NASA Forgot How To Go To The Moon!!!

Found this today and broke out laughing...

With all the renewed talk about "Did they go to the Moon" this is quite timely

Seems they forgot how they got to the moon... You would think they had the notes somewhere but Nope... they don't..

Just like they lost the Moon tapes...

The Saga Of the Lost Space Tapes
NASA Is Stumped in Search For Videos of 1969 Moonwalk
www.washingtonpost.com...

...it seems they don't have the plans on how they built the moon ships... and no one is left working for NASA that remembers how they did it...

so they are REVERSE ENGINEERING Saturn V parts and scrounging in space junk yards to relearn how to do it...

With all the Shuttle delays and accidents... now they tell us they have to figure out how to get back to the Moon



You have just GOT to see this...

NASA scientists going to junkyards to find parts to figure out how to do it

This is the best film I have seen for a long time... its got to be a classic

Wired TV PBS Release
SPACE JUNKYARD
www.pbs.org...

Here is a youtube portion but go to PBS link to see the full story

thanks for the laugh. I wouldn't want to be one of the astronauts going up into space with hammy down equipment

Wish I was the one to take it in the chin by Mr Glenn. There are some really wild stories out there. Wish I knew the 'real' one.

That is too funny. Realistically though, you wouldn't think that it would be that difficult to find the moon. But hey I guess it is hard to mimick something you have never done before.(not saying we didn't go to the moon, just that the new staff has never dealt with that)

Here is another segment

Second-hand Space Parts may take us Back to the Moon

Norton Sales, a salvage yard and spare-parts shop on a rough industrial strip in North Hollywood, California, looks like the kind of place you'd go on a weekend afternoon to find a replacement item for your Harley. But it's also the kind of junkyard where you can find a spare master panel from Houston Mission Control, a shelf full of valves from a Saturn rocket, or a fuel tank for liquid oxygen.

All this space detritus ended up here courtesy of a federal rule that required government contractors to return all their built hardware - or sell it for scrap. So Norton Sales made discarded space gear the centerpiece of its business. Their customers used to be mostly souvenir hunters and set decorators for science-fiction movies. But now, rocket scientists and engineers are calling, looking for pieces of the intricate rocket plumbing that haven't been made in four decades.

These were the kind of parts that went into the mighty Saturn Five rockets that took men to the moon from the 1960s to the early 1970s. Now, as the United States gears up for a new set of missions to the moon and beyond, NASA is discovering that it has forgotten much about how those original rockets were built. Many of the engineers and contractors who developed the incredible number of pieces of machinery that went into those rockets aren't around anymore. And in many cases, the companies they worked for have changed hands or gone out of business, taking their blueprints and records with them.

NASA engineers and technicians are now busily digging up old rocket parts, cleaning them up and reverse-engineering them to figure out how they worked. So the path back to the moon might just go through Norton Sales' salvage yard.

www.pbs.org...

This does not surprise me in the least something similar happened in the 80' when Reagan wanted a 600 ship navy the brought the WWII battleships out of retirement and tried to upgrade the ship with modern equipment but when they started they were like WTF hardly anybody knew anything luckily the guys that help build them were still around

Maybe you missed this part of your video?

Think about it as thousands of complicated components, built by hundreds of different contractors, most of whom are today out of business”.

NASA never had all the specifics on its moon vehicles, there were specialists contractors who built much of the rocket, and who were on hand if there was an issue with any of their components. This was shown very well in the Movie Apollo 13 with the Grumman LEM contractor…


Incompatibility of parts:


Grumman Contractor: “how’s about that LEM, eh?”
Gene Crantz: “Yeah, I guess you can keep your job.”
Grumman Contractor: “Darn Right!”



I guess I don’t get the conspiracy here?

[edit on 6/2/2008 by defcon5]

It seems NASA really does not want to or maybe cannot afford to chance their arm on solving the getting off Earth problem.

I find it slightly puzzling because the tech is already in place to deliver pay loads into orbit with the likes of the autonomous vehicles such the Jules Verne and of course manned platforms like the shuttle.

Assembly of components for the ISS has proven that modular construction can be achieved so in this light why could they not assemble a command module/luner lander in orbit and circumnavigate the problem of using just one heavy lift vehicle to get everything in orbit in one hit that uses technology they are not familiar with.

The budget seems to exist to deliver new ISS components but I wonder what percentage of this is being provided by other countries, I suppose if the new incentive, ie money for going to the Moon or even Mars is being provided by the US and the budget is not there than I guess they would have to go for the cheapest option it is a pity because personally I think it is holding back progress.

A few months back, I saw something on NASA's site that made me giggle. They were trying to figure out how the guillotine worked when the command module separated from the LEM. They tried for months to find an 'intact' command module guillotine that had not been used, then one of the workers had a look at his mates family vacation photos and saw a perfect unused command module sitting in a museum in a family shot.

WOW how can they not know about an unused command module????
And the Engineer found it in one of his mate’s family photos!!!!!

NASA Announces Plan To Launch $700 Million Into Space

"This is an exciting opportunity to study the effect of a hard-vacuum, zero-gravity environment on $50 and $100 bills," said NASA Administrator Michael Griffin, who noted that prior Project Denarius missions only studied space's effect on fives and singles. "Whether the money is immediately incinerated because of hard radiation, or freezes in the near-absolute-zero temperature and shatters into infinitesimal pieces, or drifts aimlessly through the cosmos before being sucked through a black hole into another dimension, it will provide crucial information for our next series of launches, which will consist of even greater sums of money, in larger denominations."

aaahahahhaah...

It's been 40 years (give or take a year) since the last (first) moon mission. EVERYTHING has advanced in leaps and bounds in that 40 years especially computers and electronics. With a large number of space missions since then one would assume that rockets would also have advanced quite a bit. They should have better computers, electronics, life support, everything basically. One would expect them to be faster and more fuel efficient among other things.

What do you need to get to the moon?
1. Leave the Earth's gravity.
Been doing that for 50 years.

2. Get to the moon.
Fuel efficiency, safety, life support and everything else has improved so that shouldn't be a problem.

3. Landing on the moon.
1/6th the gravity of Earth. Same as last time.

4. Protective gear for the astronauts.
Hmm

5. Leaving the moon
Hmm

This I feel is where the problems are. If the conspiracy theory is correct they have never been to the moon so #'s 4 and 5 is brand new and because it's 40 years on it should be a piece of cake, right?

Scratching around in a junkyard? They're buying time. My feeling is that they are worried about the protective gear and taking off. My feeling is that you'll need a much bigger craft with more fuel to take off from the moon than the "first time". If something goes wrong they'll just say "Ja, it was a first time for the current staff, yada yada yada." I say it will be the first time ever, if they get there.

I remember reading on CNN a few years back that NASA set up a webpage were you can post your older Computer stuff cause they needed older hardware now since then they have done major upgrades but I thought the page was funny here was NASA these guys went to the moon and now they were trolling the web for spare parts!

its a bluff
in my opinion, NASA wants more money, they waste it left and right on 'the latest high tech' for all these mars missions etc...
now, they are hoping that if they make a big deal reguarding using cheap scrap basically, there will be a public outcry sending 'our boys' to the moon with cheap 40 year old junk
the government bow to public pressure for a\ proper job
nasa gets a bigger budget to spend on better toys

on a slightly different note
bearing in mind the US is 9 trillion in debt
allmost bankrupt?, and really in the poop financially
where are they getting the money to pay for this?
sorry for goign off topic a bit, but kinda curious

Has Russia still got all their archives and blue prints of the CCCP days? Wonder if NASA has asked the Russians if they could borrow some space junk sitting around rusting away in Russia.

Most countries and pretty much everybody is in debt. Doesn't make us all bankrupt does it?

Hell what do i not know about NASA that i couldn't find on the internet if i tried. The moon landing - a conspiracy? Who knows the real truth? Perhaps or perhaps not.

However, regardless of what i do or do not know it raises the question about the possibility of it having been a "lie" if they need to search junk heaps... But again, there is much to be found on what is or is not on the moon and who did or did not go there.

Ok i am rambling. What was my point?

Multi-millions spent on "going to the moon and leaving again" and i echo sentiments raised in posts - surely tech has progressed enough NOT to have to look for age old tech. Yeah it is cheaper to reuse old junk but look at the shuttle problems and losses. Perhaps they need to spend more on using new tech than trying to revive old tech.

So, and this is purely an idea, perhaps the question is not can they do it but perhaps they need to "prove" somehow that they haven't been doing it already for decades - on a regular basis and need to, publicly, "remind" themselves of how they did it in the good old days - this is in NO way proof that they DO go to the moon regularly i am "just saying"

Sort of a technology smoke screen - perhaps?

NASA: Hey look at us - we are going to the moon again
PUBLIC: oooooooooooo ahhhhhhhhh
NASA: Yes, that's right. We finally decided to do it so we are refreshing our minds and we need LOTS more money to do it
PUBLIC: OK! So these ideas that you have been going to the moon, from time to time, is really all lies! Yes we believe now - you don't do that and there is no Secret ISS after all.
NASA: See, we were honest.
PUBLIC: Yeah we are so sorry for doubting you guys!
NASA: So can we have some more money for our new Navada warehouse? We need new camera equipment too - JUST in case.
PUBLIC: Oh hell yeah - what's the account number we can deposit all our hard earned money into?
NASA: Oh and before we forget, we will ensure there is another conspiracy about whether we did get there again or not. JUST to keep you ATS'ers busy!


LMAO... can you picture this scenario?

Originally posted by Lannock
...What do you need to get to the moon?
1. Leave the Earth's gravity.
Been doing that for 50 years....

For the record, an astronaut has not left (most of) Earth's gravity since Apollo 17. The astronauts on orbit in the Space Station, Space Shuttle, and Soyuz are still subjected to 99% of the Earth's gravity. In fact gravity is NEEDED to achieve an orbit. Gravity is what defines an orbit -- not the lack of gravity.

The Astronauts in orbit experience "zero g's" because they and their spacecraft are both FALLING at the same rate (falling due to Earth's gravity pulling on them).

Back on topic -- Apollo was all about getting to the Moon and getting back -- that's all. This new Constellation program is about getting to the Moon and living there...of course this program will be more complicated that Apollo, which means more time and money (although in Apollo's case, it was very expensive because of their compressed 9-year shedule to get to the Moon.)

Why would 4 decades' old tech be used in a new endeavor in space???

Isn't there already an Air Force Space Program??? That YT video, at the beginning, seemed to be a little bit of bunk.....deception.

AND, the phrase about the old Saturn V rusting away in Huntsville?

Hasn't anyone been to the KSC museum in Florida? There's a Saturn V there....indoors. Not sure if there are any innards....but, who cares?

That was 1960s technology!!!!

Let's move on....unless you want to go back to piston-driven airplanes to take twelve hours to cross the Atlantic Ocean.

This post is funny yet mildly disturbing for obvious reasons.
Granted NASA had many contractors working on past space programs,but aren't there any smart people who can figure out how to get to the Moon?
They've put up rovers,satellites and components for the space station,yet they can't build a ship to go to the Moon.
It makes me seriously wonder if anybody DID go to the moon in the first place.
If I was an astronaut I sure wouldn't want to take a ride on the SAS (Sanford and Son) Express.

reply to post by zorgon


Yea,to bad the "Secret Space Force"won't help um' out...............since they are 'lightyears'ahead of NASA in space exploration technology.

NASA is just a front for the public,nothing more.