- Joined
- Aug 12, 2015
- Messages
- 50,759
- Reaction score
- 33,564
- Points
- 223
The design decision that almost ruined the Moon landing
Among the most iconic images of the Moon landings are astronauts backing down the ladder of the lunar module, from the spaceship hatch to the Moon’s surface. Even in the TV pictures, you can tell the astronauts move with care, as they find their footing on the rungs of the ladder, in their spacesuits, in the one-sixth lunar gravity.
But what if the astronauts had stepped out of the hatch, and then swung down to the lunar surface using a rope? Fly 240,000 miles in the most advanced machines ever created by human beings–and then use the kind of rope you’d buy at the hardware store today for about $40 to finish the last 10.5 feet of the journey. Like Tarzan. Or a prison escapee slipping over the wall.
That may be the strangest–the flat-out wackiest–idea for Moon flight engineering that NASA ever took seriously.
Among the most iconic images of the Moon landings are astronauts backing down the ladder of the lunar module, from the spaceship hatch to the Moon’s surface. Even in the TV pictures, you can tell the astronauts move with care, as they find their footing on the rungs of the ladder, in their spacesuits, in the one-sixth lunar gravity.
But what if the astronauts had stepped out of the hatch, and then swung down to the lunar surface using a rope? Fly 240,000 miles in the most advanced machines ever created by human beings–and then use the kind of rope you’d buy at the hardware store today for about $40 to finish the last 10.5 feet of the journey. Like Tarzan. Or a prison escapee slipping over the wall.
That may be the strangest–the flat-out wackiest–idea for Moon flight engineering that NASA ever took seriously.
