A low-gravity ballet.
March 15, 2014 3:11 PM   Subscribe

 
Why they struggle to stand up immediately? I expected they'd be more concerned with the integrity of their suits than with the angle between their long axis and the gravity vector.
posted by hat_eater at 3:18 PM on March 15, 2014 [2 favorites]


Kicking up some dust.
posted by popcassady at 3:38 PM on March 15, 2014


I hope my legs don't break,
falling on the moon
posted by invitapriore at 3:39 PM on March 15, 2014 [4 favorites]


Why they struggle to stand up immediately?

Oh, I dunno, maybe because of the intense gravitational pull of their movie studio on EARTH!

HELLOOOOOO?!? Wake up you lunar-tics!
posted by Corduroy at 4:07 PM on March 15, 2014 [4 favorites]


planetesimal: "
Just a guess, but maybe it's because they don't want moon dust up in all the nooks and crannies of their suits.
"

Those suits were designed with the assumption moon dust would be getting all up in those nooks.

I don't think the early suits anticipated how incredibly sharp moon dust is - the edges don't get eroded off as on Earth. But the astronauts wearing those suits wouldn't have known about it, either.
posted by IAmBroom at 4:15 PM on March 15, 2014 [1 favorite]


Why they struggle to stand up immediately?

"Oh fuck, in thirty or forty years, this will be all over that internet thing they're going to invent!"
posted by yoink at 4:15 PM on March 15, 2014 [2 favorites]


QWOP LARP?
posted by ricochet biscuit at 5:00 PM on March 15, 2014 [2 favorites]


Why they struggle to stand up immediately?

Not sure what you'd want them to do instead. Just like there? Doesn't everyone get up as soon as they can from a fall?
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 5:04 PM on March 15, 2014 [1 favorite]


First plank on the moon!
posted by arcticseal at 7:55 PM on March 15, 2014


Wheeeeeeeee!
posted by BitterOldPunk at 8:51 PM on March 15, 2014 [1 favorite]


Low gravity certainly would make floating in sun salutations easier. If not for the suit, anyway.
posted by homunculus at 9:18 PM on March 15, 2014


This is just one more exhibit in my mental "I can't believe we successfully put people on the moon and got them home safely" museum. Wow!
posted by Secretariat at 9:34 PM on March 15, 2014


lol i not kno how to astronaut.
posted by dirigibleman at 9:46 PM on March 15, 2014


Aw, they're just big marshmallow babies.
posted by forgetful snow at 10:15 PM on March 15, 2014


Not sure what you'd want them to do instead. Just like there?

No, what they do is completely natural, I just thought that they'd be much more careful and restrained in their efforts, considering the environment, and I see them kicking the ground and flailing violently.
On the other hand, perhaps there is no other way to stand up with center of mass that high.
posted by hat_eater at 1:34 AM on March 16, 2014


The suits were pretty stiff and restrictive, so the astronauts had limited movement. Only the last three missions, 15-17, had suits that could really bend at the waist.

So yeah, in comparison to falling and getting up on Earth, their movements were more violent, but for understandable reasons. I suspect there might have been a psychological part also.

When you've fallen on the Earth, especially after doing something stupid, you might lay there for a minute, gathering your barings or even laughing. Face down in the dust of Moon, wearing 200 lbs of gear that you are keenly aware is thin and the only thing keeping you alive, which was hand made by the lowest bidder. Add in that you're a quarter of million miles from everyone you love and as pilot and engineer you've seen how little problems can get a person killed, I can imagine everyone wants to get back to a standing position toot sweet. That's just pure speculation on my part though.
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 4:36 AM on March 16, 2014 [3 favorites]


all you people...talking like this is real...[shakes head knowingly]
posted by lodurr at 2:20 PM on March 16, 2014


Love this so much.
posted by schwa at 9:01 PM on March 16, 2014


That's walking about the Moon, what about driving or really tearing it up?
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 7:37 AM on March 17, 2014


hand made by the lowest bidder

Really? (The "lowest bidder" bit, I mean.)
posted by yoink at 11:38 AM on March 17, 2014


yeah, i've always wondered about that myself. it's a standard joke going back a long way -- i think Tom Wolfe cites it (for whatever that's worth) from the 60s in The Right Stuff. But that does seem to be a little counter to the way things are usually done in government contracting.
posted by lodurr at 11:48 AM on March 17, 2014


Quote is attributed to a Freedom 7 era Alan Shepard: "According to Gene Kranz in his book, Failure Is Not an Option, "When reporters asked Shepard what he thought about as he sat atop the Redstone rocket, waiting for liftoff, he had replied, 'The fact that every part of this ship was built by the low bidder.'"

posted by stenseng at 3:40 PM on March 17, 2014 [1 favorite]






The reason they struggle is because they are battling the assisted wires. If they were really on the moon, they would essentially each weigh about 30-35 pounds plus another 30 pounds for their gear and would be able to push themselves up to standing position with just one hand.

Also, if they were really on the moon, any dust they kicked up wouldn't settle so quickly.

So yeah, that's why :)
posted by GrooveJedi at 7:06 PM on March 27, 2014


yeah...don't say that around buzz aldrin, m'kay?
posted by lodurr at 7:27 PM on March 27, 2014 [1 favorite]


I would never say that around ole' Buzz.

Instead, I'd ask him why he wasn't able to jump 14 feet in the air in 1/6th gravity.

If I were on the moon, that's all I'd be doing! :)
posted by GrooveJedi at 7:50 PM on March 27, 2014 [1 favorite]


Oh good, a "moon landing was faked" comment. Those never get old.
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 3:43 AM on March 28, 2014


Pictures of the sets.
posted by dirigibleman at 1:16 PM on March 28, 2014 [1 favorite]


My heart goes out to the families of the disappeared graphic artists who photoshopped those images. (And of course also to the families of the thousands of disappeared who worked on the original production, back in the 60s/70s.)
posted by lodurr at 5:17 AM on March 30, 2014 [2 favorites]


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