THE MOON LANDING 50 YEARS LATER

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Original videotape of Apollo landing sells at auction for a cool $1.8 million

Original videotapes of the moon landing have sold at auction for $1.8 million. Sotheby’s describes the tapes as “the earliest, sharpest, and most accurate surviving video images of man’s first steps on the moon,” and is offering them in original, unadulterated form —  “unrestored, unenhanced and unremastered.”

The original footage of the moon landing was recorded by two cameras — a Hasselblad and a specially adapted Westinghouse television camera that was mounted to the hatch of the Lunar Module to capture Armstrong’s first steps on the moon. The Westinghouse camera was detechable and was later placed on a tripod on the surface to record the activities of the astronauts as well. The footage from this camera was transmitted to the Parkes Observatory in Australia, from where it was sent along to NASA’s Houston base and, finally, to televisions around the world.


When NASA was preparing for the celebration of the 40th anniversary of the moon landing, it searched for the original tapes from the Westinghouse. But sadly, the tapes had already been recorded over with other projects, a phenomenon that will be familiar to anyone who grew up during the VHS era. There was one remaining set of tapes of the event though, in the form of Ampex tapes that had been used when Houston received the broadcast signal from Australia.

What happened to those surviving tapes is a saga in itself. They come from the collection of Gary George, who worked as an intern at the NASA Johnson Space Center during the summer of 1973. While he was there, he went to a government surplus auction and bought a lot contain 1,150 reels of magnetic tape from NASA projects for a total of $217.77. George was planning to take the resuable tapes and sell them on to TV stations, figuring he’d make a little extra cash.

Fortunately for all of us, George’s father looked closely at the boxes of tapes and noticed some of them were labeled “APOLLO 11 EVA | July 20, 1969 REEL 1 [–3].” George has been holding on to the tapes ever since.

Sotheby's

@Sothebys
 #AuctionUpdate Unrestored, unenhanced, and unremastered, the videotapes represent the earliest, sharpest, and most accurate surviving video images of man’s first steps on the moon #Apollo50th

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A clip of the video that shows the astronauts moving around the surface of the moon is included in this tweet from Sotheby’s. It’s amazing to see the astronauts bounce in the low gravity and hear them communicating. So even if you can’t afford a spare few million to get your hands on the original tapes, you can still see some of the wonders of the Apollo mission.

Buzz Aldrin took Holy Communion and read this Bible verse on Moon landing
Jul 20, 2019 10:31 pm
Buzz Aldrin took Holy Communion and read this Bible verse on Moon landing
(Fox News) – Fifty years ago, when American astronaut Edwin “Buzz” Aldrin, a devout Christian, made history landing on the moon, the first thing he did was give thanks to God. Aldrin, seated next to Neil Armstrong, became the first person to celebrate a religious sacrament on a heavenly body outside Earth. The ordained Presbyterian elder wrote in a piece for Guideposts in 1970 he chose Holy Communion because his pastor at Webster Presbyterian, Dean Woodruff, often spoke about how God reveals Himself through

the everyday elements. 

Continue reading Buzz Aldrin took Holy Communion and read this Bible verse on Moon landing at End Time Headlines.
https://endtimeheadlines.org/2019/07/buzz-aldrin-took-holy-communion-and-read-this-bible-verse-on-moon-landing/


https://www.foxnews.com/science/moon-landing-bible-apollo-11-buzz-aldrin-communion
Moon landing: Buzz Aldrin took Holy Communion, read this Bible verse on lunar surface
Caleb Parke By Caleb Parke | Fox News

WATCH 
Apollo 11 Moon landing: A brief timeline from 1961 to 1969
Fifty years ago, when American astronaut Edwin "Buzz" Aldrin, a devout Christian, made history landing on the moon, the first thing he did was give thanks to God.

Aldrin, seated next to Neil Armstrong, became the first person to celebrate a religious sacrament on a heavenly body outside Earth. The ordained Presbyterian elder wrote in a piece for Guideposts in 1970 he chose Holy Communion because his pastor at Webster Presbyterian, Dean Woodruff, often spoke about how God reveals Himself through the everyday elements.

APOLLO 11: BUZZ ALDRIN RECALLS THE MOON'S 'MAGNIFICENT DESOLATION'

"I wondered if it might be possible to take communion on the moon," Aldrin recalled a year after the mission, "symbolizing the thought that God was revealing Himself there, too, as man reached out into the universe. For there are many of us in the NASA program who do trust that what we are doing is part of God’s eternal plan for man."

This July 20, 1969 photo made available by NASA shows pilot Edwin "Buzz" Aldrin in the Apollo 11 Lunar Module. For the 50th anniversary of the landing, Omega issued a limited edition Speedmaster watch, a tribute to the one that Aldrin wore to the moon.
This July 20, 1969 photo made available by NASA shows pilot Edwin "Buzz" Aldrin in the Apollo 11 Lunar Module. For the 50th anniversary of the landing, Omega issued a limited edition Speedmaster watch, a tribute to the one that Aldrin wore to the moon. (Neil Armstrong/NASA via AP)

And on July 20, 1969, after the Eagle lunar lander touched down on the surface of the moon, Aldrin pulled out the wafer that was in a plastic packet and the wine, along with a small silver cup provided by his church, which he kept in his "personal-preference kit," before he spoke into the radio, according to the Religion News Service.

“Houston, this is Eagle. This is the LM pilot,” Aldrin said, referring to the lunar module, shortly after the Eagle lunar lander touched down on the surface of the moon July 20, 1969.

Audio of Buzz Aldrin giving thanks shortly before taking Communion while on the moon. (Audio courtesy the Apollo 11 Lunar Surface Journal)

“I would like to take this opportunity to ask every person listening in, whoever and wherever they may be," Aldrin said, "to pause for a moment and contemplate the events of the past few hours and to give thanks in his or her own way."

Aldrin silently read from John 15:5, which he penned on a 3-by-5-inch notecard: “As Jesus said: I am the vine, you are the branches. Whoever remains in me, and I in Him, will bear much fruit; for you can do nothing without me.”

1,700-YEAR-OLD RECENTLY DISCOVERED CHRISTIAN LETTER OFFERS CLUES INTO HOW FAITHFUL LIVED CENTURIES AGO

Aldrin then performed the ritual alone, which his dramatized in an episode of HBO's "From the Earth to the Moon," and played by Bryan Cranston. Armstrong watched but did not participate.

Buzz Aldrin's handwritten notes and scriptures flown to the surface of the moon, from a 3-by-5 inch buff-colored, lightweight card. Aldrin read John 15:5 while taking communion upon landing on the moon and read Psalm 8: 3,4 on his way back to earth.
Buzz Aldrin's handwritten notes and scriptures flown to the surface of the moon, from a 3-by-5 inch buff-colored, lightweight card. Aldrin read John 15:5 while taking communion upon landing on the moon and read Psalm 8: 3,4 on his way back to earth. (Courtesy of Heritage Auctions)

"In the radio blackout I opened the little plastic packages which contained bread and wine," Aldrin said. "I poured the wine into the chalice our church had given me. In the one-sixth gravity of the moon, the wine curled slowly and gracefully up the side of the cup. It was interesting to think that the very first liquid ever poured on the moon, and the first food eaten there, were communion elements."

He later wrote NASA requested he not read the Bible verse "because of the O'Hair lawsuit," after Apollo 8 read 10 passages from Genesis about the creation of the world and an atheist sued. Although the lawsuit was eventually dropped, the space program was nervous about including any more faith declarations. But Aldrin managed to get another verse in before once again stepping foot on earth.

APOLLO 11 INSIDERS REMEMBER HISTORY'S MOST FAMOUS SPACE MISSION: 'WE HAD A JOB TO DO AND WE DID IT'

At the end of the mission, when Aldrin was headed back to earth, he read aloud a second verse, from the Old Testament, he scrawled on the same notecard, Psalm 8: 3-4: "When I consider thy heavens, the work of thy fingers, the moon and the stars, which thou has ordained; What is man that thou art mindful of him? And the Son of Man, that thou visitest Him?"


It's something that, to this day, causes the 89-year-old living legend, whose historic communion in 1969 is still commemorated every year at Webster Presbyterian, to wonder about.

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"It was a privilege to have been able to undertake the first manned mission to the lunar surface, an honor to have worked with so many good and dedicated people, and to have left our footprints there," Aldrin told Florida Today earlier this week. "Even now, sometimes, I marvel that we went to the moon."


Buzz Aldrin's Communion on the Moon

Rodion Herrera
Published on 14 Jul 2009
Short clip (with subtitles) showing Buzz Aldrin performing communion on the moon (from "Mare Tranquilitatis", Episode 6 of "From the Earth to the Moon" miniseries

WATCH .https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5zEZvPg1itw

Mars missions and rockets: Cornwall in deep-space communications revolution
Goonhilly Earth Station is investing £10m in upgrading some of its biggest antenna to communicate with deep-space missions.
By Dan Whitehead, home news correspondent

Friday 19 July 2019 09:22, UK
CORNWALL
Goonhilly Earth Station
Image:
https://news.sky.com/story/mars-missions-and-rockets-cornwall-in-deep-space-communications-revolution-11766133
Goonhilly Earth Station's first antenna - known as Arthur - received the first images of the Apollo moon landing from NASA
 
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Scientists at a satellite earth station in Cornwall say they will be able to provide deep-space communication facilities for missions to Mars within the next five years. 

Goonhilly Earth Station - once the largest satellite station in the world - is investing nearly £10m in upgrading some of its biggest antenna to be able to communicate with deep-space missions.

Ian Jones, chief executive of Goonhilly Earth Station, said: "There's a lot of changes in the space industry at the moment - a lot of excitement - a lot of exploration - and new missions to the moon and Mars and we're going to be the first private company to be providing the communications services for those missions."

Jim Bridenstein predicts a woman will be the next person the moon

Special report: One Giant Leap
Mars mission comms for the likes of NASA and the European Space Agency could be run from Goonhilly 6 - the site's largest satellite dish - at 32 metres wide.

There are more than 30 antenna at Goonhilly which already receive data from satellites orbiting earth, providing information services such as weather and television.

It was Goonhilly's first antenna - known as Arthur - which received the very first images of the Apollo moon landing from NASA, beaming the footage across Europe.

Goonhilly has also opened a brand new multi-million pound data centre to help process the huge amounts of data required for future lunar missions.

Fifty years ago, on July 20, 1969, the Apollo 11 Mission landed on the moon. Neil Armstrong became the first human to walk on the moon, declaring the immortal words, “That’s one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind.” For a moment, the entire world was united in awe as they contemplated the wonder of humans on the moon. “For one priceless moment in the whole history of man, all the people on this Earth are truly one,” Pres. Richard Nixon told the astronauts while they were still on the moon.

The moon plays an important role in Judaism. It’s both metaphor and measure of our days. As the world marks half a century since we first ventured to its surface, here are seven Jewish facts about the moon.

Judaism’s Lunar Calendar
The Jewish calendar differs from the secular Gregorian calendar that many of use today. It relies heavily on the moon’s cycle to regulate the Jewish months. As the Talmud says, “The other nations count by the sun, while Israel counts by the moon” (Sukkah 29a). The Hebrew calendar has 12 months, timed to coincide with each lunar month (the time it takes the moon to orbit the earth and return to the same spot in the sky as viewed from earth). The lunar month is roughly 29.5 days, so Hebrew months are either 29 or 30 days long.

Since the lunar year is shorter than the solar year, if it followed the moon exclusively, the Jewish calendar would drift through the seasons (like the Muslim calendar does), falling earlier and earlier each year. A purely lunar calendar is 354 days long. Without adding leap days, the Jewish holidays would occur at different seasons in different years.

In order to regulate this, which is essential since the Torah commands us to keep Passover in the spring, the Jewish calendar uses leap months. In every 19-year cycle, seven leap months are added.

Sighting the New Moon
As the moon orbits the earth, it appears to grow larger (“waxing”) then smaller (“waning”) each day in the night sky. At the end of this 29.5-day cycle, the moon reemerges as a narrow crescent. This is called the “New Moon” and it indicates that a new Jewish month has begun. In the Talmud, Rabbi Yochanan compared a person who blesses the New Moon in its appointed time to one who greeted God himself (Sanhedrin 42a).

Since the year 358 CE, Jews around the world have calculated the exact date of each New Moon (and therefore the first day of each new Jewish month) from a set calendar. Before then, the New Moon was proclaimed by a special Jewish court in Jerusalem called the Sanhedrin.

Made up of 71 learned sages, the Sanhedrin would wait until at least two witnesses came to them with the news of the very first sighting of the New Moon. After hearing from these witnesses, the Sanhedrin would send word throughout the land of Israel and beyond that the next month had begun.

Using a long torch on top of the Mount of Olives in Jerusalem, a representative of the Sanhedrin would light a fire on top of the hill. People watching on nearby hills would see the flames and light their own fires. In this way, notice that the New Moon had been sighted spread far and wide. (This practice also explains why most Jewish holidays are celebrated for an extra day outside of the land of Israel; since it could take days for the news of the New Moon to spread, far-flung Jewish communities adopted the custom of celebrating for two days.) In later days, the Samaritans would sometimes try and confuse Jews by lighting their own fires, so the Sanhedrin began to send out news that a new month had dawned using messengers instead.

The Jewish New Moon Festival: Rosh Chodesh
The first day of each Jewish month is a mini holiday. The commandment to celebrate Rosh Chodesh (literally the “Head of the Month”) was the very first commandment that God gave to the entire Jewish people as a whole. It dates back to the days when our ancestors were slaves in ancient Egypt: “God said to Moses and Aaron in the land of Egypt, saying ‘This month shall be for you the beginning of the months. It shall be for you the first of the months of the year’” (Exodus 12:1-2).

In ancient times, Jews celebrated Rosh Chodesh by offering special gifts in the Temple in Jerusalem. Today, we mark the day with beautiful prayers, singing Psalms in synagogue and inserting special blessings into our prayers.

There’s a deeper meaning to the offerings we make on Rosh Chodesh, and it’s directly connected with the unique qualities of the moon. Waxing and waning, the moon reminds us that strength is rarely static: there are times when nations and people are strong and times when they are weaker. These changes remind us that even when we seem down and hopeless, change is around the corner. Celebrating the New Moon reminded us that our work on behalf of those who are weaker than us is never done.

Sanctification of the Moon
Each month, Jews around the world recite a beautiful prayer early in the cycle of the new moon, as it waxes in the sky. Usually said following the first Shabbat after Rosh Chodesh, the Kiddush Levanah, or Sanctification of the Moon prayer is one of the most beautiful in Jewish liturgy. The prayer compares the Jewish people to the new moon, which is renewed anew each month.

It’s very poetic. In one part, we rise up on our toes while gazing at the moon and recite “Just as I dance toward you but cannot touch you, so may none of my enemies be able to touch me for evil.” Under the light of the moon, we turn to one another and wish each other “Shalom aleichem” – peace be with you. It’s a powerful moment that reminds us of the moon’s beauty and helps us appreciate afresh the world that God created.

Outlawing Celebrations of the New Moon
In the days of the wicked King Antiochus, who ruled over the land of Israel as vassal of the ancient Greek empire, three key Jewish practices were banned: circumcision, Shabbat and Rosh Chodesh. The evil king realized that the entire Jewish calendar is dependent on watching for the New Moon and keeping track of Jewish days and holidays. He forbade Jews to watch for the New Moon; his goal was to undermine the entire Jewish calendar and thus weaken the Jewish people.

A brave band of Jewish fighters refused to give up. Led by the Maccabees, the Jews fought the Greeks and prevailed, maintaining our timeless Jewish practice of keeping track of the moon’s phases and, with that, our Jewish calendar. We celebrate this triumph each year during the holiday of Hanukkah.

Women and Rosh Chodesh
In Jewish mystical tradition, Jewish women are seen as having a special connection with the moon. During the sin of the golden calf, when some Jews lost faith in God following the exodus from Egypt and constructed a golden idol to worship, Jewish women resisted worshiping the idol and maintained their faith in God. As a reward, women were given an extra holiday each month: Rosh Chodesh, when many Jewish women refrain from some types of work.

Traditionally through the years, it’s been common for Jewish women not to cook or sew on Rosh Chodesh. Today, some women gather together on Rosh Chodesh to learn Torah or recite prayers together, honoring their connection with this special day.

Moon’s Symbolism
The moon is a central symbol in Jewish thought and many of the qualities that most ennoble the Jewish people are reflected in the moon.

Take the moon’s luminous glow in the night sky. The moon has no source of light of its own; instead, its beautiful glow is a reflection of the sun’s brilliance. So too with the Jewish people: like the moon, we reflect an important source of light - God and His Torah. Reflecting this dazzling light is an honor: like the moon, we receive beauty and then send it back into the world through our actions and our very being.

And the moon’s waxing and waning reminds us that like the moon, even when it seems diminished and nearly invisible, we are confident that it will re-emerge, growing brilliant and full once more. So too with the Jewish people: even in our darkest times, we have relied on God’s promise that the Jews will never disappear and that one day we will be restored to our dazzling fullness.




The Moon Landing, 50 Years Later
Jul 16, 2019  |  by Rabbi Benjamin Blech

The Moon Landing, 50 Years Later
How can we explain mankind’s unquenchable thirst to discover what lies beyond our earthly home?

Fifty years ago, on July 21, 1969, more than 500 million people around the globe watched in stunned awe and fascination the moment when earthlings stepped foot on the moon for the first time. Humans had achieved the impossible.

For astronaut Neil Armstrong the historic significance of the moment was captured with the now famous words, “That’s one small step for a man, one giant leap for mankind.” Man’s first landing on another world was viewed as a triumph of modern technology. It was seen as confirmation of the primacy of science as the solution for all of man’s problems. The celebration that followed this breakthrough smacked of a new kind of idolatry. The ancient worship of the moon as a god was replaced with the worship of man for his ability to step foot upon its surface.

Fifty years later, with the benefit of hindsight and the lessons of history, it would be helpful to reconsider the significance of direct human contact with the moon.

A little more than half a year before Apollo 11 made its successful landing on the moon, on December 21, 1968, Apollo 8, the first manned mission to the moon, blasted off from present-day Cape Canaveral in Florida. The plan called for the three astronauts onboard to come within about 70 miles of the moon, circle it several times and return safely home, all while broadcasting their feats to the world below. By gaining operational experience, testing equipment and checking out potential landing sites, they also hoped to pave the way for a moonwalk the following year, just in time to meet former President John F. Kennedy’s challenge to do so before the end of the decade.

The astronauts became the first to see the Earth from afar as a whole planet, taking “the single most important and powerful photograph in human history.”


Minutes after a straightforward departure, Air Force Col. Frank Borman, the mission commander, Navy Capt. James A. Lovell Jr., the command module pilot, and Air Force Major William A. Anders, the lunar module pilot, propelled themselves into uncharted territory, voyaging for three days through the vastness of space. No previous manned flight, either U.S. or Soviet, had ever left Earth’s gravitational field. On December 24, the astronauts became the first humans to see the dark side of the moon and the first to enter lunar orbit, circling the celestial body 10 times.

They had also become the first to see the Earth from afar as a whole planet. It was then that Major Anders captured what is today called by many “the single most important and powerful photograph in human history”, today known as his “Earthrise” photo.


To look at that globe and to recognize it as our home, to know that we are spinning in its orbit and living out our daily lives in the context of a far larger universe, is to grasp the full meaning of King David’s words in the Psalms, "When I see Your heavens, the work of Your fingers... [I wonder] what is man that You should recall Him" (Psalms 8:4-5).

Even as we glorify our achievements when we claim we are “conquering space”, we can’t fail but to be overwhelmed by our puniness in comparison to the vastness of the universe and its clear proof of a far more powerful Creator.

Maimonides, in his classic work the Mishne Torah, described how to best fulfill our dual obligation to love and fear God.

What is the path to attain love and awe of Him? When a person contemplates His wondrous and great deeds and creations and appreciates His infinite wisdom that surpasses all comparison, he will immediately love, praise, and glorify [Him], yearning with tremendous desire to know [God's] great name, as David stated: ‘My soul thirsts for the Lord, for the living God’ (Psalms 42:3).

When he reflects on these same matters, he will immediately recoil in awe and fear, appreciating how he is a tiny, lowly, and dark creature, standing with his flimsy, limited, wisdom before He who is of perfect knowledge, as David stated: "When I see Your heavens, the work of Your fingers... [I wonder] what is man that You should recall Him" (Psalms 8:4-5).

How can we explain mankind’s unquenchable thirst to discover what lies beyond our earthly home? What justifies the expenditure of billions of dollars to fleetingly set foot on the moon – and hopefully in the future even further? The quest is in essence spiritual. It is, as Maimonides has defined it, the longing of our soul to know more about our Creator. It is an act of love – which brings in its wake a response of incredible awe.

That is what happened on the mission which preceded Apollo 11. As William Anders pointed his camera out the window and took the shot that reminds us of our real place in the universe, the astronauts began a running diary of what they could see, from the pitch-black sky to the moon’s various mountains, craters and seas. And then, with no instructions from NASA except to do something “appropriate”, they took turns reading the opening verses of the Torah.

“In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth…”

The opening words of the Torah were but a small step for God but a giant leap for mankind.