t particularly interesting or important, but it was incredibly easy to just open the file cabinet and shred everything that was more than 3 years old.

Never underestimate the power of the US Government to be inefficient, butterfingered or otherwise incompetent.

When I first saw them I figured without the atmosphere reducing the brightness of start by about a magnitude some of the brighter ones might have made it on to the film but then I saw the same spots in the shadows. But, without the atmosphere, sunlight would be brighter too and thus shorter exposure than on earth.