Speaker 1: Nine Days in July is a production of I Heart
Speaker 1: Radio and trade Craft Studios in association with High five Content.
Speaker 1: It's May sixth, nineteen sixty eight Ellington Air Force Base, Texas.
Speaker 1: Neil Armstrong is sitting behind the controls of the Lunar
Speaker 1: Landing Research Vehicle. This isn't a simulator like the building
Speaker 1: bound trainers I described last episode. This one actually flies.
Speaker 1: The l l r V employs a massive, downward facing
Speaker 1: turbojet engine to counteract five six of the vehicle's weight
Speaker 1: and better simulate how the lunar module will behave on
Speaker 1: the mood. Two rockets and sixteen smaller thrusters provide vertical
Speaker 1: and horizontal motion and allow for fine movements. The l
Speaker 1: r V isn't pretty. It's basically a flat, square body,
Speaker 1: four legs in each corner and an open cockpit. The
Speaker 1: astronauts call it the flying bedstead. According to those who've
Speaker 1: taken the stick, it is notoriously hard to fly, but
Speaker 1: profoundly easy to correct. On this day, several hundred feet
Speaker 1: in the air, Neil is struggling with the controls as
Speaker 1: he tries to bring the machine in for a landing. Suddenly,
Speaker 1: the rockets give out, and the l l RV begins
Speaker 1: to plummet. Neil increases power to the turbojet, but as
Speaker 1: he does, the vehicle makes an uncommanded pitch forward two
Speaker 1: feet above the ground. Neil hits the jet button, his
Speaker 1: body is instantly accelerated to fourteen g's. He's so low
Speaker 1: that his parachute is open for only four seconds before
Speaker 1: he crashes back to the earth. Across the field from him,
Speaker 1: the ll RV dives into the ground and erupts in
Speaker 1: a giant fireball. If he'd waited even a second longer,
Speaker 1: he'd still have been strapped into the seat when it exploded.
Speaker 1: More than any other piece of equipment NASA had, the
Speaker 1: l l RV was the best analog for what it
Speaker 1: would be like when Neil took the LEMBS controls and
Speaker 1: guided it to the lunar surface. As he rises shakily
Speaker 1: to his feet watching the l l RV burn, how
Speaker 1: could he not be wondering if this is the fate
Speaker 1: that awaits him and Buzz There are no ejection seats
Speaker 1: in the lamb. It's July, day five of the Apollo
Speaker 1: eleven mission. This is the day humans can make history
Speaker 1: by stepping foot on another world. This is a follow
Speaker 1: control ninety three hours, nine minutes ground and laps time
Speaker 1: the follow eleven. Good morning from the black day. I
Speaker 1: look like you're really sawing away all right. After having breakfast,
Speaker 1: I'm getting all squared away. After the night's rest period,
Speaker 1: the crew will have a rather busy day to day,
Speaker 1: including the first man landing on the Moon. A busy day. Indeed, yesterday,
Speaker 1: four days after they left Earth, the conjoined Command Service
Speaker 1: Module and the Lunar Module arrived in orbit around the Moon. Today,
Speaker 1: Mission commander Neil Armstrong and Lunar Module pilot Buzz Aldrin
Speaker 1: will attempt to make history by landing a spacecraft on
Speaker 1: the Moon and setting bootprints in its ash. Like service
Speaker 1: members of the White team of flight controllers ended up
Speaker 1: by Eugene krantz Or drifting into the control room now
Speaker 1: to relieve the night watch. One of those White team
Speaker 1: members is guidance Officer Steve Bales, who you might remember
Speaker 1: from a previous episode. You could have cut the tension
Speaker 1: in that room that day with a knife. Some of
Speaker 1: the managers have been into business thirty years said they
Speaker 1: had never seen attention that they had felt in that
Speaker 1: room that day. But you also get this failing that
Speaker 1: this is a place something's going to happen at. I mean,
Speaker 1: this is a place started like the box where Columbus
Speaker 1: last thing you know, and he sailed offer to America
Speaker 1: for Gene Krantz. It's only just now beginning to sink
Speaker 1: in that today is the day they've been working towards
Speaker 1: for the better part of a decade. He's wearing his
Speaker 1: wife's good luck charm, a silver and white vest. She
Speaker 1: makes a new one for each of her husband's, but
Speaker 1: today's is especially beautiful. Elsewhere in Houston, the astronauts families
Speaker 1: are just arriving home after a morning spent at church.
Speaker 1: Each of their homes are surrounded by ravenous press. It
Speaker 1: isn't long before a small army of friends and family,
Speaker 1: most bearing pot like dishes begin showing up to offer
Speaker 1: moral support. Inside TVs and coffee pots are already hard
Speaker 1: at work. It's going to be a long day. In
Speaker 1: the corner of each living room is a squawk box,
Speaker 1: which NASA installed shortly before Apollo eleven launched into space.
Speaker 1: The devices allow the families to listen in on the
Speaker 1: communications between mission control and the spacecraft. Basically what you've
Speaker 1: been hearing throughout this podcast. Joan Aldrin finds a spot
Speaker 1: on the couch and lights a cigarette. The nearby ashtray
Speaker 1: is already in desperate need of being emptied. Chain smoking
Speaker 1: is an unfortunate side effect of being an astronaut's wife.
Speaker 1: Back aboard Apollo eleven, the crew has donned their bulky
Speaker 1: pressure garments, and Neil and Buzz have powered up the
Speaker 1: lunar module. The time has come to separate the two spacecraft.
Speaker 1: Michael seals the hatches and begins depressurizing the airlock. He
Speaker 1: is now alone in the command module. Neil and Buzz
Speaker 1: prepared to deploy the lunar modules for landing legs, which
Speaker 1: until now have been tucked tight against the spacecraft's ungainly body. Okay,
Speaker 1: we're gonna put our gear down the landing here, and
Speaker 1: by damn about ain't no doubt about that. Inside the limb,
Speaker 1: Neil and Buzz conduct a series of checks confirming their
Speaker 1: guidance system, thrusters, descent propulsion system, and rendezvous radar are
Speaker 1: all working properly. That last bit sounds innocuous, but it's not.
Speaker 1: Remember the rendezvous radar follow eleven. Then we'll go for
Speaker 1: undocking over Roger understand. As Apollo eleven curls around the
Speaker 1: far side of the Moon, it once again loses radio
Speaker 1: contact with Houston, as will happen so often on this
Speaker 1: massive and critical maneuvers are conducted without the comforting tether
Speaker 1: of mission controls. Where are you at? Okay on a maneuver?
Speaker 1: Nap to unlocking at you when you know? An't even
Speaker 1: radarselves that is complete? Let me know and I'll check
Speaker 1: out my fand finding there it is again. Rendezvous radar
Speaker 1: on Buzzes checklist is the command to make sure the
Speaker 1: radar is picking up a transponder on board the command module.
Speaker 1: This tells the LAMB where and how far away it is.
Speaker 1: Without the transponder, it will be almost impossible to find
Speaker 1: Michael in the command module once they leave the Moon.
Speaker 1: Thanks man, it checked out. Exagur Ago you guys. The
Speaker 1: two spacecraft separate, Michael has to ensure that he undocks
Speaker 1: without damaging the seals on either module. If the docking
Speaker 1: ports are damnitched, Neil and buzz will have to perform
Speaker 1: a spacewalk tomorrow to get back in. But this is
Speaker 1: Michael we're talking about, and he makes it look easy.
Speaker 1: There is no more Apollo eleven. The Eagle and the
Speaker 1: Columbia are now two separate spacecraft orbiting the Moon. Michael
Speaker 1: allows Columbia to drift a short distance away from the
Speaker 1: lunar module and takes the opportunity to inspect the eagles
Speaker 1: exterior and to ensure the landing gear is properly deployed.
Speaker 1: The MESA is a compartment on the belly of the
Speaker 1: Eagle's descent stage that holds the various equipment and tools
Speaker 1: the crew will need once they land. A moment later,
Speaker 1: the two spacecraft round the Moon and come back into
Speaker 1: contact with mission control. Brock your hen and said, look,
Speaker 1: I can find like a blant upside down. Somebody's upside
Speaker 1: down in space. There is no upside to out. Michael
Speaker 1: fires Columbia's thrusters and moves himself away, ensuring the Eagle
Speaker 1: is free and clear to navigate. The lamb initiates its
Speaker 1: descent orbit insertion burn. This is not the big burn
Speaker 1: that's going to get the Eagle down to the Moon,
Speaker 1: but rather a short one to lower them down to
Speaker 1: about fifty feet in preparation for their final descent. Every
Speaker 1: second of the burn removes nearly two miles from their
Speaker 1: health team from more of it. Michael watches the eagle
Speaker 1: getting smaller and smaller until it disappears from view altogether.
Speaker 1: Once again, the maneuver occurs out of radio contact with Houston.
Speaker 1: Back in mission control, Jean kranslights a new cigarette. He
Speaker 1: can't even count how many he's already had this morning.
Speaker 1: He's been writing furiously in his log book and notices
Speaker 1: that the pages are wet and beginning to curl. He's
Speaker 1: sweating a lot. But at his console, Steve Baale suddenly
Speaker 1: has nothing to do, and we've had about fifteen minutes
Speaker 1: to acquisition, and Jeane says, I want you flight controllers
Speaker 1: to go to this special loop that was private. I
Speaker 1: had to tell these kids how proud I was of
Speaker 1: the work that they had done, and from this stay,
Speaker 1: from the time that they were born, they were destined
Speaker 1: to be here, and they're destined to do this job.
Speaker 1: And it's the best team that has ever been assembled.
Speaker 1: And today, without a doubt, we are going to write
Speaker 1: in the history books and we're going to be the
Speaker 1: team that takes an American to the moon. And do
Speaker 1: you do not know how much that meant? For somebody
Speaker 1: like myself sitting there at with do knowing what we
Speaker 1: were going to have to do in the next few minutes.
Speaker 1: His pep talk concluded, Jean has the doors to mission
Speaker 1: control locked. No one can go in or out. It's
Speaker 1: go time. We should have cut off by this time,
Speaker 1: that should have completed the decent orbit insertion maneuver. Spacecraft
Speaker 1: is now behind the Moon and the control team the
Speaker 1: adrenal one, I mean just really was, no matter how
Speaker 1: you tried to hide it. The fact is is that
Speaker 1: you are really starting to pump. Might demand complaint. This
Speaker 1: is a follow control of one hours fifty four minutes.
Speaker 1: I believe. Back in the viewing room, we probably have
Speaker 1: one of the largest assemblages of space officials that we've
Speaker 1: ever seen in one place. Mission Control is bursting at
Speaker 1: the seams with dignitaries and v I p s. Basically
Speaker 1: anyone who's anyone in NASA is here. It's growing quite
Speaker 1: quiet here in mission control. A few moments ago, Flight
Speaker 1: Director Jane Kranz requested that everyone sit down, get prepared
Speaker 1: for events that are coming, and he closed with very
Speaker 1: remark good luck to all of you. We are now
Speaker 1: coming up on thirty seconds to acquisition of the command module. Well,
Speaker 1: we do get our acquisition, but it is a most
Speaker 1: horrible sounding noise that you've ever heard. Here we're getting
Speaker 1: ready to go to the moon and we can't even
Speaker 1: talk to the crew directly. We have to call Mike
Speaker 1: Collins and the command module to relay data down in
Speaker 1: the lunar model. Don't get any hear right here ago
Speaker 1: for a five datement over com fun no and as
Speaker 1: you can hear, the calms are terrible, But that isn't
Speaker 1: stopping buzz from grinning ear to ear. Five seconds after
Speaker 1: the engine ignites, Steve Bales once again loses all data
Speaker 1: from the moonship. When it comes back a minute or
Speaker 1: so later, he sees something's not right. We were going
Speaker 1: toward the moon per second fashion than we should have been.
Speaker 1: If we get to thirty five ft per second, I've
Speaker 1: got to stop the desa. I've got to call the board. Well, boy,
Speaker 1: when you haven't even started down to the moon and
Speaker 1: some guy comes to you and says, hey, we're halfway
Speaker 1: to our aboard women to share, gets your attention. So
Speaker 1: why was the lamb flying so much faster than anyone anticipated?
Speaker 1: Gene explains the crew had not fully pressed the tunnel
Speaker 1: between the two space crafts, so when they blew the bolt,
Speaker 1: there was a little residual air in there at let
Speaker 1: start of like pop on a cark on a bottle.
Speaker 1: But of course no one knows this at the time.
Speaker 1: All they know is that for some reason, the spacecraft
Speaker 1: is traveling faster than it should be. Either that or
Speaker 1: something's wrong with the navigational computer. Either way, the tension
Speaker 1: in mission control has now reached suffocating levels. Luckily, the
Speaker 1: calms seem to be back, but then to take down
Speaker 1: to dealt long. Neil has just recognized what Steve Bales
Speaker 1: and everyone in mission control already knows. The lamb is
Speaker 1: not where it's supposed to be. Neil is watching the
Speaker 1: terrain go by outside his window, and he realizes they
Speaker 1: are going to overshoot their landing zone. Neil rotates the
Speaker 1: lamb into a face up, feet forward position. This must
Speaker 1: be done so that when the Eagle is put upright,
Speaker 1: they will be facing forward during the landing. Now he
Speaker 1: and Buzz are looking at nothing but the void of
Speaker 1: outer space, well not quite nothing. Back in mission control,
Speaker 1: Steve Bales continues to monitor the lemb's progress Thankfully the
Speaker 1: mooncraft has not gained any additional speed. That a word
Speaker 1: danger that everyone feared no longer seems to be an issue,
Speaker 1: and I think my big problem for the day is over.
Speaker 1: Twenty seconds later, we'd get a program alarm, program alarm
Speaker 1: about two about and I was frantically scrambling, Oh my guys,
Speaker 1: it's one of those alarms who worked on. I have
Speaker 1: the cheat sheet over in my left side, but before
Speaker 1: I can even see it, Jack Garmin is yelling in
Speaker 1: my air Steve, Steve, Remember it's executive overflowed the program alarm.
Speaker 1: Neil and Buzz don't recognize the alarm, and they are
Speaker 1: too busy to go rummaging through their manuals looking for
Speaker 1: an explanation. Communication dropouts were a nuisance more than a danger,
Speaker 1: but computer problem was a show stopper. I didn't really
Speaker 1: know the consequences of those alarm, but fortunately Stephen oas
Speaker 1: guys on g n N console new I say to
Speaker 1: the flight director, we're going that alarm right here. We
Speaker 1: got you. We're going at alarm. Do you recall the
Speaker 1: story from our last episode that I told you to
Speaker 1: remember the final simulation that mission control went through the
Speaker 1: one that would never happen in real life, the one
Speaker 1: that made geene Krants so angry. Well, this is real
Speaker 1: life and the exact same thing is happening right now,
Speaker 1: except this time mission control knows exactly what's going on,
Speaker 1: and they all remember what they were told after the simulation.
Speaker 1: You should not have aboorded some person, and we've never
Speaker 1: been able to identify with The voice loop comes up
Speaker 1: and says, this is just like a simulation. The Eagles
Speaker 1: computer is overloaded with tasks. It cannot process them all.
Speaker 1: The alarm is its way of saying, hey, everybody, I've
Speaker 1: got a lot more on my plate than I can handle,
Speaker 1: so I'm going to concentrate on the most critical items
Speaker 1: and leave the rest for later. For nine, the Lembs
Speaker 1: computer is as cutting edge as it gets. It has
Speaker 1: two K of RAM and thirty six K of raw memory.
Speaker 1: If you're not a computer person like me, those numbers
Speaker 1: likely don't mean anything to you, so let me break
Speaker 1: it down for you. The last email you sent was
Speaker 1: likely twice as large as that. The lemb computer had
Speaker 1: less memory than a high school graphing calculator, and yet
Speaker 1: it got us to the mood. NASA was the first
Speaker 1: in the world to use microchips, allowing them to power
Speaker 1: a computer the size of a briefcase rather than a
Speaker 1: machine the size of a room. The moon landing didn't
Speaker 1: usher in the space age. It ushered in the digital age.
Speaker 1: And just what is if it's causing the data overflow?
Speaker 1: You probably figured it out by now. The rendezvous radar
Speaker 1: buzz left it on just in case they needed to
Speaker 1: abort and make a quick ascent back to Michael in
Speaker 1: the command module. It proved one item too many for
Speaker 1: the computer to handle. Okay, i'll flight controllers and should
Speaker 1: be throttling down. You're looking great. Neil pitches the Eagle
Speaker 1: up so that the vehicle is now traveling with its
Speaker 1: legs pointed down towards the Moon. They are over unfamiliar
Speaker 1: territory on the southwestern edge of the Sea of Tranquility,
Speaker 1: more than four miles beyond their target. Below them is
Speaker 1: a deep crater the size of a football field, and
Speaker 1: it is strew with massive boulders. Realizing that the autopilot
Speaker 1: is going to try to land the spacecraft in the
Speaker 1: middle of that crater, Neil disengages the computer and takes
Speaker 1: control himself. He needs to find a new landing site.
Speaker 1: His heartbeat has skyrocketed from seventy seven beats a minute
Speaker 1: to fifty six. Okay, I'll flight comtrollers go, I'll go
Speaker 1: for landing retro. I don't know, sorry, good Go Capcom
Speaker 1: or Gopher landing, Go get the year, go for landing over.
Speaker 1: I heard a thank go for landing three thousands three alarm.
Speaker 1: Another alarm, this time twelve o one. It's in the
Speaker 1: same series as the one before, and Steve Bales doesn't
Speaker 1: even hesitate this time. Okay, we're going to go. Thank
Speaker 1: I We're go on board the LAMB. Neil is intent
Speaker 1: on landing alarms or no alarms. You're always concerned when
Speaker 1: any kind of alarm comes on. But uh my own
Speaker 1: heeling was that as long as everything was going well
Speaker 1: and looked right, I would be in favor of continuing,
Speaker 1: no matter what the computers was complaining about it. There
Speaker 1: doesn't seem to be anywhere to set down and aboard.
Speaker 1: Suddenly seems very likely to have come this far only
Speaker 1: to abandon their prize. Now, Neil Armstrong. It was far
Speaker 1: and away the most complex part of them, the flight.
Speaker 1: The systems were very heavily loaded at that time. The
Speaker 1: unknowns were rampant. The systems in this mode had only
Speaker 1: been tested on Earth and never in the real environment.
Speaker 1: There were just a thousand things to worry about in
Speaker 1: the final descent. Nine and ninety nine of those things
Speaker 1: are boulders the size of cars. It was a fairly
Speaker 1: steep slope and it was covered with very big rocks.
Speaker 1: There were some attractive areas half mile ahead or so,
Speaker 1: so that's where I went. But now there's another even
Speaker 1: more serious problem. They didn't plan for the descent to
Speaker 1: take this long, and they are running out of fuel
Speaker 1: fast level. While normally by the time he calls out
Speaker 1: low level we have landed in training. Then we're not
Speaker 1: even close to landing here. Back at her home in Houston,
Speaker 1: Joan Aldrin rises to her feet, sways unsteadily for a moment,
Speaker 1: and collapses onto the floor. She lays there for a
Speaker 1: few moments, absolutely overwhelmed. When she rises, she braces herself
Speaker 1: against the wall for support. Break that a far feel okay,
Speaker 1: look area. You may not have been able to make
Speaker 1: that last bit out right before. Neil said he found
Speaker 1: an area he likes. Buzz informed him that they are
Speaker 1: down to eight percent of their fuel it's now or never.
Speaker 1: A lot before it got about break, I got a
Speaker 1: good Neil just said he's got a good spot. I
Speaker 1: part five quantity light. That's how much fuel they have left. Hey,
Speaker 1: that's looking good. Down a half look forward sex day
Speaker 1: saconds sixty seconds. Mission control is telling Neil that if
Speaker 1: he's not on the ground in one minute, he has
Speaker 1: to abort the landing or fade down at above the
Speaker 1: lunar surface, and buzzes noticing that their descent engine is
Speaker 1: starting to disturb the lunar dust. Far forward, Far Forward
Speaker 1: dripped into the right level half. Neil must put down
Speaker 1: within thirty seconds or abort the mission. There's a lot
Speaker 1: of concern about coming close to running out a fuel,
Speaker 1: But I didn't know that if I could have my
Speaker 1: speed stabilized and attitude stabilized, I could fall from fairly
Speaker 1: good height Propps, maybe forty feet or more, and in
Speaker 1: the low lunar gravity, the gear would distorb that much fall.
Speaker 1: That was Neil armstrong. Given that the Moon's gravity is
Speaker 1: one six of that on Earth. Neil is planning on
Speaker 1: letting the landers simply dropped to the surface. Here's the
Speaker 1: thing about the lemb's legs. They were designed to get crushed.
Speaker 1: Inside the struts is a honeycomb structure that will compress
Speaker 1: on landing. Neil is that if they run out of
Speaker 1: fuel and aren't too high when it happens, they can
Speaker 1: simply fall in the moon significantly lower gravity, and the
Speaker 1: legs will absorb the impact. There are only three options
Speaker 1: that day. Either going to land, You're going to a board.
Speaker 1: You're gonna crash. There's no more what happens. I'm not
Speaker 1: gonna call a boar. The crew is close enough to
Speaker 1: the surface. I'm gonna let them give it their best shot.
Speaker 1: Carlton was just ready to say fifteen seconds and anyway
Speaker 1: here the crow say contact right. Three of the four
Speaker 1: lamb footpads are equipped with nearly six ft long probes
Speaker 1: to alert the crew in contact with the surfaces made.
Speaker 1: At least one of those probes has made contact with
Speaker 1: a jolt, not unlike a passenger jet touching down on
Speaker 1: a runaway, the lamb comes to a stop. The silence
Speaker 1: is deafening. The two men glance at each other in relief.
Speaker 1: The eagle has only forty five seconds worth of fuel
Speaker 1: remaining because of avoiding hostile terrain, their descent has taken
Speaker 1: your thirteen minutes longer than planned and burned roughly five
Speaker 1: hundred and thirty unplanned pounds of fuel. Neil's heart rate
Speaker 1: is a thunderous one and fifty beats per minute, and
Speaker 1: they are approximately four miles from where they planned on landing,
Speaker 1: but they are on the Moon. Outside Neil sees something
Speaker 1: that takes his breath away. Was absolutely dumbfounded when I
Speaker 1: shut the rocket engine off and the particles were going
Speaker 1: out radially from the bottom of the engine belt all
Speaker 1: the way all over the horizon and instantaneously disappeared. There
Speaker 1: is so little atmospheric resistance on the Moon that the
Speaker 1: lunar dust scattered by the lembs exhaust raced away from
Speaker 1: the spacecraft at the speed of a bullet and traveled
Speaker 1: halfway around the Moon before it finally settled. Buzz grabs
Speaker 1: Neil's hand and whispers, we made it, and here the
Speaker 1: ankle has landed. Rocket crank quiality. We caty on the ground.
Speaker 1: You gotta fight the guys about the turn blue. We're
Speaker 1: breathing again. So long as the spacecraft is resting on
Speaker 1: the Moon, it will no longer be referred to as
Speaker 1: the Eagle. Now it is Tranquility Base. I was so
Speaker 1: excited I couldn't get out Tranquility Base. It came out.
Speaker 1: So I'm like Roger Houston, Tranquility Base, and I believe
Speaker 1: that's true. It was a true statement, was spontaneous, but
Speaker 1: it was true. I mean we were I was holding
Speaker 1: my breath, you know, because we were close. I don't
Speaker 1: think any of us breathed for that last sixty seconds.
Speaker 1: All across the Earth, time has stopped. Six d and
Speaker 1: fifty million people are glued to their televisions, making the
Speaker 1: moon landing the most watched television event in history. It's
Speaker 1: to seventeen PM in Houston, Texas. As her friends and
Speaker 1: family erupt into cheers, Joan Altering excuses herself and sneaks
Speaker 1: away into her husband's study, closing the door behind her.
Speaker 1: She wakes up several moments later, having passed out a
Speaker 1: few feet away from her As a fall and matchbook,
Speaker 1: the her limbs feel as if they are no longer
Speaker 1: in her control. She claus for the matchbook and curls
Speaker 1: her fingers around it, desperate for the feel of something
Speaker 1: real and tangible. She remains in this position for several minutes,
Speaker 1: regaining her composure before rising, smoothing out her dress and
Speaker 1: rejoining the others in the living room. See all smiles.
Speaker 1: She tells them, no more tears. But on CBS News,
Speaker 1: Walter Krunkite is in tears. U S soldiers in Vietnam
Speaker 1: crowd around handheld radios even as mortars fall all around them.
Speaker 1: In New York City, the Yankees are playing the Washington Senators.
Speaker 1: The gathered fans erupt in cheers as they're on The
Speaker 1: Moon flashes on the scoreboard, and the game is paused
Speaker 1: while the crowd spontaneously begins to seeing America the beautiful.
Speaker 1: Ten thousand people gathered in Central Park to watch the
Speaker 1: landing on giant screens erupt in ear splitting applause. Thousands
Speaker 1: of travelers and airports and train stations begin applotting, and
Speaker 1: then the air airplane passengers began running up and down
Speaker 1: the aisles, shaking each other's hands. As a seven year
Speaker 1: old child watching Apollo eleven blast off at Cape Kennedy,
Speaker 1: I was dying to watch the landing on TV, but
Speaker 1: my dad wanted to drive back home to Michigan, and
Speaker 1: everybody on the interstate was pulling over to listen to
Speaker 1: the landing on the radio. Was in Vietnam that day
Speaker 1: in July, was airborne in an F one Super Saber
Speaker 1: when someone came up on the emergency perconcide and announced
Speaker 1: that the eagle had landed. So the year, in the
Speaker 1: month I was born, butt Nick launched and I was
Speaker 1: nicknamed butt Nick for the first six years of my life.
Speaker 1: And then on my twelfth birthday, Apollo eleven launched to
Speaker 1: head to the Moon. Three days later, we were sitting
Speaker 1: in the living room watching Walter Cronkite and watching him
Speaker 1: walk on the Moon. During the week of the landing,
Speaker 1: I was at summer camp and the councilor in our
Speaker 1: cabin was kind of a cool guy. And remember why
Speaker 1: changed that on his little black and white TV with
Speaker 1: rabbit ears. I was just a nineteen year old rookie
Speaker 1: protocol officer. My boss said, Werner von Braun needs an
Speaker 1: escort in the controls interviewing room, and as young and
Speaker 1: inexperience as I was at nineteen, I realized exactly what
Speaker 1: he was doing. I just stayed there until the end
Speaker 1: of the entire moonwalk. My father was an airman station
Speaker 1: at Office Air Force Base in Omaha. The night of Lynn,
Speaker 1: He's getting right home from a fellow airman who was
Speaker 1: African American. They pulled up at the bar and my
Speaker 1: dad realized it was an African American bar. And they
Speaker 1: walked in and my dad kind of feel all eyes
Speaker 1: upon him, you know, being a six foot seven white man.
Speaker 1: He said, in that moment when they said the words,
Speaker 1: you know, the Eagle has landed, cheers erupted, and there
Speaker 1: was no race in that bar. It was just this
Speaker 1: group of Americans excited and amazed at what had just
Speaker 1: been accomplished. Well, it was the summer of nineteen sixty
Speaker 1: nine and he had just graduated from high school and
Speaker 1: was headed to college. I was with my boyfriend who
Speaker 1: would later become my husband, and watch the landing together.
Speaker 1: As a young eighteen year old woman. It made me
Speaker 1: feel anything was possible and then I could do anything.
Speaker 1: It created an atmosphere of excitement and promise. And I
Speaker 1: must say that all the negativity in our culture today
Speaker 1: is so hard. And I have six grandchildren and I
Speaker 1: want them to be full of hope. We could really
Speaker 1: use an Apollo eleven experience today. Remember an episode three
Speaker 1: when we talked about John Hubolt, the engineer who insisted
Speaker 1: that lunar orbit rendezvous was the only way to get
Speaker 1: us to the Moon. You may remember that one of
Speaker 1: the men who disagreed with him at the time was
Speaker 1: Verna von Braun, the designer of the Saturn five rocket. Well, today,
Speaker 1: von Braun has invited Huboldt to mission control to witness
Speaker 1: Apollo Levin's touchdown. As the viewing area erupts and cheers
Speaker 1: and applause, von Braun turns to who Bolton says, thank you, John,
Speaker 1: it is a good idea and UH for the first
Speaker 1: time he had an opportunity within the control team to
Speaker 1: just take a deep breath and say, my God, today
Speaker 1: we just landed on the Moon with the UH be
Speaker 1: advised lots of smiling faces in its room and all
Speaker 1: over the world. Or threw up my fare There was
Speaker 1: a beautiful job, you guys, and don't forget one. In
Speaker 1: the command model. That last voice was Michael Collins in
Speaker 1: orbit sixty miles above. You've almost forgotten about him, hadn't you.
Speaker 1: On the earthword side, he has the chatter of Mission
Speaker 1: Control and Tranquility Base to keep him company. But on
Speaker 1: the far side of the Moon. For forty eight minutes
Speaker 1: at a time he has utterly cut off. Michael is
Speaker 1: well aware of what everyone is saying about him back
Speaker 1: on Earth. Michael Collins the loneliest man in the universe,
Speaker 1: but despite the fact that he's experiencing the most profound
Speaker 1: solitude of any human being in history, he doesn't feel lonely.
Speaker 1: That It's one of the questions I get asked him
Speaker 1: and God, and you got so close to the moning
Speaker 1: it didn't land. Don't not really bug it. It really
Speaker 1: does not. Uh. I honestly felt really privileged to be
Speaker 1: on Apollo eleven. Uh to have one of those three seats.
Speaker 1: I mean, there are guys in the ast obviously put
Speaker 1: my throat here to hear to have one of those
Speaker 1: three seats. Okay, just keep that averybody days ready for
Speaker 1: us up there. Now. We'll do our recommendation at this
Speaker 1: point is planning it easy, starting at about eight o'clock
Speaker 1: the season years some time, stand mine, give us some time.
Speaker 1: Things about that quality basic Houston. We thought about it.
Speaker 1: We will support it. We're going at that time over.
Speaker 1: The plan was for Kneel and Buzz to begin a
Speaker 1: sleep period once they landed on the Moon, but the
Speaker 1: astronauts are excited they want to get out onto the
Speaker 1: Moon's surface. Now they can sleep later, and Houston concurs.
Speaker 1: But first Buzz wants to acknowledge the enormity of the moment.
Speaker 1: I hear that in tran quiality over tranquility used to
Speaker 1: go ahead, Roger, this is the lamp pilot. I'd like
Speaker 1: to take this opportunity to every person listening in, whoever
Speaker 1: wherever they may may, to pause for a moment and
Speaker 1: contemplate the events of the past you are and to
Speaker 1: give thanks in his or her own way. Over Buzz
Speaker 1: switches off the radio and takes a moment in the
Speaker 1: midst of the maelstrom of history to quiet himself. He
Speaker 1: opens two small plastic containers. One contains bread, the other
Speaker 1: contains wine. The last supper is the first meal on
Speaker 1: the moon. We are beginning our eav a prip. Neil
Speaker 1: and Buzz struggle into their portable life support systems. These
Speaker 1: are the backpacks containing their breathable oxygen, water, coolant, and
Speaker 1: communication systems. Tranquility based, Houston, you are go for a
Speaker 1: cabin deep. As the men equalize the pressure inside their
Speaker 1: cabin to match the lunar environment outside, Neil ponders what
Speaker 1: he's going to say when he first steps on the moon.
Speaker 1: He's had too much to concentrate on in the weeks
Speaker 1: and days leading up to the mission to come up
Speaker 1: with anything. He suddenly realizes that whatever he says is
Speaker 1: going to be recorded in every history book for time immemorial.
Speaker 1: No pressure. As the mission commander, Neil will be the
Speaker 1: first one out of the vehicle. The Buzz actually petitioned
Speaker 1: NASA to be the first. The decision came down to
Speaker 1: fun hui. The Lamb's hatch swings into the cabin and
Speaker 1: to the right, blocking Buzz behind it until Neil climbs
Speaker 1: out of the way. Now comatic open slowly, Neil begins
Speaker 1: making his way down the ten foot ladder. His suit
Speaker 1: is so cumbersome that he can't even see his own feet.
Speaker 1: On the second rung, he yanks ad ring, deploying the
Speaker 1: MASA equipment and tool bay, as well as a television camera,
Speaker 1: which automatically begins broadcasting a signal back to Earth. Well,
Speaker 1: I look at pictures. We can see you're coming down
Speaker 1: the ladder. Now there's that foot there down the steps.
Speaker 1: If you've ever looked at pictures of Neil on the lamb, ladder.
Speaker 1: You've noticed that the rung stop about three and a
Speaker 1: half feet before the footbeds, forcing him to jump the
Speaker 1: rest of the disc it's down. This is because everyone
Speaker 1: anticipated that the legs would compress upon landing. Instead, Neil
Speaker 1: set the eagle down so gently that the legs never
Speaker 1: even budged. He's a victim of his own masterful flying.
Speaker 1: At the foot of the ladder, the lamp foot beds
Speaker 1: are only impressed in the surface about one or two
Speaker 1: inches brought the lamb mount Neil steps off with his
Speaker 1: left foot, places it on the surface, and bounces slightly
Speaker 1: to test it. So there's a foot on the moon,
Speaker 1: stepping down on the moon. If he's testing that first step,
Speaker 1: he must be stepping down on the Moon at this point.
Speaker 1: And just like that, for the first time in history,
Speaker 1: a human has stepped foot on another world. Armstrong is
Speaker 1: on the Moon. Neil Armstrong, thirty eight year old American,
Speaker 1: standing on the surface of the Moon on this July
Speaker 1: nineteen and sixty nine. And now the man known for
Speaker 1: his silences must find the perfect words. In Neil's living
Speaker 1: room back in Houston, his wife Janet tightly clutches their
Speaker 1: two small sons be descriptive now, Neil, she says aloud,
Speaker 1: at just shy of ten pm Houston time. Neil Armstrong says,
Speaker 1: that's one man. Neil later admitted to what he'd meant
Speaker 1: to say was the more consistent and grammatically correct. That's
Speaker 1: one small step for a man, one giant leap for mankind.
Speaker 1: But in all of the excitement he misspoke. Thankfully the
Speaker 1: world understood his meaning. Just fine, purpose is fine and powdery.
Speaker 1: I can end it up loosely with my toe at here,
Speaker 1: and the fine layers like potter and charcoal to the
Speaker 1: side of my fruit. Regular, the fancy word for moon dust,
Speaker 1: is as fine as talcum powder, but as abrasive as
Speaker 1: sand paper. It is electrically charged by solar radiation, so
Speaker 1: that it sticks to every surface it comes in contact with.
Speaker 1: Seems to be no difficulty and moving around the simulations
Speaker 1: of one and we performed and various simulations on the
Speaker 1: ground on Earth during training. Neil, combined with his suit
Speaker 1: and backpack, weighed three hundred and fifty pounds. Here, in
Speaker 1: lunar gravity, he weighs less than sixty. Neil is inside
Speaker 1: a wearable spacecraft that cost one thousand dollars to design
Speaker 1: and manufacture. It was made by Platex. Yeah, the bra manufacturer.
Speaker 1: They know a thing or two about making strong, flexible,
Speaker 1: form fitting clothing. The astronauts were protected from the Moon's
Speaker 1: extremes of heat and cold, ultra violet radiation, and micro
Speaker 1: meteorites by twenty one layers fitted to knee preme bellows
Speaker 1: and steel aircraft wires, which allowed the men to bend
Speaker 1: in all the right places. Such joints are critical given
Speaker 1: that each suit is inflated to about three point seven
Speaker 1: five pounds per square inch of pure oxygen. Think about
Speaker 1: how firm of football is when it's fully inflated. And
Speaker 1: here's the coolest bit of all. Each suit was sown
Speaker 1: by hand buzz lowers a hassle blab camera down to
Speaker 1: Neil via a cable and pulley system rigged to the
Speaker 1: inside of the capsule. The astronauts have dubbed it the
Speaker 1: Brooklyn clothesline. Neil is astonished by the view all around
Speaker 1: him and feels compelled to capture some images of the
Speaker 1: surrounding topography. If you've seen any of the pictures from
Speaker 1: the Moon, you know that Neil took some extraordinary images.
Speaker 1: All the more impressive since Neil doesn't have a viewfinder
Speaker 1: to look through. The camera is mounted to his chest
Speaker 1: and at its own it's like much as the United
Speaker 1: States Good, but it's very pretty unious. With some pictures
Speaker 1: out of the way, Neil begins collecting some of the
Speaker 1: soil at his feet and scooping it into a bag.
Speaker 1: After filling it out, Neil tosses away a ring that
Speaker 1: had been keeping the bag open in the one six gravity.
Speaker 1: It sails far from him. Now it's Aldrin's turn. Are
Speaker 1: you ready? Buzz pauses on the ladder to make sure
Speaker 1: that the hatch doesn't close behind him. Even the slightest
Speaker 1: pressure difference between the inside and the outside would make
Speaker 1: the hatch profoundly difficult, if not impossible, to open again. Thought,
Speaker 1: that's our home for the next couple of hours. And
Speaker 1: two Americans on the Moon. Back in Houston, Joan Aldrin's
Speaker 1: body shutters as she vacillates between laughter and sobs. As
Speaker 1: her husband takes his first steps on the moon, she
Speaker 1: begins throwing kisses towards his flickering black and white image.
Speaker 1: And magnificent desolation is well a perfectly sublime way of
Speaker 1: describing the surface of the Moon. But it's about as
Speaker 1: close as we're going to get to either of these
Speaker 1: guys getting emotional during their experience. They have a job
Speaker 1: to do, and philosophical musings aren't on their checklists. The
Speaker 1: first thing that is on Buzzes checklist is to get
Speaker 1: used to walking around in the lunar environment, which terrifies
Speaker 1: his son Andy. I was convinced that Dad was going
Speaker 1: to trip in, you know, end up flat on his
Speaker 1: back like a dead bug, in front of six million
Speaker 1: people and most importantly my two hundred classmates. Those are
Speaker 1: the kind of things that we're going through my head
Speaker 1: because I'm an eleven year old kid. As Buzz continues
Speaker 1: to get used to his new environment, Neil opens the
Speaker 1: masa storage bay housing their tools and equipment. Beside it
Speaker 1: is a metal plaque bolted to one of the eagles
Speaker 1: legs airmen from the planet Earth for except for it,
Speaker 1: upon the Moon ninety became in baseball mankind, it's time
Speaker 1: to run some experiments. First off is the solar wind collector,
Speaker 1: basically a small sheet of aluminum foil attached to a
Speaker 1: telescoping pole and planted to face the Sun. It will
Speaker 1: spend the duration of the mission soaking up solar wind particles,
Speaker 1: which will in turn provide clues for how our solar
Speaker 1: system was formed. Per his checklist, Neil takes a number
Speaker 1: of photos of Buzz at work. This is a Paulo
Speaker 1: Levin's only scandal. Well, Buzz was in possession of the camera,
Speaker 1: which admittedly was much less time than Neil. He didn't
Speaker 1: take a single picture of his mission commander. We have
Speaker 1: no images of Neil Armstrong on the Moon. That famous bootprint.
Speaker 1: That's Buzz too. Some conspiracy theorists believe that Buzz did
Speaker 1: this in retaliation for not being allowed to be the
Speaker 1: first one down the ladder, though it's far more likely
Speaker 1: just in oversight in the excitement of the moment. Next up,
Speaker 1: the men withdraw an American flag and erected a short
Speaker 1: distance from the spacecraft say that end up. The top
Speaker 1: edge of the flag is braced by a crossbar, ensuring
Speaker 1: the stars and stripes are always visible on the Moon.
Speaker 1: Without it, the flag would hang limp, as Earth flags
Speaker 1: do on windless days. Once the flag is up, Neil
Speaker 1: snaps one of the most famous images of the mission,
Speaker 1: Buzz saluting the flag and the camera, just as the
Speaker 1: guys are getting ready to move on to their next item,
Speaker 1: they get a surprise call. Neil and Buzz. The President
Speaker 1: of the United States is in his office now and
Speaker 1: would like to say, over honor, go ahead, Mr President. Hello,
Speaker 1: Neil and Buzz. For every American this has to be
Speaker 1: the proudest day of our lives. And for people all
Speaker 1: over the world. I am sure they too joined with eizing.
Speaker 1: What an immense speed this is because of what you
Speaker 1: have done, the heavens have become a part of man Borough.
Speaker 1: Thanking about the President. It's a great honor and privates
Speaker 1: for Earth to be here presented, not all in the
Speaker 1: United States, but and base of all nations, and with interest, profectualiosity,
Speaker 1: and with the vision for the feature. Time for some
Speaker 1: more experiments. As Neil gathers rocks, Buzz sets up two devices.
Speaker 1: The first is a seismic detector designed to allow scientists
Speaker 1: on Earth to monitor for moonquakes, volcanic eruptions, or meteorite impacts.
Speaker 1: The fatim had been bed floored manually. Next up is
Speaker 1: the laser ranging retro refractor. Scientists on Earth can bounce
Speaker 1: lasers off of it, gathering precise measurements of the distance
Speaker 1: from the Earth to the Moon. LA factor is installed,
Speaker 1: and the global level and alignment appears to be good.
Speaker 1: Well Buzz collects some regular Neil ventures a few hundred
Speaker 1: feet over to a raader, taking some time to marvel
Speaker 1: at his surroundings and snap a couple of pictures. This
Speaker 1: is the furthest that either of the astronauts will travel
Speaker 1: during the entire e v A. In our imaginations, we
Speaker 1: picture the Apollo eleven astronauts bounding euphorically across the lunar landscape,
Speaker 1: far from their spacecraft. However, the total area within which
Speaker 1: Neil and Buzz trade would fit roughly within a Major
Speaker 1: League Baseball field. The suston you have approximately three minutes
Speaker 1: and to you, let's comment a termination activity whatever? Okay, hey,
Speaker 1: anything more before I head and I get a head
Speaker 1: on up the ladder heads on him. Well Buzz makes
Speaker 1: his way up the ladder. Neil uses the regular around
Speaker 1: his feet to fill in the empty spaces in several
Speaker 1: cases of moon rocks. Each case is vacuum sealed, ensuring
Speaker 1: that when the boxes are later opened in special clean
Speaker 1: rooms back on Earth, the atmosphere inside the case is uncontaminated.
Speaker 1: Neil sends two cases up to Buzz via the Brooklyn clothesline.
Speaker 1: There's one last thing the men want to do. The
Speaker 1: comments you just heard are all that was said about
Speaker 1: their final task. They didn't inform the viewing public, nor
Speaker 1: do many admission control know what's going on. From the
Speaker 1: open hatch, Buzz throws Neil a pouch, which he places
Speaker 1: on the lunar soil. Inside is an Apollo one patch
Speaker 1: honoring the three astronauts Gus Grissom, Ed White and Roger Chaffee,
Speaker 1: who perished in the fire two years earlier, a disc
Speaker 1: containing goodwill messages from seventy three nations, and a small
Speaker 1: gold olive branch representing their peaceful intent. These items are
Speaker 1: not controversial, but the pouch also contains two Soviet medals.
Speaker 1: The first commemorates Uriga Garn, the first man in space,
Speaker 1: who died in a plane crash in n The second
Speaker 1: is a medal for Vladimir camarav, a cosmonaut who was
Speaker 1: killed when the parachutes on his Soyu spacecraft failed to
Speaker 1: open after a re entry. While these men were on
Speaker 1: the other side of the space race, as well as
Speaker 1: on the other side of America's Cold War with Soviet Russia,
Speaker 1: This was Apaul Elevin's way of honoring fallen comrades who
Speaker 1: didn't live long enough to see history made on the Moon.
Speaker 1: There's also one other item the public wasn't aware of
Speaker 1: inside the Eagle. Beside the astronauts during their flight to
Speaker 1: and from the Moon were wooden and cloth fragments from
Speaker 1: the original Right Flyer, the first successful airplane flown by
Speaker 1: Wilbur and Orval Wright just sixty years earlier. His job
Speaker 1: on the Moon done and his air supply running low,
Speaker 1: Neil re enters the lunar module. Once inside, he and
Speaker 1: Buzz take one last look at the lunar surface where
Speaker 1: they spent the better part of three hours, and then
Speaker 1: seal the hat closed and lang. Inside the spacecraft is
Speaker 1: a new smell from all the moon dust covering their gear.
Speaker 1: It smells like a spent firecracker. It reminds Buzz of
Speaker 1: wet ashes as they struggle out of their bulky backpacks. Houston.
Speaker 1: Let's Michael in on the news, Columbia, Columbia, that is Houston.
Speaker 1: The crew of Tranquiality bases back inside their base, repressurized.
Speaker 1: They're in a process of adopting the u plusses. Everything
Speaker 1: went beaut to play cover. Oh yeah, with all of
Speaker 1: those rocks and soil samples, the eagle is now too
Speaker 1: heavy to lift off the lunar surface. To lighten the vessel,
Speaker 1: they must now open the hatch and toss out everything
Speaker 1: they no longer need, from their life support backpacks and
Speaker 1: boots to empty food packages, another trash, even a spare
Speaker 1: hassle blood camera. Remember that seismometer that Buzz set up
Speaker 1: Roger's tranquility. We observe your equipment Jedison on the TV
Speaker 1: and the pactive site and get experiment recorded docs when
Speaker 1: each float hit the surface. Over ants get away with
Speaker 1: anything anymore. No, indeed, they'd like to say from all
Speaker 1: of us down here in Arson and early, from all
Speaker 1: of us and all that countries and in the entire world,
Speaker 1: we think that you've done a magnificent job up there today.
Speaker 1: Thank you very much. It's been a long day. Yes, indeed,
Speaker 1: get some rest there and have at it tomorrow. Neil
Speaker 1: and Buzz have now been up for twenty one hours. Famished,
Speaker 1: they eat some cocktail sausages and try to find a
Speaker 1: place to sleep. The eagle doesn't have beds. Neil curls
Speaker 1: up on the cover of the ascent tension while Buzz
Speaker 1: chooses the floor, so they pull blinds down over the windows.
Speaker 1: A lot of light still streams into the capsule, enough
Speaker 1: to allow Buzz to see that one of the circuit
Speaker 1: breaker switches on the control panel was broken off while
Speaker 1: they struggled out of their backpacks. The switch sends electrical
Speaker 1: power to the ascent engine that they're gonna need to
Speaker 1: get off the Moon in the morning. Without that switch,
Speaker 1: they're not going anywhere. That, combined with a far more
Speaker 1: frigid spacecraft than either of anticipated, guarantees they will get
Speaker 1: next to no sleep tonight. The race for the Moon
Speaker 1: has been one. The exploration of space has just begun.
Speaker 1: Day five is over. Day six, July one begins with
Speaker 1: our next episode. The day Apollo eleven is to leave
Speaker 1: the Moon, but because the lunar module is crippled, the
Speaker 1: return home is now in doubt. Only one half of
Speaker 1: President Kennedy's pledge has been fulfilled. Yes, the United States
Speaker 1: has landed men on the Moon before the end of
Speaker 1: the decade, but returning them safely back to Earth maybe impossible.
Speaker 1: This podcast is a production of I Heart Radio and
Speaker 1: trade Craft Studios. Executive producers Ashe Seroia and Scott Bernstein
Speaker 1: in association with High five Content and executive producer Andrew Jacobs.
Speaker 1: Amazing research and production assistance by associate producers Brian show
Speaker 1: Saw and Natalie Robomed. Our incredible editor is Bill Lance.
Speaker 1: Original music by Henry ben Wah. Special thanks to Andy
Speaker 1: Aldrin and Mission controls Steve Bales. Thanks to Mike Dawson,
Speaker 1: Jeff McCarthy, Terry Guvara, Greg Simpson, Adam Howard, John Rantle,
Speaker 1: Paul Olmstead, and Margaret Roland for sharing their moon landing memories.
Speaker 1: Special thanks to everyone at NASA who made this podcast possible,
Speaker 1: especially the incredible technological wizardry of consulting producer Ben Feist,
Speaker 1: who's responsible for organizing and cleaning the eleven thousand hours
Speaker 1: of mission audio your hearing selections from in this podcast.
Speaker 1: Special thanks also to consultant Gina Dellback Licensing rights and
Speaker 1: clearances by Deborah Correa. This is a brand new podcast
Speaker 1: and we're so excited to be sharing it with you.
Speaker 1: Help us spread it far and wide, tell your friends,
Speaker 1: leave ratings and reviews, and chat about it on social media.
Speaker 1: Our hashtag is nine D I J. We would love
Speaker 1: to hear what you think. New episodes come out each week,
Speaker 1: so be sure to subscribe wherever you get your podcasts.
Speaker 1: I'm Brandon Phipps. Thanks so much for listening, and I'll
Speaker 1: see you next episode.