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My Opinion on the Moon Hoax

A conspiracy theory has existed for years now stating that the Moon landings of the Apollo missions were faked by NASA. A television program presented this theory and convinced many people that it was true. Its very easy to show that all the evidence presented to support the theory could be explained without having to resort to the extreme explanations shown in the program.

Here's a list of the "evidence" and my explanation of it...

Evidence: No stars appear in the background sky of photos.

Explanation: This is quite normal. The glare from brightly lit surrounding objects makes seeing faint objects, like stars, impossible on film even though the sky is dark because of the lack of atmosphere.

Evidence: Camera cross hairs appear behind bright objects being photographed.

Explanation: This is a well-known phenomenon caused by the bright light from foreground objects causing overexposure and bleeding on the film.

Evidence: Some photos show shadows from different objects at different angles. If all the light comes from the Sun shouldn't they be parallel?

Explanation: Yes, and they are, but because of the angle of the terrain and the difficulty in judging distance on film there is often the appearance of varying angles.

Evidence: Why can we see objects in shadow if the Sun is the only source of light?

Explanation: The Sun is the only original source of light but a lot is reflected from the Moon's surface onto the shadowed regions making objects visible.

Evidence: The flag waves in the breeze (there is no air, therefore no breeze, on the Moon).

Explanation: The waving is caused by movement of the pole and flag as the astronaut pushed it into the ground.

Evidence: The photograph of Aldrin by Armstrong shows the top of his head. How was this possible?

Explanation: The moon isn't flat. Armstrong was on a much higher point which resulted in this view.

Evidence: Who photographed Armstrong during his first descent of the ladder to the Moon?

Explanation: A camera mounted on the outside of the lander which he swung into position before continuing down the ladder.

Evidence: The Moon photographs are too good, especially considering the camera was attached to the front of the astronaut's suit. How did they frame them so well?

Explanation: There were many bad photos sent back but we only tend to see the good ones. Also, the astronauts did extensive training on using the cameras.

Evidence: Some of the video is faked because you can see right through the astronauts.

Explanation: This is caused by the relatively poor quality video facilities available at the time. Very bright objects leave an after-image which creates this effect.

Evidence: Why is there no communications lag during radio transmissions?

Explanation: There is, but it only just over a second (the Moon is exceptionally close by astronomical standards) so it isn't usually noticed.

Evidence: The "moon buggy" was too big to fit in the lander.

Explanation: The vehicle design incorporated many features to minimise the space it took so it could be carried in the lander.

Evidence: The lander was filmed during takeoff. No one was left on the moon so who could have filmed it?

Explanation: It was filmed by a remote-control camera attached to the lunar rover which was left on the surface of the Moon.

Evidence: The slow motion effect of walking and driving on the Moon is simply normal motion run at half speed.

Explanation: If you do this (run the Moon video at double speed) you will see this is clearly not the case. Look at the motion of the dust which falls in a perfect parabolic arc (something that doesn't happen on Earth due to air friction).

Evidence: During takeoff from the Moon there is no flame from the lander engine.

Explanation: This is normal. The fuel (hydrazine and dinitrogen tetroxide) produces an invisible flame. The fuel is quite different from that used in solid boosters such as the Shuttle's which do produce lots of smoke.

Evidence: The dust on the surface of the Moon clumps like it is wet. There is no water on the surface of the Moon. How is this possible?

Explanation: The very fine dust on the surface naturally clumps without water begin present.

Evidence: Why is there no dust on the lander's feet?

Explanation: The blast angle of the engine pushed the dust away. Because there is no air to re-distribute the dust it didn't settle on the feet.

Evidence: The dust should stay in the air longer because of the lower gravity.

Explanation: There is no air on the Moon so there is nothing to suspend dust like there is on Earth. Dust actually settles at the same speed as anything else will fall. In fact, this is proof of filming on the Moon. Dust doesn't behave like this on Earth and the computer technology to fake it didn't exist at the time.

Evidence: Why is there no crater caused by the rocket engine under the lander?

Explanation: At full power the rocket engine probably wouldn't make a crater and with the lower power used during the final descent one certainly wouldn't be expected.

Evidence: The computers available at the time weren't sufficient to control the mission.

Explanation: The basic computations involved in orbit calculation are easy. You could do them on a calculator so the computers of the time were perfectly adequate. Also, the astronauts did more of the tasks handled by computers today.

Evidence: Why can't we see the parts of the landers left on the Moon through telescopes?

Explanation: They are simply too small. Even the Hubble Space telescope would not be able to see such a small object at that distance. Some satellite photos of the moon have shown disturbed dust around landing sites.

Evidence: Why do objects in the background of photos re-appear in different photos?

Explanation: Judging distance is difficult on the moon because of the closer horizon and lack of atmospheric hazing. Many of what looked like quite close hills were actually tall mountains at much greater distances than they appeared to be. These objects naturally stayed in view longer.

Evidence: Two videos of astronauts on the same hill are presented by NASA as if they are different hills when they obviously aren't.

Explanation: This was a genuine mistake by NASA - they were actually the same hill. The mistake is readily admitted and explained by NASA.

Evidence: Why weren't the astronauts killed by the radiation in space?

Explanation: Normally, the radiation encountered travelling through the Van Allen belt is quite low (around 1 rem). No symptoms show until 25 rems of exposure. Death occurs at around 500.

Evidence: The heat on the lunar surface during the day is too much for the astronauts to survive.

Explanation: Without their spacesuits this would be true. The suits incorporated light reflection and cooling features making survival on the surface possible.

Evidence: A rock photographed on the Moon has a "C" written on it? Is this fake?

Explanation: No, its a piece of dust on a copy of a photograph. Its not on the original.

Fact: Rocks from space have been analysed by many geologists and have been confirmed as not being from Earth.

Fact: Many scientific experiments on Earth have used mirrors left on the Moon to bounce lasers. How did they get there if the Apollo missions never happened?

Conclusion

As you can see, none of the explanations are particularly complicated. Its hard to see how the conspiracy theory believers and the TV show producers couldn't have discovered at least some, if not all, of these. I am forced to conclude that they either didn't try to find an alternative explanation, or conveniently ignored any that were produced.