Fish Fear Me

It Just Feels Wrong

There's an old saying that I believe goes something like "Funerals are not for the dead, but the living." They give those of us left behind the chance to grieve, to remember, to together celebrate a life lived, to move on. In that sense, it seems so terribly wrong to me that Neil Armstrong, the first man to ever set foot on the Moon, will be laid to rest in a private ceremony on Friday.

I understand that the family would want to continue Armstrong's lifelong penchant for modesty, but in this, his final respects, I humbly disagree. I think Armstrong should receive a state funeral befitting his, and the many thousands of others, indeed the whole nation's, historic achievement.

In life it was right to leave him to the modesty and lack of limelight that he chose. In death though, it is time to honor his, and our achievement with honors that befit a great man and a great nation.

I think it doesn't speak well for us as a society, now or in the future, if we let this moment pass without a state funeral.

My two cents.  

Neil Armstrong, Rest In Peace

A boyhood hero of mine, and many millions of others, has died:

CINCINNATI (AP) — Neil Armstrong was a quiet self-described nerdy engineer who became a global hero when as a steely-nerved pilot he made "one giant leap for mankind" with a small step on to the moon. The modest man who had people on Earth entranced and awed from almost a quarter million miles away has died. He was 82.

Armstrong died following complications resulting from cardiovascular procedures, a statement Saturday from his family said. It didn't say where he died.

I had read that he recently had heart surgery and that he was doing well. I'm very saddened that it turns out that things took a terrible turn for the worse. My condolences to his family and friends. 

Armstrong's accomplishments are obviously widely known and appreciated, and there's no need for me to recap them here. I will say though, there was a time in my youth when he was second only to my father in my respect and admiration. Time naturally adds more to that place over the years, but there's no doubt he remains there in my esteem.

He was a fellow Buckeye, a brave astronaut, and later, a man who set the standard for public figures by showing humility and grace in accepting how his own hard work and flat-out luck put him in one of the greatest roles in human history. I love how after soaring all the way to the moon, he chose to spend part of his years working the earth and raising cattle on his farm outside of Cincinnati.  

There were many thrilling moments to that most wondrous Apollo 11 mission to the moon, but the one I hold most dear is the successful descent and landing instead of that first step, because of all of the opportunities for disaster that never came to pass as they set the Eagle down. Neil Armstrong would be the first to credit the whole team, but his skill and courage had much, if not everything, to do with that too.

So few words will ever compete with "...the Eagle has landed." 

Godspeed, Neil Armstrong.

Forty Years Ago Today X-Splashdown

Apollo 11 splashed into the Pacific Ocean at 11:51 A.M. CDT on July 24, 1969, ending what I consider the greatest journey in history. The mission had lasted 195 hours, 18 minutes, 35 seconds and it had fulfilled John F. Kennedy's goal of "landing a man on the Moon and returning him safely to the Earth."

I remember being a little worried that the capsule had ended up upside down in the water, but a few minutes later it was right side up and the divers and rafts then made it to the scene. What followed was a carefully rehearsed recovery process of isolation and decontamination:

The possibility of the astronauts bringing a dangerous Moon germ back to Earth was considered remote, but not impossible. At this point in the recovery, the UDT decontamination specialist, LT Clancy Hatleberg, jumped into the water from helicopter #66 and swam to one of the rafts. He donned a special Biological Isolation Garment (BIG suit) and then handed 3 other BIG suits into the spacecraft so the Apollo 11 crew could put them on. These suits created an effective biological barrier for the astronauts who had come in contact with lunar dust so any germs wouldn't spread to the recovery team.

More details at that link. I don't think anyone but the usual crackpot crowd seriously thought that Apollo 11 would bring back any kind of organism, but even the slightest possibility could not be ignored. The astronauts would spend three weeks in quarantine until being declared 100% fit to take part in the huge number of parades and celebrations that awaited them. They seemed endless to me at the time and I never got tired of seeing them on the news.

I have more to say about Apollo 11, but I'll end this "forty years ago today" stuff with a picture of three astronauts. Not the three Apollo 11 astronauts, not that they aren't deserving, but of the three men who seemed mostly forgotten this past week or so, and who gave their lives while training for the first Apollo mission; Gus Grissom, Ed White, and Roger Chaffee.

The accident that killed them led to major redesign of the command module and a tightening of standards in production. It was a terrible blow to NASA and the nation at the time, but the lessons learned resulted in the successful Apollo 11 mission two and a half years later. RIP, men.

Forty Years Ago Today IX-One Small Step

I remember that after the successful landing on the moon, all of the tension in me evaporated and nothing was left but pure exhilaration. I could barely contain myself as we all waited to head over to my grandparent's house and watch a man step onto the moon for the first time. Finally, sometime after dinner, my parents loaded all five of us(mom was about 3 months along with the littlest sister, Patty) into the car and we headed over to watch history.

My grandparent's had a big color TV, something that we, and if I remember correctly, most homes, didn't have at the time. Not that it turned out to matter. We gathered together in that living room, the adults sitting on the furniture, the kids sprawled all over the carpet. I remember being alarmed at first because the first images looked like crap. In fact, I think I was about ready to burst into tears. But somebody at NASA fiddled and faddled with the contrast and we could soon make out Neil Armstrong on the ladder.

We all cheered. The time was 9:56 P.M. CDT. I remember Buzz Aldrin joining Armstrong and watching them walk around and plant the US flag, but I don't remember how long we stayed. Most likely, all of us kids one by one fell asleep and I bet dad ended up carrying a couple of us to the station wagon to go home way past our bedtimes.

It was a tremendous moment that I will never forget. They would spend a total of 22 hours on the moon, roughly 2 1/2 of those walking on the surface. They were still a long way from home and there would be risky moments after that, but I don't remember worrying about them. If they had made it that far, I figured everything else was going to work out too. And it did.

Forty Years Ago Today VIII-The Eagle Has Landed

Apollo 11 entered lunar orbit on the afternoon of the 19th and the crew readied for the big day. On the morning of the 20th, they began to fire up the fantastically bug-like lunar module to land two of them on the moon:

At 9:27 a.m. (eastern time), Buzz Aldrin crawls into the Lunar Module and starts to power-up the spacecraft. About an hour later, Neil Armstrong enters the LM and together they continue to check the systems and deploy the landing legs.

I don't actually remember much of what went on during that day. I know that I had the same fears as everyone else at the time. Would they crash? Would they sink into the surface of the moon and be swallowed by it? Would the lunar module really work and get them back to the command module or would they end up stuck on the moon? I knew all of those smart men with their white shirts and pocket protectors were on the case, but could they actually pull off this amazing feat?

At 1:46 P.M. EDT, the LEM separated from the command module and began its descent to the moon. A little later that afternoon, at 4:18 P.M. EDT, millions around the world and I heard those immortal words..."Houston, Tranquility Base here...the Eagle has landed." There would be more immortal words to come.

Forty Years Ago Today VII

On day 3 of the Apollo 11 mission they continued an uneventful, well, relatively speaking, journey to the moon. By late afternoon they were about 175,000 miles from Earth and about 48,000 miles from the moon. It seems largely forgotten now, but the day before an unmanned craft from the USSR, Luna 15, had entered lunar orbit. That vessel was launched into space on July 13th and was a Soviet attempt to steal a little of Apollo 11's thunder by bringing their own lunar samples back to Earth. It crashed on the 21st while the Soviets were attempting to land it.

This is a pretty cool site if you are interested in tracking where Apollo 11 was and they are replaying the transmissions between the crew and mission control as they happened 40 years ago. It took forever to load for me this afternoon so you might have to be patient.

Forty Years Ago Today VI-We have a liftoff

I remember watching the video below when it really happened, though it was on just a black and white TV. I was in my pj's that morning as an eight year old boy. In fact, exactly an eight year old boy, as that day was my birthday. It was the mission to have a man walk on the moon, a real "man on the moon." The thought blew my little boy mind.

It was no sure thing, and so the suspense. The following video starts at just under the six minute mark before launch. I remember that at some point after after the launch and before the first stage separated, I stood up and pumped a fist and said GO! That launch was one of the most profound and gutsiest things I have ever witnessed to this day.

Godspeed.

Haha-One of my sisters tracked this pic down and gave it to me last night:

Dude...what's up with your hair? I asked my dad about that and he looked again, shrugged, and said "you were eight." Yep, can't argue with that. And if you couldn't tell for sure...yes, that's a rocket on the top of the cake.

Forty Years Ago Today V

One more day:

After a rigorous training schedule, the astronauts held a unique televised press conference while in quarantine at KSC, some 15 miles away from their questioners. "We're willing and ready to achieve our national goal," Apollo 11 commander Neil Armstrong told the press. When asked if they were afraid, there was a long pause while each waited for the other to answer. Armstrong finally said, "I wouldn't say fear is an unknown emotion to us. There is knowledge that there may be something you haven't thought of...or can't cope with. But as a crew ... we have no fear of launching out on this expedition," he said.

Forty years later, I think we have mostly forgotten just how complicated and dangerous it was to put three men on top of a 6.4 million pound rocket and ignite it. The launch team was confident after several successful Apollo launches, but everyone knew that there was a risk of something going disastrously wrong and the crew dying a fiery death. Instead of celebrating the first men to land on the moon in five more days we could have been watching a solemn memorial service.

In the meantime, the launch team continued the many tasks needed to bring the rocket to launch ready status. Starting on the evening of the 15th, the fueling task was begun(described in more detail here). The first stage of the rocket burned a kerosene/liquid oxygen mix and the millions of pounds of kerosene was loaded first. Later in the night/early morning of the 16th, they would begin filling the cryogenic tanks with liquid oxygen and hydrogen and maintain those at low pressure until just before liftoff.

Forty Years Ago Today IV

The terminal countdown for the launch of Apollo 11 began at 7:00 P.M. EDT on July 14, 1969 after a 16 hour scheduled hold. At that point, the mission was at T-28 hours. The hours don't add up because there were two more scheduled holds to come; 11 hours on the 15th and 1 hour 32 minutes on the morning of the 16th. It was a day for both the crew and the launch team to rest up for the final push:

July 14 - Countdown at 2

The Apollo 11 astronauts spent a quiet day at their moonport. Neil Armstrong, Mike Collins and Buzz Aldrin spent most of the day in the astronaut apartments at the Kennedy Space Center. Most of the Apollo launch team also took at least part of the day off for some rest. The Countdown was stopped for 16 hours -- as scheduled -- to allow a pause in the hectic preparations. In the "firing room" of the launch control center, fewer than 100 people kept watch over the giant rocket. That number would grow to 600 at blastoff time.

Forty Years Ago Today III

The anticipation continues to build:

July 13 - Countdown at 3

The Apollo 11 astronauts, in their final few days before going to the moon, eased up on their rigid training and did some "fun" flying. The crew started the day inside spacecraft trainers, but two of them broke away in the afternoon to sharpen their piloting skills above the flat Florida landscape. The Countdown for their historic lunar journey moved along smoothly through the day, still aimed at a 9:32 a.m. blastoff of the giant Saturn V rocket on Wednesday, July 16.