Neil Armstrong was a test pilot before he was an astronaut. He had his pilot's license before he had his driver's license. But even he had some trouble getting used to that darned Lunar Excursion Module (LEM). [more inside]
posted by cmchap on Aug 5, 2009 - 40 comments

Moon Landing Tapes Found! [more inside]
posted by sexyrobot on Jul 2, 2009 - 93 comments

One Small Step (HQ footage) [more inside]
posted by Substrata on Mar 8, 2009 - 30 comments

Thanks to Yahoo's video search, I've spent the morning thrilling to movies from Nasa's earlier space programs. Ed White does the first american spacewalk, the crew of apollo 8 sends out a christmas message (wonder how that would play these days), Neil Armstrong goes for a walk, Buzz Aldrin gives a science lesson, John Young goes muddin', Apollo 17 lifts off from the moon. Galileo gets his due via Apollo 15, as does Kubrick, via Skylab. all this makes the Challenger explosion just incredibly sad.

Though I still don't know why searching for apollo 8 turned up gay porn and I don't wanna know.

What is really interesting though, is watching this Apollo 17 astronaut work on the moon. His body is moving in all sorts of subtle ways that highlight how odd it must be to work in lower gravity.
posted by Brandon Blatcher on Jan 9, 2005 - 35 comments

Neil Armstrong. The awful truth. In 1969, Neil Armstrong made history by becoming the first man to walk on the moon, uttering the immortal phrase, "One small step for man, one giant leap for mankind." Or did he? Previously suppressed footage discovered by blogjam shows that Armstrong's reaction was a great deal more uninhibited than history suggests, and that a hasty editing job was needed to prepare the astronaut's moment of glory for broadcast. So here, for the first time, is the unedited NASA film from the triumphant Apollo 11 mission. [Maybe NSFW]
posted by srboisvert on Oct 30, 2003 - 51 comments