Post by Chicago Astronomer - Astro Joe on Mar 4, 2005 15:24:58 GMT -6
Spacecraft Snoops Apollo Moon Sites
We all have heard about the conspiracy theories that the Lunar Landings were faked to satisify and win the space race before the 1960's ended. Almost all of the points brought up in this belief are absurd and quite ignorant, but some interesting questions have some merit and have not been successfully answered. We now have the opportunity to actually image the landing sites in good detail from the ESA SMART 1 spaceprobe.
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This from Space.com: A European spacecraft now orbiting the Moon could turn out to be a time machine of sorts as it photographs old landing sites of Soviet robotic probes and the areas where American Apollo crews set down and explored.
New imagery of old Apollo touchdown spots, from the European Space Agency’s (ESA) SMART-1 probe, might put to rest conspiratorial thoughts that U.S. astronauts didn’t go the distance and scuff up the lunar landscape. NASA carried out six piloted landings on the Moon in the time period 1969 through 1972.
Foing told SPACE.com that the SMART-1 orbiter circling the Moon has already covered the Apollo 11, 16, 17 landing sites, as well as spots where the former Soviet Union’s Luna 16 and Luna 20 automated vehicles plopped down. The images have not yet been released.
More here: www.space.com/missionlaunches/050304_moon_snoop.html
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Now, it states that the craft has already imaged some manned sites, including Apollo 11. What's the delay in releasing them? I would love to see the sites and I would think that NASA would be just as anxious to release the images, crude or not, to a waiting American public and the world, and end the question if we landed there or not. This is a ESA probe, and sort of independant of NASA's meddling, so I wonder whats going on.
I'm bothered by this and await positive vindicative results.