What are you talking about, Turb? You do realize the Saturn V was capable of this (it was designed to do this), and did so in December 1968?
That we haven't that heavy lift out of Earth orbit capability today is completely irrelevant.



No one who has academic and practical qualifications (such as aerospace engineeers, astrophysicists, research pilots, etc...) have any difficulty distinguishing between a documented test program and an opinion based upon lack of information and knowledge about that program. They understand the how of an engineering flight test program. None of them believe it was true, because lots of them did it. The only people who actually make your type of distinction are those who know very little about such things...




True....save that the test aspect was to send them into space, for determination if microgravity had any effects, possible radiation effects, etc...
The space 150,000 miles out, or in lunar orbit is no different biologically. We went into Earth orbit because that's where capability was. As soon as lunar capability was accomplished, animals went there too.



True, but again, your emphasis on LEO is irrelevant. It was the space environment we were interested in. LEO was the capability. Lunar orbit is not biologically significant. If you can tolerate one, you can tolerate the other...it's just a matter of getting there.



True until you get to the part about Apollo 8, which was of course a logical progression based upon our capabilities at the time.
Kosmos 110 sucessfully sent animals into the lower Van Allen belts for a month. Zond 5 sent a slew of animal and other biological payloads around the Moon, both occurring before the Apollo 8 mission. All specimens, including the turtles, worms, bacteria and plants survived the week long journey to the Moon and back with no ill effects.





See above...





I think only a hard core HB could make such an argument...
How does one walk on Jupiter or Saturn?


The fact is, you simply cannot come to grips with an engineering test flight program, which is what the entire U.S. space program was!
Set bold goals, design to accomplish incrementally, set yourself up to minimize all risk that is possible to minimize, and progress.

Apollo 8 happened because we were ready to do it. Apollo 11; ditto. There was nothing further to test when these TEST FLIGHTS were executed. They were the next step in the progression.

You don't test manned lunar orbital capability, with a vehicle that is ready, to the best of everyone's knowledge, WITHOUT THE MEN.
You don't test manned lunar landing capability, with a vehicle that is ready to do so, to the best of everyone's knowledge, WITHOUT THE MEN.

It is difficult to see how reasoning to the contrary works.

In March 1966, Boeing approved the design and development of the 747-100. They built the facility for construction, did the design, engineering, exhaustive testing, and just under 3 years later, the first aircraft rolled out, ready to fly. What was the next thing to do?

Test fly her, maybe? Prove her out? Shake her down?
Sure, any test pilot would agree, any engineer. It was a massive aircraft designed to be flown by men, and, to the best of everyone's knowledge, it was ready.

By your reasoning, we shouldn't have done that. Why? Because, it had never been done! It had never been flown by men!
Well then, what do we do?

Well, let's fly it unmanned! Make sure it works!

The looks would've been priceless to see...especially on the faces of the test pilots who had studied this thing from stem to stern, and who were were ready to fly her...to test her to make sure she was indeed what the numbers said she was.

At a certain point, you get in and test it the way it was designed to be tested. That's what Apollo did...all the way down the line.

No...but I'd have loved to have been on any of them...except 13!
That was not the best 4 days to be spending in space!

Summarized details of the Lunar Module Development Program sourced from Apollo Program Summary Report

4.5 Lunar Module Development Program

4.5.1 Introduction

The decision to utilize a lunar rendezvous mission technique was made in July 1962, and the contract for the design and development of the lunar module was awarded four months later. The lunar module was unique in that it was the first manned spacecraft which was specifically designed for operation totally outside of the earth's environment. Basedf on the mission plan, the spacecraft was designed to (1) land two astronauts on the moon from lunar orbit, (2) support lunar surface exploration and the deployment of scientific experiments, and (3) return the astronauts and lunar samples to the command and service mudule in lunar orbit.

No parallel equivalent to the command module Block I and Block II development philosophy existed in the lunar module development, although the lunar module was reconfigured in the late stages of the Apollo program to accomodate an extended lunar stay capability. Unlike the command module development program, the lunar module development program emphasized ground tests and minimized unmanned flight development tests. As planned, LM-1 was the sole unmanned lunar module which was flight tested with operative systems. In all, only three production lunar modules were flight tested prior to the Apollo 11 lunar landing mission (see section 2.3 and 2.4) and there were no boilerplate flight items in the program. The general configuration of the lunar module is shown in figure 4-18.

4.5.2 Test Articles and Ground Test Program

The lunar module developments program utilized a series of ground test vehicles for establishing the production copnfiguration and man-rating the flight vehicles. In increasing order of development complexity, the types of vehicles employed were mockups (M series), test modules (TM series), and lunar module test articles (LTA series). In some instances, the lunar module was simulated. The following paragraphs identify the test articles and indicate the types of ground test programs that they supported.

4.5.2.1 Mockups. - Five lunar module mockups were constructed during the course of the development program. A wooden mockup, designated M-1, was constructed for the purpose of studying the ascent stage cabin configuration requirements. M-3 was an ascent and descent stage external configration article. It was used for verification of the spacecraft/launch vehicle adapter interface and for facility verification. The M-4 mockup was constructed to study the descent stage engine comp[artment requirements. M-5 was a mockup for the evaluation of the spacecraft equipment installation. Mockup M-6 was developed to support new flammability test requirements imposed after the Apollo 1 fire.

4.5.2.2 Test Models. - Sixteen test models were used in the lunar module development program. Most of the test models were specialized for specific investigations and were not complete ascent and descent stage configurations. These models were used for such things as crew visabgility and mobility studies (TM-1), radio frequency tests (TM-3), pyrotechnic studies of ascent/descent stage separation (TM-4), lightweight descent stage landing studies and stowage reviews (TM-5), rendezvous radar antenna tests (TM-6 and TM-7), landing radar tests (TM-8), reaction control ststem plum impingement tests (TM-9), battery installation thermal tests (TM-13), docking tunnel tests (TM-14), descent stage thermal tests (TM-15 and TM-17), and descent stage structural tests (TM-16)

4.5.2.3 Lunar Module Test Articles. - Eight lunar module test articles were constructed. the LTA-B article was used solely to provide ballast, in the form of the lunar module configuration, for the Apollo 8 mission. The LTA-1 test article was used for ground testing the lunar module electrical and electronic systems and to verify the checkout procedures which were develpoed for the flight spacecraft. Like all the LTA series, LTA-1 was constructed, inspected, and tested by the same controlled process as a production flight vehicle. Also, this test article was designed in parallel with the LM-1 unmanned flight vehicle, but had an earlier forward hatch configuration. Test article LTA-2 was first used to test the response to the launch vehicle vibration environment. It was later refurbished and used as payload ballast for the Apollo 6 launch vehicle. LTA-3 was a static and dynamic structural test article. Designed in parallel with LM-3, the LTA-3 test article was a product of the so-called super weight improvement program which was implemented for LM-3 and subsequent vehicles to decreas and control the growing lunar module weight. The LTA-5 test bed was a complete descent stage and was used for descent stage propulsion testing at the White Sands Test Facility. Man-rating testing was performed on LTA-8 in the Space Environment Simulation Laboratory at the Manned Spacecraft Centre (sec. 11.4). This test article was essentially the same as the LM-1 spacecraft. Originally built as a test article for use by the command and service module prime contractor, LTA-10 was later used on the unmanned Apollo 4 mission as instrumented ballast for the launch vehicle. The LTA-11 test vehicle supported the extended lunar stay requirements for the Apollo 15, 16 and 17 missions, and was used as a drop test vehicle in conjunction with the testing of the lunar roving vehicle.

4.5.3 Unmanned Flight Test Program

The Apollo 5 mission featured the unmanned flight testing of the first production lunar module, designated LM-1. As an unmanned vehicle, LM-1 had both automatic and remote controlled programming capability to operate the active onboard systems. The LM-2 vehicle was produces as a "sister ship" to LM-1, but had optional manned/unmanned flight capability. Originally intended to be used as the first manned lunar module on Apollo 8, it was diverted to support the ground test program in the Manned Spacecraft Center's vibro-accoustic test facility after Apollo 8 became the comman-and-service-module lunar orbital mission.

4.5.4 Manned Vehicles

The lunar module development program was continued during the production of the flight spacecraft by the continual updating of flight hardware to reflect changes indicated from mission experience and new program requirements. The most program-effective single step was the aforementioned super weight improvement program. This program employed some of the most sophisticated engineering design and manufacturing techniques used to date in the production of manned spacecraft.

4.5.4.1 Apollo 9 through Apollo 14 Lunar Modules. - The vehicles used in the Apollo 9 and Apollo 10 missions were developed for use in earth orbit and lunar orbit and, as such, had numerous differences from the lunar landing spacecraft. Table 4-V indicates the major differences.

4.5.4.2 Extended-Stay Lunar Modules. - The Apollo 15 through Apollo 17 mission lunar modules were modified to support the program requirements for greater science payloads and a longer stay time, and to carry a lunar roving vehicle for lunar surface exploration. These changes are shown in table 4-V.




Cz

Well, postie, all I can say is 'thanks' - because this is another perfect example of what I'm talking about.

How is it possible that they did this 47 years ago, while no manned dive has even approached that depth ever since? I'll answer that at the end of this post. But to continue with the other points..



This is your logical fallacy/"if I ran the zoo" argument, which you've also used for Apollo.

You're taking it as a proven fact that they did send two people on "such a ridiculous venture". That is, you're starting out with that assumption, and then you ask me why they would do so, without attempting it first with unmanned/remote craft.

But, as with Apollo, I do not take it as a proven fact. And therefore, I really don't see any point in addressing questions that start with that assumption - because it is not a proven fact.



Great questions. We can only speculate on the reason(s) why, of course. If they faked the descent, that would perfectly explain why they did not take any photos, etc. - because they weren't actually there. Another reason can be used both legitimately and to maintain a fraud - that the craft was not capable of photography at such depths, etc.
Maybe that's the reason they did give. (On a sidenote - this is the same way that many questions about Apollo's authenticity are answered)

Why do you think they didn't?



We don't. Do you think otherwise?



I don't think we should. Do you?



AFAIK, there is no evidence. Do you know of any?



No samples were returned, AFAIK. Do you know of any?



None.



None.



Ah, you're right back to your assumption that it actually happened as claimed, and raising questions based on that assumption. Sorry, postie, but you know my thoughts about that.



Yes. Do you think they faked it?



Well, as I just said, I think they faked it.

But if you don't think they faked it, then why do you choose to believe it, with very little evidence?



It does.


Now, it seems to me that you do believe that this story is factual, postie. Am I right about that? If you doubt the story, it's not very apparent from your comments and questions. Although you do note that there is very little evidence to support it, other than the word of those directly involved.

I think there is much more evidence that it was a hoax, as you'll see below...

Let's start with some points of interest, taken from the official account...

While on the bottom at maximum depth, Piccard and Walsh (unexpectedly) regained the ability to communicate with the surface ship, USS Wandank II ATA-204, using a sonar/hydrophone voice communications system.

While on the bottom, Piccard and Walsh observed small soles and flounders swimming away, proving that certain vertebrate life can withstand all existing extremes of pressure in earth's oceans. They noted that the floor of the Challenger Deep consisted of "diatomaceous ooze".

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bathyscaphe_Trieste

[i]At the bottom, Walsh and Piccard were surprised to discover soles or flounder about 30 cm (1 ft) long, as well as shrimp. According to Piccard, "The bottom appeared light and clear, a waste of firm diatomaceous ooze".

http://www.kerala.com/wiki-Mariana_Trench

Now, let's see if their claims can be validated by Kaiko - the only other craft (or the only one, period) to have reached the bottom of the Challenger Deep...

Kaikō was a remote control Japanese deep-sea submarine that sampled bacteria from the ocean floor of the Challenger Deep in the Mariana Trench, the deepest location in the world. On March 2, 1996, Kaikō reached a depth of 10,897 m, marking the deepest dive for an unmanned submersible on record

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kaiko


The Japanese submersible Kaiko, sampling mud at the bottom of the Challenger Deep in the Mariana Trench

So, is there life on the ocean floor? You bet! Is there life on the bottom of the Mariana Trench? Plenty! But it is not the kind of life you see in the jungle or in the pond in the local park.

First of all, most life forms at that depth are microorganisms or microbes. Tiny organisms you cannot see with the eye.

Below a depth of about 100 meter, the temperature is roughly 2 or 3 °C. All bacteria from these depths are called psychrophilic. They love the cold. That is all it means.

Pressure increases with one atmosphere for about every 10 meters (one atmosphere is 101,325 Pa; one bar is exactly 100,000 Pa). While some microbes (microsp merely are able to tolerate high pressures (barotolerant), others actually depend on it (barophilic).

Barotolerant microbes usually don't grow at pressures higher than 500 atmospheres and grow best at lower pressures. Barophilic microorganisms grow best at high pressures although they still grow at 1 atm as well.

http://www.smarterscience.com/mrssippi/mar...nchbiology.html

"My greatest hope was that we would see animals down there, and we did. This was the first thing we saw after Kaiko touched bottom." He flattens his finger on the screen below a small, white object manoeuvring close to a piece of fish bait that Kaiko brought down with it. The white object turns out to be a sea cucumber. "We were very pleased to see that. We hadn't expected it."

It soon becomes clear that even the deepest part of the deepest ocean contains life. Kaiko's video camera also captured a scale worm drifting slowly nearby. Despite the presence of two lonely-looking animals, to human eyes the Marianas Trench looks almost dead. In fact, the sediment is teeming with life, and the microbiologists had a field day.

"We brought up six mud samples from the bottom," says microbiologist Koki Horikoshi, "and we found that there were about a million bacteria in a gram of dried mud. That's not a small number, even though it's about a hundredth or a thousandth of what you would find in ordinary garden soil. We found conventional bacteria, but we also found some very interesting microbes."

But while the microbiologists were over the moon about their finds, Fujioka found the geology far less exciting. "Most of this is sediment," he says, indicating the flat, featureless environment recorded by Kaiko's video camera. "It's mainly sands and clays which have been brought down from the upper slopes of the trench—the kind of stuff we have seen a lot of in other expeditions. There's also a lot of detritus from the water above."

http://environment.newscientist.com/channe.../mg15220548.100

In 1996, the remotely operated vehicle Kaiko, operated by the Japan Marine Science and Technology Center, visited the Challenger Deep and recorded several marine organisms, including shrimp-like amphipods, a scale worm, a sea cucumber, and various microbes.

http://www.ocean.udel.edu/extreme2001/miss...ion/trench.html

Comparison 1:

- A sea cucumber, a scale worm, and some amphipods - observed during the 45 minutes Kaiko spent at the bottom. (excluding the bacteria, etc. later found in the mud samples)

- Soles or flounder about 30 cm (1 ft) long, as well as shrimp - observed by the Trieste crew, during the 20 minutes they spent at the bottom.


Comparison 2:

- "It's mainly sands and clays which have been brought down from the upper slopes of the trench—the kind of stuff we have seen a lot of in other expeditions. There's also a lot of detritus from the water above." Fujioka (Kaiko) The photo above supports this claim.

- "The bottom appeared light and clear, a waste of firm diatomaceous ooze" - Piccard (Trieste)

Both claims made by the Trieste crew are contradicted by the Kaiko findings. No foot-long soles/flounder were seen swimming around at the bottom. And the bottom is basically muddy brown, not light and clear. The photo above also confirms that the bottom is dark, not light and clear.

You asked me at the top of this post....

"How is it possible that 47 years ago, humans descended to a depth of approx 36,000 feet using 1950's technology? The depth record prior to Trieste was nowhere near 36,000 feet. No manned dive has approached that depth in the intervening years."

I think it's quite clear, from all the available evidence, that it was not possible to do 47 years ago.

I am absolutely convinced that the Trieste story is a fraud, and a lie. Just like I believe the Apollo moon landings are a fraud and a lie.

Thanks, UTH!

What are you really saying here? That we looked at some reports issued by the USSR about their animal missions/tests, subsequently deemed those reports to be 100% reliable and credible, and then declared it safe to begin manned missions to the moon?

I hope not.

To expand on my last post...

We did not rely on reports about the USSR's animal flights in LEO, and decide that it was safe for us to begin sending humans into LEO. We also sent animals into LEO before humans went, just like the Soviets did.

So to suggest we relied on the USSR's reports, and that we considered it safe to start directly with manned lunar missions (no animal missions, since the Soviets already did that for us) is utter nonsense.

Thanks. The budget graph was posted, but I think it would be much more interesting to compare it against graphs of achievement within other fields, such as aviation, computers, etc.

They won't look anything like the 'space achievements' graph, that's for sure!

Two points:

1. Please provide evidence to back up this claim. Without evidence it is just another opinion and you know what those of us aren't CTs think of HBs opinions without facts to back them up.
2. Even if you are correct why should they look the same? Please provide evidence to back up this claim too.

I have been asked to forward this for the attention of Mid and Gavin:

Jarrah's rebuttal :

" Dribble, dribble, dribble. This guy cannot even get his history right, the development of the F-1 began in 1955, Kaysing joined Rocketdyne a year later.

Nowhere do I hear this clown comment on the fact that he sent a copy of his threat to Ralph Rene and then denied knowing him during the interrogations.

And this rubbish from Stone: "Hehe JarrahWhite shows a complete misunderstanding of Thermodynamics. I've just watched his Part C video where he compares the amount of fuel burned by the CSM for mid course corrections to the amount of fuel burned by the LM for the course corrections on Apollo 13. This is an entirely ignorant thing to do simply because they are different engines and they are using different propellants."

Who gave him the idea that the LEM and CSM use different propellants? All legit sources I've read tell us that both the Descent Engine and the Service Module engine run on N2O4/Aerozine 50. I even show that in my film!

I've better things to do than waste my time on liars who try and pin their fabrications against me.

Jarrah "

It seems to me, regarding the deep-sea thing, if there was photgraphic evidence, video evidence or even samples of rocks, then that still wouldn't be enough to convince anyone who's decided that it couldn't be done. :-/

Translation:
"If I insult them as liars, hopefully no one will realise that I didn't give any facts and just repeated my original claim"

Really, belial?
To me?
Let's see...I think this maybe was to me?



Rebuttal to what, I wonder?

I can't be sure if this section refers to me...it makes no sense, and doesn't refer to anything specifically.

I don't think I understand what he's talking about (which probably isn't surprizing). I recall many a comment I've made about the late Mr. Kaysing and his lack of qualifications. But I don't get the history reference.

The fact is the development of the F-1 did begin in 1955, and was subsequently halted until NASA requirements got it back on the boards in 1959. Indeed, Kaysing worked at Rocketdyne from 1956 until 1963. So?

What I have stated is that Kaysing had no technical or scientific training (which was rather evident from reading what he said and listening to him talk), no knowledge of rocket engines and their operation, and certainly no in depth knowledge of the technicalities and problems involved with the F-1. He had a B.A. in English and served in several capacities pertaining to writing and maintaining technical publications. He resigned from Rocketdyne in 1963, allegedly for "personal reasons".

His positions have all been thoroughly debunked, and they're all laced with an unsupported opinion, a complete lack of engineering and technical knowledge, and are quite frankly, silly.

I have said that Kaysing left Rocketdyne long before the F-1 was a functional engine. In fact, I stated that the F-1 was still blowing itself up when he left Rocketdyne. Indeed, at the time he left Rocketdyne, we had serious problems with the engine, and anyone might have thought they were fighting a losing battle with the thing.

It took until September 1966 to get the F-1 man-rated. Kaysing wasn't anywhere near Rocketdyne while the engine's large-scale problems were fixed, and wouldn't have understood what was done to fix it anyway.

That's a little history...but still, I have no idea what White is talking about, really.


As to the line about Rene:



Huh?
Is that me (the clown)?
What threat?
Denied knowing him during the interrogations?

I don't know him, nor do I have any desire to know him.

I have absolutely no idea what White's talking about.
I will say that I have no desire to threaten Mr. Rene. And most certainly Mr. Rene is no threat to me. He makes me laugh, for the most part. He, like Kaysing, have had all of his wacky ideas about Apollo shredded by experts in the field.





That I believe might be addressed to Gav. I don't know what that's about...





I shall assume that I must be one of those liars...attempting to pin my fabrications on him?

That's pretty comical, actually.

I do think it's it's this upstart wanna-be film producer (apparently real big on youtube) who is the one with the crafty fabrications that he's weakly, almost comically attempting to pin on NASA. It's kind of ironic, actually.



The bottom line here is that I'm not really all too interested in what this kid has to say.
This "rebuttal" from him, allegedly, makes no sense at all (what it rebuts is not all too clear).
About the most that can be ascertained from it is that it sounds like a kid who's overwhelmed with being slammed on by people who actually know something.

That's understandable, of course...but then again, if you're going to make film snippets about something like those that he makes, and put them out there for public consumption, you should expect some form of response, especially when you're spewing off about things you haven't the slightest idea about.

I do hope that he has better things to do than waste his time, and ours, by forwarding such jibberish. It interferes with the educational process that many of us attempt to install here.

No, of course not.
It was just some confirmation to go along with our understandings of the radiation belts, and our designs for shielding, and our trajectory planning though them.

You were saying that no animals had been sent out to the Moon. That was incorrect. Animals had been sent to the Moon, and came back, and animals had spent more time traversing the Van Allen belts than any man ever did or has since.




As indicated, the USSR's reports were just additional data. Nice to have.

Really?
I wonder how you weigh the various prerequisites to a lunar landing mission and conclude that there's a giant spike at Apollo 11?
The reality is that the graph of accomplishments would resemble a continual incremental upswing, each subsequent mission being an equal increment up from the previous one.

In other words, we did the following:

Manned sub-orbital flight. 1961
Manned orbital flight. 1962
Controllable manned orbital flight. 1963
test two-man orbital vehicle. 1964
Two manned orbital flight. 1965
Orbital plane and altitude changes. 1965
Get out of the spacecraft and crawl around. 1965
Test fuel cells for electrical power and fly for a week. 1965
Fly for as long as it would take to make a lunar mission. 1965
Rendezvous in space. 1965
Docking in space. 1966
Perfect rendezvous, docking and EVA techniques. 1966
Develop 3 man spacecraft. 1966
Test launch vehicle with lunar lift capability. 1967
Test 3 man spacecraft. 1968
Execute lunar orbital flight with that spacecraft. 1968
Test Lunar module un-manned. 1968
Test lunar module manned in Earth orbit. 1969
Test lunar module manned in lunar orbit. 1969


These things are all essentials, and none can be weighted as more valuable than another as pertains to the goal. They represent a general and even upward trend.


Then of course, the next logical thing was:

Land on the Moon. 1969


That was an equal incremental step upward, not a huge spike.

And the rest:

Precision land on the Moon. 1969
Precision land and extend the exploratory capabilities of the crew. 1971
Explore in-depth. 1971-1972


These too were incremental upward steps.

The actual curve would look like an upward line with a couple of plateaus in it, perhaps an occassional dip downward. But in no way would it look like a seismic graph of an earthquake.



You really have to understand the vast amount of work that went into this project from its inception to understand that there were no massive spikes involved. It was incremental progress.

If you look at a graph of human accomplishment throughout history, you're definitely going to see some spikes...all along that general upward curve. The space race was certainly one of them, as was the industrial revolution, the Rennaisance, ancient Greece, etc., etc...


I just think you over-emphasize what you perceive as impossible accomplishments, by neglecting the incremental process of development and logical progression that preceeded them.

belial,
I realise that these are not your own words, however referring to members of this site as liars is in contravention of the rules:

If Jarrah White wishes to join this board and debate then he is free to do so, he will of course have to stick to the same set of rules as the rest of us (which is, I suspect, the real reason he will not debate here).

If he is not prepared to do so then I suggest you take care not to be his messenger as it is you that will be held responsible for any breaches in the rules in your posts.

So your idea is that this capsule got frozen inside until it was oppened on the sea?It went through the reentry and still got frozen inside...Sorry friend,but it is an absurd...Another desperate propagandist trying to convince us of an absurd....Apollo 13 was a fake mission,just as all the other apollo missions..

Fantastic Jarrah!!! These desperates propagandists are shooting in the dark.They give absurd answers to inteligent questions.

Hat:

What this data indicates is that Apollo 13's CM did not freeze at all.
It gradually decreased in temperature during the 4 days that it was powered down, without internal heating, to a minimum of ~ 43 degrees F.
Re-entry heating did not affect the interior temperature of any Apollo Command Module to any significant degree. To understand that you must realize why we entered blunt end forward, with that heat shield pointing into the airstream, and understand what ablation means and what it does.

It would've taken many hours for the AS-13 CM to get warm enough to evaporate the condensation on the cool interior surfaces. Re-entry had no effect on interior cabin temperatures, by design. It didn't have enough time to do that, with power up coming very shortly prior to SM SEP and re-entry.


Apollo 13 was very real, Hat, and illustrated the NASA of the time at it's very finest. It's a very complex, and very engrossing story...which no Hollywood movie can do justice to, in my humble opinion.

Understand something:

The most compelling thing in the entire Apollo archive is the voice loops from mission control during the hour following the Apollo 13 explosion...something that until recently, no one in the general public ever heard (it's now available, of course). There's no acting there, my friend...only a bunch of guys trying to understand what the hell just happened, and all of them talking over each other, as well as listening to each other. To be a flight controller was to be the best of the best, and that audio is inspirational, and tells one what these young people were made of, and how intensely they were trained, as well as how expert they all were in their various systems.

It did get cold in that spacecraft, and that's been explained in detail...with as much simplicity as I can muster. And that was the very least of our problems. Cz has provided comments from official reports which support the facts. Re-entry had no effect on cabin temperatures, and that was designed to be that way.

No, it is not "my idea", it is the facts, borne out by the evidence, which is something that YOU have none of.

What is absurd here is your lack of understanding and apparent inability to read or at least comprehend what is written in front of you.

Tell me, Hat... where in my post did I say that the capsule had "frozen"...? In fact, I said quote the opposite:



Insulation works both ways. The CM's insulation was designed to keep the cold of space out AND to keep the heat of re-entry out as well. As has been said by others in this thread and I'm sure elsewhere, the insulation worked extremely well.



And you're just another typical Hoax Believer - ignorant of the facts, incapable of understanding what is presented and unwilling to learn.

The reality is that Apollo happened as documented by history. Your inability to understand that fact or the science behind it, does not negate the fact that it happened.


Cz

Take heed, Hat.

Mr. White's message says nothing, and addresses nothing specific. It is, as such, absurd, and the intelligent answers provided to questions posed herein resulted in absurd commentary from someone who apparently will not, or cannot come here himself.

This is likely for good reason.

I saw today in a discovery channel documentary that there are probes around mars that can take pictures of 4 mts long structures.Now they are sending a probe capable of taking pictures of a 1mt long structure.....But on the moon ,things are always much more difficult,....We will never have a probe like that around the moon because all the truth will be revealed to the world.In fact,I am sure that the actual probes around the moon have resolution for that and can figure out that men never went there.NASA and JAXA are lying when they say that probes with 4mts or 1mt resolution only go to mars and never to the moon.They say that probes around the moon have only 10mts long resolution...What a joke!!!!!
I have to myself that this fact is one of the greatest indicators that apollo missions were a big hoax!!!

Gentlemen,
a little less of the childish name calling and a little more intelligent debate please. Please read the forum guidlines towards the top of this page. Thank you.

UNDER THE HAT,
Please read my post where I pointed out to beliel that he will be held responsible for the content of his posts and where I pointed out that Jarrah White's comments broke the rules of this site. It may surprise you to learn that the same rules apply to everyone else on this site also apply to you, including this one:
Given this fact do you really consider that quoting the offending post in it's entirety and applauding it after such a clear warning from a moderator was the intelligent behaviour of a poster who wishes to remain a member of this site?

If, after careful consideration you come to the conclusion it was not then I suggest that you question your motives for your actions and try not to repeat them. If you conclude that the answer is yes then it is possible that this site is not really for you. Just as in real life, no one asks you to like the rules here, just to follow them.

Apologies, Waspie... as I'm sure you're aware, it is sometimes very frustrating when the point of and information contained in one's post is apparently completely ignored, either deliberately or due to language barriers or for other reasons. Doubly so when one has words or ideas attributed to them when the evidence is completely to the contrary.

I will endeavor to keep my frustration from boiling over in the future.


Cz

You're sure? Then you can show using math the resolution they do have and how that differs from the reported resolution? Would you believe it even if they did have probes in orbit with higher resolution? (I think not and predict you'll cry fake in the next few years when higher res probes are in orbit)

Hat:

A 14 mt (meter) long structure is 13 feet...plus a little.
A 1 meter long structure is 3.28 feet.

What this means is that the smallest object visible in the picture will be between 3.28 and 13 feet in size, and those will be the smallest specs you see in an image of such resolution (the smallest specs on the image).


What you will require to verify Apollo landing sites with any real detail will be on the order of inches resolution, and we have those already...see?



Detail like this will never be seen from any orbital photograph. At 1 m resolution, you'll see shapes that look like Apollo descent stages, maybe an LRV parked, but they'll still be determined to be fakes by the hell-bent upon disbelieving.

The question, since this is now pointed out is:

Why would we waste our resources on imaging something that we already know is there?
This is not meant to be demeaning...just a question borne of logic.
No one in the scientific community needs any proof of Apollo, and the idea of sending a high zoot imaging system to the Moon to image Apollo artifacts is frankly something that would meet with stares of disbelief, and perhaps loss of employment for the suggester!

The documentary you saw must be a bit out of date. Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter was launched in August 2005 and has been in orbit of Mars for a little over a year now. It's High Resolution Imaging Science Experiment (HiRISE) camera does have a resolution of 1-meter.


No, it is not more difficult, it is just not necessary. No one in the global scientific community who is doing Lunar research questions whether Apollo happened, so the need to provide detailed photographs of the landing areas has never been there. The science being done has only required pictures that show the larger scale features and processes on the Lunar surface, so the instruments sent there were designed to provide that level of detail.


Of course you can provide proof of this, can't you...?


They say that because that it what they have sent there.


That is your uninformed opinion. You have no facts of evidence to support that.


Cz

Yes Frenat,I believe these guys are lying as those ones lied about the entire apollo program.Men never went to the moon.

In shall be forced to repeat myself one more time:

You believe.
That's fine, buit it's not reflective of any knowledge.
Additionally, you did not answer frenat's questions.
Thus, I shall repeat my own...


How did we lie about Apollo?
How can you say men never went to the Moon...when everything indicates that we in fact did?


Again, there are obviously doubts.

Ask your questions, and cease with the declarations. They're unsubstantiated and you won't be able to prove them.
On the other hand, learning is fun, and you just might....

That is what I am trying to say to you.It is very convenient to say that the level of detail that we have nowadays from the moon is 10 mts long.We have technology for much better resolution,but we sent a millionaire mission to the moon with a stupid old camera attached on it because it is very ,very convenient for NASA to keep the truth unrevealed.MEN NEVER WENT TO THE MOON.

Sorry Mid,you are a great guy.
I know you were not an apollo astronaut (as you said),but I am quite sure that you were one of those hundreds poor men on NASA mission control thinking that men were really on the moon when,in fact , they were not.

Its also 100% true, at least as far as currently orbiting satellites are concerned. The high resolution orbital panoramic photography taken during the later Apollo missions had higher resolution, on the order of 1 - 2 meters.


Ok, well a camera cannot be "stupid" because it is a machine. And as to old, given that the instrument was custom built for the mission, its not really all that old. Its not like they took a Nikon D-50 camera body, duct taped it to the side of the satellite, slapped on a lens, hooked it up to a remote shutter release and shot it off into space. The mission requirements dictate the technology developed for the instruments assembled into the spacecraft. The mission requirements called for a camera with 10-meter resolution, and that's what was developed. If their supplier had said "Well, they asked for 10-meter resolution, but aw, heck, let's spend more of their money and give them a camera with 1-meter resolution", the instrument would have not fit the mission parameters and probably would have been rejected, or possibly shelved for use on a later mission, if that instrument fit the requirements of such a later mission.

Also, given that the 2 missions currently in orbit are not run by, were not financed by and are not controlled by NASA, its hardly factual to say that NASA is restricting the level of technology being sent to the Moon. In fact, its quite false and again showcases a lack of understanding and unwillingness to do any research.


Your opinion only. Not supported by the facts or the evidence.


Cz

Something tells me, we're losing you here.
That's your choice, Hat.

But it's not wise to ignore what's been said, fail to do any homework, and come back saying things like that (you have nothing that can back up your declarations that we didn't go to the Moon).

I asked you for questions...I did not ask you for declarations you cannot back up. In fact, I advised you against it.


No one in ther MOCR was a "poor man". Those were some of the richest guys you can imagine.

You are beginning to sound childish, and you showed alot of promise.
What was it, a post containing a message by Mr. White that inspired you to become almost obstinate? That's not healthy, Hat. Mr. White is not someone you can rely on.
How about you get with the program, think about what's been said, and what's been asked of you, and come back with some questions you're really interested in?


You were doing pretty well, and I appreciated it.
This recent string of posts is indicating that something else might be going on in your head.

Let's get it out.


I asked you questions.
You failed to answer them.

Get on with it.





If you fail to do so, you may become one of the ignored, and inconsequential.
I don't think you are one of them.

Prove me right.

MID: http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=nebxYU2PE6o, this is what Jarrah is referring to. May I suggest a whiskey before hand as to prevent the wanting to slit your wrists at the absolute absurdity in the video.

Thank you for relaying this Belial, all thought I'd be careful if I were you with relaying crap from Jarrah White!

You are indeed correct, Jarrah. The Apollo CSM and Apollo LM used the same propellants; Nitrogen tetroxide and Aerozine 50. I was confusing the Saturn V propellants with the LM propellants, with the Saturn V using RP-1 and Liquid Oxygen as propellants.

I'm not going to concentrate on your calculating of the available fuel in your video. Not only is it absolutely absurd, wrong in every single way and totally devout of any knowledge of rocket engines, it is at the end of the day, irrelevant. You are totally misunderstanding what a free return trajectory actually is. Why you are comparing the amount of time needed to burn to decelerate to enter the moons orbit is beyond me. First lets look at the mission profile.



You realise that at translunar injection the engine is burnt to place the CSM into a Free return trajectory? The first mid course correction then knocks the craft off a free return trajectory. The burn that placed them back into a free return trajectory took roughly 34 seconds. THIS MANEUVER ALONE WOULD HAVE CAUSED APOLLO 13 TO SLINGSHOT AROUND THE MOON AND THEN TRAVEL BACK TO EARTH SUBSEQUENTLY ALLOWING THEM TO LAND IN THE INDIAN OCEAN WITH NO NEED FOR ANY ENGINE BURN WHATSOEVER. However, to speed the return of Apollo 13 up, it was decided to perform a second descent propulsion maneuver to speed the return time up. This burn was roughly 263 seconds in length, and produced a velocity change of roughly 850 feet per second. This changed the Earth landing point to somewhere in the pacific ocean.

This Jarrah, and for other reasons is why your analysis is completely flawed, and to be frank, more or less wrong in every single way.

I just had a quick look through this video (since I don't drink, whiskey wasn't an option, so I scanned through it to find just the following bits )

The weight estimates Jarrah uses are completely off by about 35,000 lbs. He claims the CSM/LM stack weighed about 129,000 lbs pre-TEI, with about 50,000 pounds of fuel in the SM. The Mission Report for A13 contradicts this. In total there was only (approximately) 42,000 lbs of fuel and oxidizer (SPS, SM RCS, CM RCS) at launch, and the first mid-course correction (which is the only one the SPS was used for) burned approximately 240 pounds. Plus, he lists the weight of the LM at about 33,000 pounds, then it appears that he then adds another 18,000 pounds for fuel, when in reality, the approximate 33,000 pounds includes the DPS, APS and RCS fuel loads plus other consumables. A quick look at the A13 Mission Report Mass Properties table (Appendix A, Table A-1, page A-6) shows a pre-TEI stack weight of approximately 95,000 pounds.

I don't have the time right now to compose a more complete answer - heading out to watch a hockey game (Go Canucks! ) but once I get back, I'll run through the video again and compare the numbers with the Apollo 13 Mission report's numbers.


Cz

Thanks for taking the time to reply Turbs.

I think your question is fundamentally flawed - well, not the question itsef, but the implied premise that it can't be possible, simply becasue it was done in the past and hasn't been done since. In 1975 you could buy a ticket to fly at twice the speed of sound from London to New York. Today? Impossible. Did they fake Concorde?



I have no idea whether the Trieste made it or not. My gut instinct, based on what I've read, says there is no reason to disbelieve it. But I've not seen any proof, only what I've read in books or found on the internet.






I don't follow your "lack of photos = faked descent" logic. Apollo provided thousands of photos, but you claim that they are all fake. Why the difficulty in taking some photos of the bottom of the ocean where it's just a few hundred feet down, and just stating they were taken at the bottom of Challenger Deep? Who would know?



I've absolutely no idea. If it was faked, I've no idea why they didn't provide some faked film or photos either. It's even possible they did take photos/film but I've only ever been able to find one photo of both men inside the Trieste.



I can't know this with any more or less certainty than I know Hillary and Tensing were the first to climb Everest. (Why no photo of Hillary? Only one photo of Tensing?) Or that Amundsen was the first to reach the South Pole. There comes a point, unless presented with serious doubts to the contrary, that you either accept or reject a scientific claim, or a claim of discovery.

However, I'm prepared to accept that they did indeed descend to the bottom Challenger Deep. From what I can tell, they had the right equipment. I've never heard of anyone having serious doubts about the claim, including the Japanese robotic Kaiko team. I just don't accept the premise that "noone has been back, therefore they didn't go".



I've no more reason to trust or distrust them anymore I would the word of Hillary and Tensing. Amundsen and his team.



The only direct evidence I'm aware of is witness testimony, some of which you posted yourself.



See above, and re your answers about film and photos.



I was playing Devil's Advocate, using the same logic you used about space techology.



I've seen no evidence to suggest they faked it. I've never heard any murmurings from the scientific community about the validity of the dive (or any other community, including the conspiracy community). On the other hand, we have little evidence other than their testimony, and the testimony of the crew aboard the support vessel.



I don't believe it with the same degree of certainty I believe APollo happened. I'd be willing to bet my house that men landed on the moon and returned safely to Earth during the Apollo programme. I'm able to be that confident because I've spent years looking at the evidence in favour of Apollo, and in favour of a hoax.

I do believe they did indeed reach the bottom of Challenger Deep, though I'm more inclined to be skeptical. When I say skeptical, what I mean is if it was proven that it was indeed faked, I'd be surprised, but not gob-smacked. I certainly wouldn't bet my house on it though!



You kind of got ahead of me there, I didn't honestly expect you to say you thought it was faked!



See above for my position.

tbc...

Explained by the surface ship drifting slightly. Once contact was re-established, it was very faint, and there was a seven second delay due to the distance involved.

QUOTE

Can't get this link to work - is it this image?





Re your first comparison. Do you know what an amphipod is? A shrimp-like creature. Just a lucky guess by Piccard? I don't see how one expedition seeing flounder-like fish, and another 40-odd years later seeing sea cucumber could possibly be construed as evidence that the first team lied? I could spend an hour fishing at a certain spot on a river and catch a couple of trout. Someone else could come along later and catch salmon. How do you know which if either is lying?

Re comparison two. Here's another photo of the same location as the one above. One is quite dark, the other quite light. I'll let you chew on that one!



More pertinently...

Why do you believe the Japanese Kaiko claims, but not the US/Swiss Trieste claims? Is it simply because the former was robotoic? Or because they had more hard evidence? Why do you believe their hard evidence (samples and photos), but not the Apollo hard evidence?



Turbs... I can understand you not wanting to believe Trieste dived to the bottom of the Challenger Deep. But for you to claim "it's quite clear, from all the available evidence, that it was not possible to do 47 years ago" is utterly ludicrous. You've presented no case at all to prove it was impossible to do. Can you show that the design of the bathyscaphe was flawed?


<TIME OUT>

OK let's agree to a truce on this one... I never intended to start a genuine discussion on the why's and wherefore's of Trieste, although that's what's happened. I was trying to draw a comparison as to what is accepted as a standard of proof compared to Apollo. I wrongly assumed you wouldn't be questioning the validity of Trieste as strongly as you did.

OK...

I'll go out on a limb here and say, why do you accept the Kaiko expedition data as fact? Noone has been back since. It conveniently disappeared during a storm. It returned some still photos and video that could have been faked at a higher depth. The samples could have been returned from the ocean floor, not Challenger Deep. Why believe Kaiko, and not Apollo, with thousands of photos, hours of video, 800 lbs of samples, 24 eye witness accounts of travelling to the moon, 12 of landing on it?

Let's not get too side tracked here. Whilst the Trieste stuff is interesing it is rapidly getting way off topic.

If you want to discuss it further why not start a new topic?

I realised after answering Turbo's reply that it was starting to get too off topic, so apologies to all and sundry for that.

Ok.. back from watching the game ('Nucks won ) and I have watched the video (and am still sane).

(well... no less sane than when I started at any rate... )

Great reply, TNT. Not too much I want to add, just want to clean up the numbers I used in my earlier reply.

Oh... and I realize that Jarrah is just reading from Ralph Rene's letter to Tom Hanks but for the sake of this post, I'm just going to refer to the claims as Jarrah's.

Jarrah's CSM/LM stack weight claims:

CM: 13,000 lbs
SM: 33,000 lbs + 50,000 lbs of fuel
LM: 33,000 lbs (includes 17,800 lbs of fuel)

129,000 lbs (after doing the math, I find that, contrary to what I had thought earlier, he did not add the weight of the LM fuel a second time)

Actual flown weights:
(Source: Apollo 13 Mission Report, Appendix A, Mass Properties, Table A-I, page A-6)

CSM @ T&D: 63,720.3 lbs.
LM @ T&D: 33,499.1 lbs.
CSM/LM Stack weight @ T&D: 97,219.4 lbs.
CSM/LM Stack weight @ TEI burn: 95,424 lbs.
CSM/LM Stack weight after TEI burn: 87,456 lbs.
LM DPS propellant expended on TEI burn: 7,968 lbs.

Propellants loaded at lift-off:
(Source: Apollo 13 Mission Report, section 7, Mission Consumables, pages 7-1 & 7-2)

SM SPS Fuel loaded: 15,685 lbs.
SM SPS Oxidizer loaded: 24,084 lbs.
SM SPS Propellant total: 40,769 lbs.

SM RCS Fuel loaded (all four quads): 440.1 lbs.
SM RCS Oxidizer loaded (all four quads): 902.7 lbs.
SM RCS Propellant total: 1342.8 lbs.

CM RCS Fuel loaded (system 1 & 2): 88.8 lbs.
CM RCS Oxidizer loaded (system 1 & 2): 156.3 lbs.
CM RCS Propellant total: 245.1 lbs.

CSM Stack Propellant total: 42356.9 lbs.

(section 7, Mission Consumables, page 7-3)
LM DPS Fuel loaded: 7083.6 lbs.
LM DPS Oxidizer loaded: 11,350.9 lbs.
LM DPS propellant total: 18,434.5 lbs.

Already we can see that, even including the RCS systems for both the CM and SM, we are well under Jarrah's original estimate of 54,000 lbs of fuel. But to make it easier, lets just assume that the RCS propellant weights are counted in with the dry weights of the spacecraft.

We know that the CSM's SPS was used only for the first mid-course correction burn. After the O2 tank explosion, Houston thought it too risky to attempt to light off the SPS again, not knowing what if any damage had been done to it by the explosion.

According to telemetry received in Houston, the SPS had only consumed 240 lbs. of propellant at the time of the O2 tank explosion. An even further cry from the 4,000 pounds of propellant Jarrah's figures claimed were burned.

So, for simplicity sake, lets say that after the O2 tank explosion, the CSM stack has 40,500 lbs. of propellant, which is still close enough to say that the tanks were