Jump to content

Moon landing conspiracy theories: Difference between revisions

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Browse history interactively
← Previous editNext edit →
Content deleted Content added
VisualWikitext
Undid revision 220219533 by 76.179.50.177 (talk) - Reverted vandalsim
←Replaced content with 'People that believe this sack of shit are dumb fuckers who should get a life. The U.S.A. did not fake the landings, but China will. Yeah, whoever's IP address ...'
Line 1: Line 1:
People that believe this sack of shit are dumb fuckers who should get a life. The U.S.A. did not fake the landings, but China will.
[[Image:GPN-2002-000032.jpg|thumb|250px|[[Buzz Aldrin]] and [[Neil Armstrong]] in NASA's training [[mock-up]] of the Moon and lander module. [[Hoax]] proponents say the entire mission was filmed on sets like this training mock-up.]]
'''Apollo Moon Landing hoax [[conspiracy theories]]''' are claims that some or all elements of the [[Project Apollo|Apollo]] [[Moon landing]]s were faked by [[NASA]] and possibly members of other involved organizations. Some groups and individuals have advanced various theories which tend, to varying degrees, to include the following common elements:


Yeah, whoever's IP address this is: 76.179.50.177. Go fuck yourself you cock-sucking, ass-raping, shit-eating, mother fucking SON OF A BITCH!!!!!!!!
*The Apollo [[astronaut]]s did not land on the [[Moon]];
*NASA and possibly others intentionally deceived the public into believing the landing(s) did occur by manufacturing, destroying, or tampering with evidence, including photos, [[telemetry]] tapes, transmissions, and rock samples;
*NASA and possibly others continue to actively participate in the conspiracy to this day.


and someone please erase this fucking article, because you'd have to be a fucking dumbass to believe this bullshit.
Many commentators have published detailed rebuttals to the hoax claims. A 1999 poll by the [[The Gallup Organization]] found that 89 percent of the US public believed the landing was genuine, while 6 percent did not and 5 percent were undecided.<ref name="gallup1">[http://www.gallup.com/poll/1993/Did-Men-Really-Land-Moon.aspx Did Men Really Land on the Moon?<!-- Bot generated title -->]</ref><ref name="gallup2">[http://www.gallup.com/poll/3712/Landing-Man-Moon-Publics-View.aspx Landing a Man on the Moon: The Public's View<!-- Bot generated title -->]</ref>


Have a nice day.
== Origins and history ==
The first book dedicated to the subject, [[Bill Kaysing]]'s self-published ''We Never Went to the Moon: America's Thirty Trillion Dollar Swindle'' was released in 1974, two years after the Apollo Moon flights had ceased.

Folklorist Linda Degh pointed out that the 1978 film ''[[Capricorn One]]'' (which depicts a hoaxed journey to [[Mars]] in spacecraft that look identical to the Apollo craft) may have given a "boost" to the hoax theory's popularity in the post-[[Vietnam War]], post-[[Watergate scandal|Watergate]] era when segments of the American public were disinclined to trust official accounts. Degh writes that "The mass media catapult these half-truths into a kind of twilight zone where people can make their guesses sound as truths. Mass media have a terrible impact on people who lack guidance."<ref name="wired">{{cite web
| url = http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/2.09/moon.land.html?pg=5&topic=
| title = The Wrong Stuff
| last = van Bakel | first = Rogier
| year = 1994 | month = September
| work = ''[[Wired (magazine)|Wired]]''
| format = [[magazine]]
| publisher = [[Condé Nast Publications]]
| accessdate = 2007-05-09
| quote = Are you sure we went to the moon 25 years ago? Are you positive? Millions of Americans believe the moon landings may have been a US$25 billion swindle, perpetrated by NASA with the latest in communications technology and the best in special effects. Wired plunges into the combat zone between heated conspiracy believers and exasperated NASA officials.}}</ref>

In his book ''[[A Man on the Moon]]'', published in 1994, [[Andrew Chaikin]] mentions that at the time of [[Apollo 8]]'s lunar-orbit mission in December 1968 similar ideas were already in circulation.

== Predominant hoax claims ==
A number of different hoax theories have been advanced. No one has proposed a complete narrative of how the hoax could have been perpetrated, but instead believers focus on perceived gaps or inconsistencies in the historical record of the missions. Several of these ideas and their most readily identifiable proponents are described below:
# '''Complete hoax''' — The idea that the entire human landing program was faked. Some claim that the technology to send men to the Moon was insufficient or that the [[Van Allen radiation belts]], [[solar flares]], [[solar wind]], [[coronal mass ejection]]s and [[cosmic rays]] made such a trip impossible.<ref name="kaysing2002">''We Never Went to the Moon: America's Thirty Billion Dollar Swindle'', Bill Kaysing, Pomeroy, WA, USA: Health Research Books, 2002. ISBN 1-85810-422-X.<!-- my copy has ISBN 0-7873-1254-0487-5, but that has the wrong number of digits. I've also seen the ISBN given as 0-7873-0487-5. Bubba73 --></ref>
# '''Partial hoax / unmanned landings''' — [[Bart Sibrel]] has stated that the crew of Apollo 11 and subsequent astronauts had faked their orbit around the Moon and their walk on its surface by trick photography, and that they never got more than halfway to the Moon. A subset of this proposal is advocated by those who concede the existence of [[retroreflector]]s and other observable human-made objects on the Moon. British publisher [[Marcus Allen (publisher)|Marcus Allen]] represented this argument when he said "I would be the first to accept what [telescope images of the landing site] find as powerful evidence that something was placed on the Moon by man." He goes on to say that photographs of the lander would not prove that America put men on the Moon. "Getting to the Moon really isn't much of a problem – [[Luna 2|the Russians did that in 1959]], the big problem is getting people there." His argument focuses around NASA sending robot missions because radiation levels in space were lethal to humans. Another variant on this is the idea that NASA and its contractors did not recover quickly enough from the [[Apollo 1]] fire, and so all the early Apollo missions were faked, with Apollo 14 or 15 being the first authentic mission.<ref>[http://www.bautforum.com/archive/index.php/t-1180.html Irrefutable proof [Archive&#93; - Bad Astronomy and Universe Today Forum<!-- Bot generated title -->]</ref> Still others believe the first and only landing occurred on [[December 11]], [[1972]] with [[Apollo 17]], as this was the first and final mission with a civilian scientist. {{Fact|date=June 2007}}
# '''Manned landings, with cover-ups'''
#* William Brian believes that the astronauts may have used "a secret zero gravity device" derived from technology found on a "captured extraterrestrial spaceship", but that NASA was compelled to cover up these facts and others relating to the gravity and the presence of atmosphere on the moon in order to maintain secrecy surrounding the alien space ship.<ref>[http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/2.09/moon.land.html?pg=3&topic= Wired 2.09: The Wrong Stuff<!-- Bot generated title -->]</ref>
#* Others believe that, while astronauts did land on the Moon, they covered up what they found, whether it was gravitational anomalies, alien artifacts, or alien encounters. <ref>[http://www.debunker.com/texts/apollo11.html The Apollo-11 UFO Incidents by James Oberg<!-- Bot generated title -->]</ref> [[Philippe Lheureux]], in ''Lumières sur la Lune'' (''Lights on the Moon''), said that astronauts did land on the Moon, but that, in order to prevent other nations from benefiting from scientific information in the real photos, NASA published fake images.<ref>{{cite book|last=Lheureux|first=Philippe||title=Lumières sur la Lune|publisher=Editions CARNOT|date=2000|url=http://lheureux.free.fr/|isbn =2912362490}}</ref>
#'''Actual lunar landing - faked filming''' – Still others believe that men did land on the moon, but that the photography was of very low media quality and in most cases unsuitable or even unusable. Therefore the U.S. government (NASA), since it had to present proof of the space program's success to justify taxpayers' money and keep the program alive, altered, modified and even faked many of the pictures and video, launching a subsequent media campaign with great success. Advocates of this theory state that the equipment used to photograph (Hasselblad cameras privately modified by NASA) had no protection for the film against radiation nor intense lighting conditions present on the moon and in space.{{Fact|date=August 2007}}

===Suggested motives for a hoax===
Several motives are given by hoax proponents for the [[United States government|U.S. government]] to fake the Moon landings.

#[[Cold War|Cold-War]] prestige — The U.S. government considered it vital that the U.S. win the [[space race]] against the [[Soviet Union]]. Going to the Moon was risky and expensive ([[John F. Kennedy#Space program|John F. Kennedy]] famously said that the U.S. chose to go ''because'' it was difficult.) Despite close monitoring by the Soviet Union, Bill Kaysing believes that it would have been easier for the U.S. to fake it, and consequently guarantee success, than for the U.S. actually to go.<ref name="kaysing2002" /><sup> p. 29</sup>
#Money — NASA raised approximately $30 billion to go to the Moon. Bill Kaysing thinks that this amount could have been used to pay off a large number of people, providing significant motivation for complicity.<ref name="kaysing2002" /><sup> p. 71</sup>
#Risk — This argument assumes that the problems early in the space program were insurmountable, even by a technology team fully motivated and funded to fix the problems. Kaysing claimed that the chance of a successful landing on the moon was calculated to be 0.017%.<ref name="kaysing2002" /><sup> pp. 26&ndash;40</sup>
#Distraction — According to hoax proponents, the U.S. government benefited from a popular distraction from the Vietnam war. Lunar activities suddenly stopped, with planned missions canceled, around the same time that the U.S. ceased its involvement in the Vietnam War.<ref>[http://www.apfn.org/apfn/moon.htm Was The Apollo Moon Landing Fake?<!-- Bot generated title -->]</ref> (However, the Apollo program was cancelled several years before the Vietnam War ended.<ref>[http://nssdc.gsfc.nasa.gov/planetary/lunar/apollo.html The Apollo Program (1963 - 1972)<!-- Bot generated title -->]</ref>)
#Delivering the promise — To seemingly fulfill President Kennedy's 1961 promise "to achieving the goal, ''before this decade is out'', of landing a man on the Moon and returning him safely to the Earth."

==Public opinions==
===Opinion polls===
A year after the first moon landing, ''[[Knight Newspapers]]'' conducted a poll of 1721 U.S. citizens and found that more than 30 percent of all of the poll's respondents were "suspicious of NASA's trips to the Moon" with the number increasing to more than half among some demographic categories. The ''[[Newsweek]]'' article that published the poll results noted that among the respondents were "an elderly Philadelphia woman who thought the moon landing had been staged in an Arizona desert". Another respondent said, "It's all a deliberate effort to mask problems at home... the people are unhappy - and this takes their minds off their problems."<ref name="wiredmoonlandpr">{{cite web
| url = http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/2.09/moon.land.html
| title = The Wrong Stuff
| last = van Bakel | first = Rogier
| year = 1994
| work = ''[[Wired (magazine)|Wired]]''
| format = [[magazine]]
| publisher = [[Condé Nast Publications]]
| accessdate = 2007-02-10
}}</ref>

According to a 1999 [[Gallup poll]], about 6 percent of the population of the United States has doubts that the [[Apollo program|Apollo]] [[astronaut]]s walked on the Moon. (Five percent had no opinion, while 89 percent believed the landings took place.)<ref name="gallup1"/> It asked, "thinking about the space exploration, do you think the government staged or faked the Apollo Moon landing, or don't you feel that way?" Six percent of respondents answered "yes, staged."<ref>{{cite web
| last = Newport
| first = Frank
| year = 1999
| url = http://poll.gallup.com/content/default.aspx?ci=3712
| title = Landing a Man on the Moon: The Public's View
| work = The Gallup Poll
| publisher = The Gallup Poll
| accessdate = 2006-07-05
}}</ref> <ref name="plait2002">''Bad Astronomy: Misconceptions and Misuses Revealed, from Astrology to the Moon Landing "Hoax"'', Dr. Philip Plait, [[John Wiley & Sons]], 2002. ISBN 0-471-40976-6. See esp. chapter 17.</ref><sup>, p. 156</sup> "Although, if taken literally, 6 percent translates into millions of individuals," Gallup said of this, "it is not unusual to find about that many people in the typical poll agreeing with almost any question that is asked of them; so the best interpretation is that this particular conspiracy theory is not widespread." A 1995 ''[[Time (magazine)|Time]]/[[CNN]]'' poll also found that 6 percent of the people believe in a hoax<ref name="plait2002" /><sup>, p. 156</sup>. [[Fox television]]'s 2001 TV special " ''Conspiracy Theory: Did We Really Land on the Moon?''"<ref>Fox TV, "''Conspiracy Theory: Did We Really Land on the Moon?''"[http://video.google.com/url?docid=-1138935117048624484]</ref> may have given a boost to the idea. Fox said roughly 20 percent of the public had doubts about the authenticity of the Apollo program after the show.

A [[Dittmar Associates]] poll in 2006 showed that among 18-26 year old college-educated students “''27 percent expressed some doubt that NASA went to the Moon, with 10 percent indicating that it was ‘highly unlikely’ that a Moon landing had ever taken place.''”<ref>[http://www.thespacereview.com/article/787/1 The Space Review: Generation Y and lunar disbelief<!-- Bot generated title -->]</ref>

[[James Oberg]], an American journalist who writes about space (and has worked for NASA's [[space shuttle]] program), estimates that "perhaps 10 percent of the population, and up to twice as large in specific demographic groups" believe in the hoax or have some doubts about the Apollo program.<ref name="oberg1">http://www.jamesoberg.com/042003lessonsfake_his.html</ref> "It’s not just a few crackpots and their new books and Internet conspiracy sites," Oberg said in 1999. "There are entire subcultures within the U.S., and substantial cultures around the world, that strongly believe the landing was faked. I’m told that this is official dogma still taught in schools in Cuba, plus wherever else Cuban teachers have been sent (such as Sandinista Nicaragua and Angola)."<ref>[http://www.jamesoberg.com/103102apollodebunk.html April 2002: Jim's Critique of NASA 'Official History' of Shuttle-Mir<!-- Bot generated title -->]</ref> In other sources Oberg has tied these beliefs to larger social phenomena: "Myths have a way of blossoming in the fertile soil of scientific discovery . . . from the time of the Phoenicians...to Marco Polo, and including [[mermaids]] and unipeds and all these mythological creatures that lurk at the edge of our exploration."<ref name="wiredmoonlandpr" />

===Other opinions===
[[Image:AS8-13-2329.jpg|thumb|300px|right|One of the earthrise photos. The [[Flat Earth Society]] used these photos as evidence of a faked landing, since they show a spherical Earth.]]

[[Charles K. Johnson]], president of the [[Flat Earth Society|International Flat Earth Research Society]], challenged the idea that men had landed on the Moon, claiming that the landings were "faked in Hollywood studios", with science-fiction writer [[Arthur C. Clarke]] writing the script. He was of the opinion that the Apollo program was faked in part to promote what he believed to be the myth of a round Earth.<ref>[http://www.lhup.edu/%7Edsimanek/fe-scidi.htm The Flat-out Truth: Earth Orbits? Moon Landings? A Fraud! Says This Prophet], [[Robert J. Schadewald]], ''Science Digest'', vol. 83, July 1980, pp. 58&ndash;63.</ref><ref>Where are they Now? the Flat Earthers, ''[[Newsweek]]'', vol. 73, [[January 13]], [[1969]], p. 8.</ref>

[[The International Society for Krishna Consciousness]] has published articles on its Web site in favor of hoax accusations. [[A. C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada|Srila Prabhupada]] instructed his students to write to the LA Times and he outlined ten reasons why they did not go to Chandra Loka, the Moon planet. His students remember three of the points:
#By its own admission NASA agreed the temperature on the moon to be 200 degrees below zero&mdash;no human body could withstand that temperature even with 1969 technology;
#The moon's surface according to Vedic conclusion, common sense, and scientific reasoning is made of a reflective substance; why then are there shadows in the video?;
#The international community of scientists at that time did not recognize the validity of the moonwalk, nor did they give credence to it.<ref>[http://krishna.org/Articles/2000/08/00082.html Man On The Moon-A Colossal Hoax that Cost Billions of Dollars<!-- Bot generated title -->]</ref><ref>[http://science.krishna.org/Articles/2000/12/00227.html Did man really walk on the Moon ???<!-- Bot generated title -->]</ref>

The late U.S. Senators [[Alan Cranston]] ([[Democratic Party (United States)|D]]-California) and [[Strom Thurmond]] ([[Republican Party (United States)|R]]-South Carolina) were on record as having written to NASA passing on the concerns of their constituents.<ref name="wiredmoonlandpr" />

==Critiques of hoax accusations ==
{{main|Independent evidence for Apollo Moon landings}}
===Conspiracy theory===
Hoax accusations have been characterized as [[conspiracy theory|conspiracy theories]] since believers claim that conspirators in the possession of [[secret knowledge]] are misleading or have misled the public in pursuit of a hidden agenda&mdash;namely, hiding that the Moon landings were faked. This is the central argument of the prominent critics of the conventional history of the Apollo program. The 2001 Fox special, which examined the issues on each side, used that term in its title (''Conspiracy Theory: Did We Land on the Moon?''). However, the term "conspiracy theory" is highly charged, and many people consider it to be pejorative.<ref>
{{cite web | url=http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/theeditors/2006/12/the_danger_with_conspiracies_1.html
| last=Rudin | first=Mike | title=The danger with conspiracies
| date=2006-12-08 | accessed=2007-02-09 | publisher=BBC.com }}</ref>

The Apollo Moon landing hoax accusations have been the subject of [[Debunker|debunking]] and, according to the debunkers, have been [[falsification|falsified]]. An article in the German magazine ''[[Der Spiegel]]'' places the Moon hoax in the context of other well-known 20th century conspiracy theories which it describes as "the rarefied atmosphere of those myths in which Elvis is alive, John F. Kennedy fell victim to a conspiracy involving the Mafia and secret service agents, the Moon landing was staged in the Nevada desert, and [[Princess Diana]] was murdered by the British intelligence services."<ref name="Cziesche">{{cite web
| last = Cziesche
| first = Dominik
| coauthors = Jürgen Dahlkamp, Ulrich Fichtner, Ulrich Jaeger, Gunther Latsch, Gisela Leske, Max F. Ruppert
| year = 2003
| url = http://service.spiegel.de/cache/international/spiegel/0,1518,265160,00.html
| title = Panoply of the Absurd
| work = Der Spiegel
| publisher = Der Spiegel
| accessdate = 2006-06-06
}}</ref>

=== Scientific method ===
Application of the [[scientific method]] to this scenario would allow each explanation of an event as a separate [[hypothesis]], like this:

; Real landing hypothesis : NASA's portrayal of the Moon landing is fundamentally accurate, allowing for such common errors as mislabeled photos and imperfect personal recollections.

; Hoax hypothesis : NASA's portrayal of the Moon landing is an orchestrated hoax.

In this type of evaluation, any hypothesis that is contradicted by the observable facts may be rejected.<ref>{{cite web
| last = Calder
| first = Vince
| coauthors = Johnson, Andrew P.E.
| title = Ask A Scientist
| work = Newton "Ask a Scientist", General Science Archive
| publisher = "Newton", Argonne National Laboratory
| date = [[2002-10-12]]
| url = http://www.newton.dep.anl.gov/askasci/gen01/gen01278.htm
| accessdate = 2007-02-07 }}</ref> The lack of narrative consistency in the hoax hypothesis occurs because hoax accounts vary from proponent to proponent. The 'real landing' hypothesis is a single story, since it comes from a single source, but there are many hoax hypotheses, each of which addresses a specific aspect of the Moon landing. The evidence regarding the Moon landings is met by hoax believers with skepticism, who label the NASA story as unconvincing propaganda made by "[[the establishment]]" to cover up the alleged lie.

An example of such an exchange is the evidence for the landing of the ''[[Apollo 11]]'', ''[[Apollo 14]]'', and ''[[Apollo 15]]'' [[retroreflector]] arrays on the Moon. Scientists have reflected lasers off these to measure the distance between Earth and the Moon (see [[Lunar laser ranging experiment|Lunar Laser Ranging Experiment]]).<ref>{{cite web
| title = Laser Ranging Retroreflector
| work = NSSDC Master Catalog Display: Experiment
| publisher = National Space Science Data Center, NASA
| date = [[2006-12-04]]
| url = http://nssdc.gsfc.nasa.gov/database/MasterCatalog?sc=1971-063C&ex=8
| accessdate = 2007-02-07 }}</ref> Hoax proponents such as [[Marcus Allen (publisher)|Marcus Allen]] say that because the Russians placed reflectors on the Moon using robotic missions,<ref>Unmanned Soviet [[Lunokhod]] 1 and Lunokhod 2 rovers carried mirror arrays.
(Lunokhod 1 : {{cite web
| title = Luna 17/Lunokhod 1
| work = NSSDC Master Catalog Display: Spacecraft
| publisher = National Space Science Data Center, NASA
| date = [[2006-12-04]]
| url = http://nssdc.gsfc.nasa.gov/database/MasterCatalog?sc=1970-095A
| accessdate = 2007-02-07 }},
(Lunokhod 2 : {{cite web
| title = Luna 21/Lunokhod 2
| work = NSSDC Master Catalog Display: Spacecraft
| publisher = National Space Science Data Center, NASA
| date = [[2006-12-04]]
| url = http://nssdc.gsfc.nasa.gov/database/MasterCatalog?sc=1973-001A
| accessdate = 2007-02-07 }})
Reflected signals were received from Lunokhod 1, but then it was left in a position preventing the return of signals.
({{cite conference
| last = Stooke
| first = P. J.
| title = Lunar Laser Ranging and the Location of Lunokhod 1
| booktitle = 36th Annual Lunar and Planetary Science Conference, abstract no.1194
| publisher = Lunar and Planetary Institute, NASA
| place = League City, Texas
| date = March 14-18, 2005
| url = http://www.lpi.usra.edu/meetings/lpsc2005/pdf/1194.pdf
| accessdate = 2007-02-07 }})</ref> the presence of similar reflectors should be explained by, for example, a secret American robotic mission with an express aim to place retroreflectors on the Moon to provide misleading evidence and corroborate that part of the Apollo missions.<ref name="Cziesche"/><ref>{{cite web
| last = Matthews
| first = Robert
| title = Telescope to challenge moon doubters
| publisher = The Sydney Morning Herald
| date = [[2002-11-25]]
| url = http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2002/11/24/1037697982142.html
| accessdate = 2007-02-07}}</ref>

== Hoax claims examined==
As mentioned above, many hoax claims focus on perceived problems with specific portions of the historical record surrounding the moon landings. Below is an overview of these claims as well as their associated attempted debunking from various sources:

===Missing data===
[[Image:Apollo11C.jpg|thumb|right|Photo of the high-quality SSTV image before the scan conversion.]]
[[Image:Apollo11D.jpg|thumb|right|Photo of the degraded image after the SSTV scan conversion.]]

[[Blueprint]]s and design and development drawings of the machines involved are missing. Apollo 11 data tapes containing [[telemetry]] and the high quality video (before scan conversion) of the first moonwalk are missing.<ref>[[n:Apollo Moon landings tapes reported missing|Apollo Moon landings tapes reported missing]], Wikinews, August 5, 2006.</ref> For more information see [[Apollo program missing tapes]].
:a) Dr. David Williams (NASA archivist at [[Goddard Space Flight Center]]) and Apollo 11 flight director [[Gene Kranz]] both acknowledged that the Apollo 11 telemetry data tapes are missing. Hoax proponents interpret this as support for the case that they never existed.<ref name="Moonhoaxcom">[http://Moonhoax.com/site/evidence.html Did We Go? The Evidence Is In!<!-- Bot generated title -->]</ref>
:*''Only the Apollo 11 telemetry tapes made during the moonwalk are missing—and not those of Apollo 12, 14, 15, 16, and 17.<ref>[http://www.solarviews.com/eng/apo17.htm SolarViews.com]</ref> For technical reasons, the Apollo 11 Lunar Module carried a [[Slow-scan television]] (SSTV) camera (see [[Apollo TV camera]]). In order to be broadcast to regular television, a scan conversion has to be done. The [[radio telescope]] at [[Parkes Observatory]] in Australia was in position to receive the telemetry from the Moon at the time of the Apollo 11 Moonwalk.<ref>[http://www.parkes.atnf.csiro.au/apollo11/introduction.html a peer-reviewed paper in "Publications of the Astronomical Society of Australia"]</ref> Parkes had a larger antenna than NASA's antenna in Australia at the [[Honeysuckle Creek Tracking Station]], so it got a better picture. It also got a better picture than NASA's antenna at [[Goldstone Deep Space Communications Complex]]. This direct TV signal, along with telemetry data, was recorded onto one-inch fourteen-track analog tape there. A crude, real-time [[scan conversion]] of the SSTV signal was done in Australia before it was broadcast around the world. The original SSTV broadcast had better detail and contrast than the scan-converted pictures.<ref>[http://www.parkes.atnf.csiro.au/apollo11/Parkes_Apollo11_TV_quality.html On Eagle's Wing: The Story of the Parkes Apollo 11 Support<!-- Bot generated title -->]</ref> It is this tape made in Australia before the scan conversion which is missing. Tapes or films of the scan-converted pictures exist and are available. Still photographs of the original SSTV image are available (see photos). Also, about fifteen minutes of the SSTV images of the Apollo 11 moonwalk were filmed by an amateur [[8 mm film]] camera, and these are also available. Later Apollo missions did not use SSTV, and their video is also available. At least some of the telemetry tapes from the [[Apollo Lunar Surface Experiment Package|ALSEP]] scientific experiments left on the Moon (which ran until 1977) still exist, according to Dr. Williams. Copies of those tapes have been found.<ref>[http://www.cosmosmagazine.com/node/818 Lost Moon landing tapes discovered | COSMOS magazine<!-- Bot generated title -->]</ref>

:* ''Others are looking for the missing telemetry tapes, but for different reasons. The tapes contain the original and highest quality video feed from the Apollo 11 lunar landing which a number of former Apollo personnel want to recover for posterity, while NASA engineers looking towards future Moon missions believe the Apollo telemetry data may be useful for their design studies. Their investigations have determined that the Apollo 11 tapes were sent for storage at the US National Archives in 1970, but by 1984 all the Apollo 11 tapes had been returned to the Goddard Space Flight Center at their request. The tapes are believed to have been stored rather than re-used, and efforts to determine where they were stored are ongoing.<ref>http://www.honeysucklecreek.net.nyud.net:8080/Apollo_11/tapes/Search_for_SSTV_Tapes.pdf</ref> Goddard was storing 35,000 new tapes per year in 1967,<ref>http://ntrs.nasa.gov/archive/nasa/casi.ntrs.nasa.gov/19670010532_1967010532.pdf</ref> even before the lunar landings.''

:* ''On November 1, 2006 [[Cosmos Magazine]] reported that some one-hundred data tapes recorded in Australia during the Apollo 11 mission had been discovered in a small marine science laboratory in the main physics building at the [[Curtin University of Technology]] in [[Perth, Western Australia|Perth, Australia]]. One of the old tapes has been sent to NASA for analysis. It is not known if the slow-scan television images are on any of the tapes.<ref>Carmelo Amalfi, [http://www.cosmosmagazine.com/node/818 Lost Moon landing tapes discovered], [[COSMOS Magazine]], Nov 1,2006 </ref>''

:b) Hoax proponents say that blueprints for the Apollo Lunar Module, [[Lunar rover|rover]], and associated equipment are missing.<ref name="xenophilia">[http://www.xenophilia.com/zb0003c.htm Xenophilia - Moon Hoax Debate<!-- Bot generated title -->]</ref>
:*'' There are some diagrams of the Lunar Module and [[Lunar rover|Moon buggy]] on the NASA web site as well as on the pro hoax web site Xenophilia.com.<ref name="xenophilia"/> [[Grumman Aircraft Engineering Corporation|Grumman]] appears to have destroyed most of the documentation.<ref>[http://pirlwww.lpl.arizona.edu/~jscotti/NOT_faked/collier.htm The Collier article - a critique<!-- Bot generated title -->]</ref><ref>[http://www.clavius.org/bibcollier.html Clavius: Bibliography - the Collier article<!-- Bot generated title -->]</ref>
:* ''Despite the questions concerning the existence or location of the [[Apollo Lunar Module|LEM]] blueprints, an unused LEM is on exhibit at the [[Cradle of Aviation Museum]].<ref>[http://www.cradleofaviation.org The Cradle of Aviation Museum<!-- Bot generated title -->]</ref><ref>[http://www.cradleofaviation.org/exhibits/space/lm-13/index.html LM-13]</ref> The Lunar Module designated LM-13 would have landed on the Moon during the [[Apollo 18]] mission, but was instead put into storage when the mission was canceled: it has since been restored and put on display. Other unused Lunar Modules are on display: LM-2 at the [[National Air and Space Museum]], LM-9 at [[Kennedy Space Center]], and LM-16 at the [[Museum of Science and Industry (Chicago)|Museum of Science and Industry]] in [[Chicago]].<ref>http://aesp.nasa.okstate.edu/fieldguide/pages/lunarmod/index.html</ref>''

:* ''Copies of the blueprints for the Saturn V exist on microfilm.'' <ref>[http://www.space.com/news/spacehistory/saturn_five_000313.html SPACE.com - Saturn 5 Blueprints Safely in Storage<!-- Bot generated title -->]</ref>

:*''Four mission-worthy [[Lunar rover|Lunar Rovers]] were built, but three were carried to the Moon on Apollo 15, 16, and 17, and left there. After Apollo 18 was canceled (see [[Canceled Apollo missions]]), the other lunar rover was used for spare parts for the lunar rovers on the upcoming Apollo 15 through 17 missions. The only lunar rovers on display are test vehicles, trainers, and models.<ref>[http://nssdc.gsfc.nasa.gov/planetary/lunar/apollo_lrv.html The Apollo Lunar Roving Vehicle<!-- Bot generated title -->]</ref> The "Moon buggies" were built by [[Boeing]] (the New [[Encyclopædia Britannica]] Micropedia, 2005, vol 2, p 319).<ref>[http://www.thespacereview.com/article/127/1 The Space Review: Lunar rovers past and future (page 1)<!-- Bot generated title -->]</ref> The 221-page operation manual for the Lunar Rover contains some detailed drawings,<ref>[http://www.hq.nasa.gov/alsj/lrvhand.html Lunar Rover Operations Handbook<!-- Bot generated title -->]</ref> although not the design blueprints.

:c) [[Bart Sibrel]] said "In my research at NASA I uncovered, deep in the archives, one mislabeled reel from the Apollo 11, first mission, to the Moon. What is on the reel and on the label are completely different. I suspect an editor put the wrong label on the tape 33 years ago and no reporter ever had the motive to be as thorough as I. It contains an hour of rare, unedited, color television footage that is dated by NASA’s own atomic clock three days into the flight. Identified on camera are Neil Armstrong, Edwin "Buzz" Aldrin, and Michael Collins. They are doing multiple takes of a single shot of the mission, from which only about ten seconds was ever broadcast. Because I have uncovered the original unedited version, mistakenly not destroyed, the photography proves to be a clever forgery. Really! It means they did not walk on the Moon!"

:*''The evidence offered in the reel of footage 'found' by Bart Sibrel is limited and it is important to note that the extracts used have themselves been edited to remove portions that contradict and debunk his theory that the shots of a distant Earth seen by people on T.V. were faked. This portion of the film is never shown by hoax proponents. {{Fact|date=December 2007}}<br> The NASA atomic clock referred to is not the same clock as that used during the Apollo missions.''<ref name="Lunar Legacy Episode 1, Part 5 (Did we land on the moon?)">[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_SRV7elUFjo YouTube - Broadcast Yourself<!-- Bot generated title -->]</ref>

===Technological capability of USA compared with the USSR===
At the time of Apollo, the Soviet Union had five times more manned hours in space than the US.<ref>[http://www.moonmovie.com/moonmovie/default.asp?ID=7 Moon Landing Hoax Top 10 Reasons<!-- Bot generated title -->]</ref> They had achieved:
# First manmade satellite in orbit (October 1957, [[Sputnik 1]]).
# First living creature to enter orbit, a female dog named [[Laika]], (November 1957, [[Sputnik 2]]).
# First to safely return living creature from orbit, two dogs [[Belka and Strelka]], 40 mice, 2 rats (August 1960, [[Sputnik 5]]).
# [[Yuri Gagarin|First man in space]] (April 1961, [[Vostok 1]]).
# First man to orbit the Earth (April 1961, Vostok 1).
# First to have two spacecraft in orbit at the same time (''though it was '''not''' a [[space rendezvous]], as frequently described'') (August 1962, [[Vostok 3]] and [[Vostok 4]]).
# [[Valentina Tereshkova|First woman in space]] (June 1963, [[Vostok 6]], as part of a second dual-spacecraft flight including [[Vostok 5]]).
# First crew of three cosmonauts on board one spacecraft (October 1964, [[Voskhod 1]]).
# First spacewalk ([[Extra-vehicular activity|EVA]]) (March 1965, [[Voskhod 2]]).

On [[January 27]] [[1967]], the three astronauts aboard [[Apollo 1]] died in a fire on the launch pad during training. The fire was triggered by a spark in the oxygen-rich atmosphere used in the spacecraft test, and fueled by a significant quantity of combustible material within the spacecraft. Two years later all of the problems were declared fixed. Bart Sibrel believes that the accident led NASA to conclude that the only way to 'win' the moon race was to fake the landings.<ref>Bart Sibrel</ref> In any case, the first manned Apollo flight, [[Apollo 7]], occurred in October, 1968, 21 months after the fire.
*''NASA and others say that these achievements by the Soviets are not as impressive as the simple list implies; that a number of these 'firsts' were mere stunts that did not advance the technology significantly, or at all (e.g. the first woman in space).<ref>[http://www.clavius.org/techsoviet.html Clavius: Technology - beating the soviets<!-- Bot generated title -->]</ref>
*''A close examination of the many flight missions reveal'' many ''problems, risks, and'' near-''catastrophes for both the Soviet and American programs. A negative 'first' for the Soviets was the first in-flight fatality, in April 1967, three months after the Apollo I fire, as [[Soyuz 1]] crash-landed. Despite that disaster, the Soyuz program continued, after a lengthy interval to solve design problems, as with the Apollo program.''
* ''Before the first Earth-orbiting Apollo flight, the USSR had accumulated 534 hours of manned spaceflight whereas the US had accumulated over 1,992 hours of manned spaceflight. By the time of Apollo 11, the US's lead was much wider than that'' (see [[List of human spaceflights, 1960s]].)
* ''Most of the firsts above were done by the US within a year afterwards (sometimes within weeks). In 1965 the US started to achieve many firsts which were important steps in a mission to the Moon. See [[List of Space Exploration Milestones, 1957-1969]] for a more complete list of achievements by both the US and USSR. The USSR never developed a successful rocket capable of a Moon landing mission — their [[N1 rocket]] failed on all four launch attempts. They never tested a lunar lander on a manned mission.<ref>[http://www.astronautix.com/flights/sovnding.htm Soviet Lunar Landing<!-- Bot generated title -->]</ref>''

===Photographs and films===
[[Image:AS11-40-5968HR.jpg|thumb|180px|Some stars are visible in some photographs, such as this one from Apollo 11.]]
{{main|Examination of Apollo moon photos}}

Moon hoax proponents devote a substantial portion of their efforts to examining NASA photos. They point to various issues with photographs and films purportedly taken on the Moon. Experts in photography (even those unrelated to NASA) respond that the anomalies, while sometimes counter-intuitive, are in fact precisely what one would expect from a real Moon landing, and contrary to what would occur with manipulated or studio imagery. Hoax proponents also state that whistleblowers may have deliberately manipulated the NASA photos in hope of exposing NASA.

1. Crosshairs appear to be behind objects.
:*''Overexposure causes white objects to bleed into the black areas on the film.''

2. Crosshairs are sometimes misplaced or rotated.
:*''Popular versions of photos are sometimes cropped or rotated for aesthetic impact. ''
[[Image:AS11-40-5968crop.jpg|thumb|180px|Enlargement of cropped version of the above photo; a few stars are visible.]]

3. The quality of the photographs is implausibly high.
:*''There are many, many poor quality photographs taken by the Apollo astronauts. NASA chose to publish only the best examples.''<ref>[http://www.clavius.org/photoqual.html Clavius: Photography - image quality<!-- Bot generated title -->]</ref><ref>[http://www.clavius.org/photoret.html Clavius: Photography - crosshairs<!-- Bot generated title -->]</ref>

4. There are no [[star]]s in any of the photos. The Apollo 11 astronauts also claimed in a press conference after the event to have not remembered seeing any of the stars.
:*''The sun was shining. Cameras were set for daylight exposure, and could not detect the faint points of light. Some stars are visible in some photographs, depending on the exposure.''<ref name="plait2002" /><sup>, pp. 158&ndash;160</sup>

5. The color and angle of shadows and light are inconsistent.
:*''Shadows on the Moon are complicated by uneven ground, wide angle lens distortion, light reflected from the Earth, and lunar dust.<ref name="plait2002" /><sup>, pp. 167&ndash;172</sup> Shadows also display the properties of vanishing point perspective leading them to converge to a point on the horizon.''

6. Identical backgrounds in photos are listed as taken miles apart.
:*''Shots were not identical, just similar. Background objects were mountains many miles away. Without an atmosphere to obscure distant objects, it can be difficult to tell the relative distance and scale of terrain features.''<ref>http://www.iangoddard.net/Moon01.htm</ref> One specific case is debunked in ''Who Mourns For Apollo?'' by [[Mike Bara]].''<ref name="whomourns">[http://www.lunaranomalies.com/fake-moon2.htm Who Mourns For Apollo?, part II, by Mike Bara.]</ref>

7. The number of photographs taken is implausibly high. Up to one photo per 50 seconds.<ref>http://www.aulis.com/skeleton.html</ref>
:*''Simplified gear with fixed settings permitted two photographs a second. Many were taken immediately after each other. Calculations are based on a single astronaut on the surface, and does not take into account that there were two persons sharing the workload during the EVA.''

8. The photos contain artifacts like the two seemingly matching 'C's on a rock and on the ground.
:* ''The "C"-shaped objects are most likely printing imperfections not in the original film from the camera.

9. A resident of [[Perth, Western Australia|Perth, Australia]], with the pseudonym "[[Una Ronald]]", said she saw a [[soft drink]] bottle in the frame.
:*''No such newspaper reports or recordings have been verified. "Una Ronald"'s existence is authenticated by only one source. There are also flaws in the story, i.e. the emphatic statement that she had to "stay up late" is easily discounted by numerous witnesses in Australia who observed the event to occur in the middle of their daytime, since this event was an unusual compulsory viewing for school children in Australia.<ref>[http://www.webwombat.com.au/careers_ed/education/fly-to-moon.htm Fly Me to the Moon : Astronomy : School : Education : Web Wombat<!-- Bot generated title -->]</ref>''

10. The book ''[[Moon Shot]]'' contains an obvious composite photograph of [[Alan Shepard]] hitting a golf ball on the Moon with another astronaut.
:*'' It was used in lieu of the only existing real images, from the TV monitor, which the editors of the book apparently felt were too grainy to present in a book's picture section. The book publishers did not work for NASA.''

11. There appear to be "hot spots" in some photographs that look like a huge spotlight was used at a close distance.
:*'' Pits in moon dust focus and reflect light in a manner similar to minuscule glass spheres used in the coating of street signs, or dew-drops on wet grass. (see [[Heiligenschein]])<ref>[http://www.clavius.org/bootspot.html Clavius: Photo Analysis - buzz's hot spot<!-- Bot generated title -->]</ref>''

12. Footprints in the extraordinarily fine lunar dust, with no moisture or atmosphere or strong gravity, are unexpectedly well preserved, in the minds of some observers – as if made in wet sand.

:* ''The dust is silicate, and this has a special property in a vacuum of sticking together like that. The astronauts described it as being like "talcum powder or wet sand".''<ref name="whomourns" />

<gallery>
Image:Aldrin Apollo 11 original.jpg|The original Buzz Aldrin photograph.
Image:Earth over Apollo 11 Lunar Module.jpg|Photo of the Earth taken from behind the Apollo 11 Lunar Module.
Image:A14golf.jpg|The photo mockup made for the book ''Moon Shot''. The second astronaut is located in the 'fold' in the middle of the scanned photo.
Image:Apollo 14 golf.jpg|TV image of the actual scene.
</gallery>
{{clear}}

===[[Ionizing radiation]] and heat===
'''Challenges and responses'''

1. The astronauts could not have survived the trip because of exposure to radiation from the [[Van Allen radiation belt]] and galactic ambient radiation (see [[Radiation poisoning]]). Some hoax theorists have suggested that [[Starfish Prime]] (high altitude nuclear testing in 1962) was a failed attempt to disrupt the Van Allen belts.
:*''The Moon is ten times higher than the Van Allen radiation belts. The spacecraft moved through the belts in just 30 minutes, and the astronauts were protected from the ionizing radiation by the aluminium hulls of the spacecraft. In addition, the orbital transfer trajectory from the Earth to the Moon through the belts was selected to minimize radiation exposure. Even Dr. [[James Van Allen]], the discoverer of the Van Allen radiation belts, rebutted the claims that radiation levels were too dangerous for the Apollo missions. [[Dosimeter]]s carried by the crews showed they received about the same cumulative dosage as a chest [[X-ray]] or about 1 [[Gray (unit)|milligray]].<ref>[http://spider.ipac.caltech.edu/staff/waw/mad/mad19.html MAD19<!-- Bot generated title -->]</ref> Plait cited an average dose of less than 1 [[Röntgen equivalent man|rem]], which is equivalent to the ambient radiation received by living at [[sea level]] for three years.<ref name="plait2002" /><sup>, pp. 160&ndash;162</sup>''

:*''The radiation is actually evidence that the astronauts went to the Moon. Irene Schneider reports that thirty-three of the thirty-six Apollo astronauts involved in the nine Apollo missions to leave Earth orbit have early stage [[cataract]]s that have been shown to be caused by radiation exposure to cosmic rays during their trip.<ref>See Ms. Irene Schneider on the [http://archived.thespaceshow.com/shows/416-BWB-2005-11-20.mp3 November 20, 2005] episode of [http://www.thespaceshow.com/ The Space Show].</ref> However, only twenty-four astronauts left earth orbit. At least thirty-nine former astronauts have developed cataracts. Thirty-six of those were involved in high-radiation missions such as the Apollo lunar missions. <ref>[http://science.nasa.gov/headlines/y2004/22oct_cataracts.htm Blinding Flashes<!-- Bot generated title -->]</ref>''

2. Film in the cameras would have been fogged by this radiation.
:*''The film was kept in metal containers that prevented radiation from fogging the film's emulsion.''<ref name="plait2002" /><sup>, pp. 162&ndash;163</sup> ''In addition, film carried by unmanned lunar probes such as the [[Lunar Orbiter program|Lunar Orbiter]] and [[Luna 3]] (which used on-board film development processes) was not fogged.''

3. The Moon's surface during the daytime is so hot that camera film would have melted.
:*''There is no atmosphere to efficiently couple lunar surface heat to devices such as cameras not in direct contact with it. In a vacuum, only radiation remains as a heat transfer mechanism. The physics of radiative heat transfer are thoroughly understood, and the proper use of passive optical coatings and paints was adequate to control the temperature of the film within the cameras; lunar module temperatures were controlled with similar coatings that gave it its gold color. Also, while the Moon's surface does get very hot at lunar noon, every Apollo landing was made shortly after lunar sunrise at the landing site. During the longer stays, the astronauts did notice increased cooling loads on their spacesuits as the sun continued to rise and the surface temperature increased, but the effect was easily countered by the passive and active cooling systems.<ref name="plait2002" /><sup>, pp. 165&ndash;67</sup> The film was not in direct sunlight, so it wasn't overheated.'' <ref>[http://www.clavius.org/envheat.html Clavius: Environment - heat<!-- Bot generated title -->]</ref>

:*''Note: all of the lunar landings occurred during the lunar daytime. The [[Lunar day|Moon's day]] is approximately 29½ days long, and as a consequence a single lunar day (dawn to dusk) lasts nearly fifteen days. As such there was no sunrise or sunset while the astronauts were on the surface. Most lunar missions occurred during the first few earth days of the lunar day.''

4. The [[Apollo 16]] crew should not have survived a big solar flare firing out when they were on their way to the Moon. "They should have been fried."
:*''No large solar flare occurred during the flight of Apollo 16. There were large solar flares in August 1972, after Apollo 16 returned to Earth and before the flight of [[Apollo 17]].<ref>[http://science.nasa.gov/headlines/y2005/27jan_solarflares.htm Sickening Solar Flares<!-- Bot generated title -->]</ref><ref>[http://skyandtelescope.com/news/article_1754_1.asp SkyandTelescope.com - News from Sky & Telescope - Predicting Solar Eruptions<!-- Bot generated title -->]</ref>

===Transmissions===
'''Challenges and responses'''

1. The lack of a more than two-second delay in two-way communications at a distance of a 400,000 km (250,000 miles).
:*''The round trip light travel time of more than two seconds is apparent in all the real-time recordings of the lunar audio, but this does not always appear as expected. There may also be some documentary films where the delay has been edited out. Principal motivations for editing the audio would likely come in response to time constraints or in the interest of clarity.''<ref>[http://www.redzero.demon.co.uk/moonhoax/Radio.htm Radio Lag<!-- Bot generated title -->]</ref>
[[Image:Speed of light from Earth to Moon.gif|thumb|center|800px|The relative sizes of, and distance between, Earth and Moon, to scale, with a beam of light travelling between them at the speed of light.]]

2. Typical delays in communication were on the order of half a second.
:*''Claims that the delays were only on the order of half a second are unsubstantiated by an examination of the actual recordings. It should also be borne in mind that there should not be a straightforward, consistent time delay between every response, as the conversation is being recorded at one end - Mission Control. Responses from Mission Control could be heard without any delay, as the recording is being made at the same time that Houston receives the transmission from the moon.''
3. The [[Parkes Observatory]] in [[Australia]] was billed to the world for weeks as the site that would be relaying communications from the Moon, then five hours before transmission they were told to stand down.
:*''The timing of the first Moonwalk was moved up after landing. In fact, delays in getting the Moonwalk started meant that Parkes did cover almost the entire Apollo 11 Moonwalk.''<ref>[http://www.nasm.si.edu/collections/imagery/apollo/AS11/a11sum.htm Apollo 11 Mission Summary<!-- Bot generated title -->]</ref>
4. Parkes supposedly provided the clearest video feed from the Moon, but Australian media and all other known sources ran a live feed from the United States.
:*''While that was the original plan, and, according to some sources, the official policy, the Australian Broadcasting Commission (ABC) did take the transmission direct from the Parkes and [[Honeysuckle Creek]] [[radio telescopes]]. These were converted to [[NTSC]] television at [[Paddington, New South Wales|Paddington]], in Sydney. This meant that Australian viewers saw the Moonwalk several seconds before the rest of the world.<ref>[http://www.honeysucklecreek.net/Apollo_11/Australian_TV.html Apollo 11 TV – as seen in Australia<!-- Bot generated title -->]</ref> See also [http://www.parkes.atnf.csiro.au/apollo11/ The Parkes Observatory's Support of the Apollo 11 Mission], from "Publications of the Astronomical Society of Australia"'' (The events surrounding the Parkes Observatory's role in relaying the live television of man's first steps on the Moon were portrayed in a slightly fictionalized 2000 Australian [[film]] comedy ''[[The Dish]]''.)
5. Better signal was supposedly received at Parkes Observatory when the Moon was on the opposite side of the planet.
:*''This is not supported by the detailed evidence and logs from the missions.''<ref>[http://www.parkes.atnf.csiro.au/apollo11/one_giant_leap.html On Eagle's Wings: The Story of the Parkes Apollo 11 Support<!-- Bot generated title -->]</ref>

===Mechanical issues===
'''Challenges and responses'''

1. No blast crater or any sign of dust scatter as was seen in the 16mm movies of each landing <ref name="kaysing2002" /><sup>, p. 75</sup>.
:*''No crater should be expected. The Descent Propulsion System was throttled very far down during the final stages of landing. The Lunar Module was no longer rapidly decelerating, so the descent engine only had to support the module's own weight, which by then was greatly diminished by the near exhaustion of the descent propellants, and the Moon's lower gravity. At the time of landing, the engine's thrust divided by the cross-sectional area of the engine bell is only about 10 [[kilopascals]] (1.5 [[Pound-force per square inch|PSI]])<ref name="plait2002" /><sup>, p. 164</sup>, and that is reduced by the fact that the engine was in a vacuum, causing the exhaust to spread out. (By contrast, the thrust of the first stage of the Saturn V was 3.2 [[MPa]] (459 PSI), over the area of the engine bell.) Rocket exhaust gases expand much more rapidly after leaving the engine nozzle in a vacuum than in an atmosphere. The effect of an atmosphere on rocket plumes can be easily seen in launches from Earth; as the rocket rises through the thinning atmosphere, the exhaust plumes broaden very noticeably. Rocket engines designed for vacuum operation have longer bells than those designed for use at the Earth's surface, but they still cannot prevent this spreading. The Lunar Module's exhaust gases therefore expanded rapidly well beyond the landing site. Even if they hadn't, a simple calculation will show that the pressure at the end of the descent engine bell was much too low to carve out a crater. However, the descent engines ''did'' scatter a considerable amount of very fine surface dust as seen in 16mm movies of each landing, and as [[Neil Armstrong]] said as the landing neared ("...kicking up some dust..."). This significantly impaired visibility in the final stages of landing, and many mission commanders commented on it. Photographs do show slightly disturbed dust beneath the descent engine. And finally, the landers were generally moving horizontally as well as vertically until right before landing, so the exhaust would not be focused on any one surface spot for very long, and the compactness of the lunar soil below a thin surface layer of dust also make it virtually impossible for the descent engine to blast out a "crater".''<ref name="plait2002" /><sup>, pp. 163&ndash;165</sup>

2. The launch rocket (Lunar Module ascent stage) produced no visible flame.
[[Image:Titan 2 launching Gemini 11 spaceship.jpg|thumb|The launch of a [[Titan II]], which uses hypergolic fuel. Note the near-transparency of the exhaust.]]
:*''[[Hydrazine]] (a fuel) and [[dinitrogen tetroxide]] (an oxidizer) were the Lunar Module propellants, chosen for their reliability; they ignite [[hypergolic]]ally &ndash;upon contact&ndash; without a spark. Hypergolic propellants happen to produce a nearly [[transparency (optics)|transparent]] exhaust. Hypergolic fuels are also used by several space launchers: the core of the American [[Titan rocket|Titan]], the Russian [[Proton rocket|Proton]], the European [[Ariane]] 1 through 4 and the Chinese [[Long March rocket|Long March]], and the transparency of their plumes is apparent in many launch photos. The plumes of rocket engines fired in a vacuum spread out very rapidly as they leave the engine nozzle (see above), further reducing their visibility. Finally, most rocket engines use a "rich" mixture, where excess fuel is pumped so it will burn outside the engine, to lengthen their lifetimes. This cannot happen in a vacuum.''

3. The rocks brought back from the Moon are identical to rocks collected by scientific expeditions to [[Antarctica]].
:*''Chemical analysis of the rocks confirms a different oxygen isotopic composition and a surprising lack of volatile elements. There are only a few 'identical' rocks, and those few fell as meteorites after being ejected from the Moon during impact cratering events. The total quantity of these 'lunar meteorites' is small compared to the more than 840 lb (380 kg) of lunar samples returned by Apollo. Also the Apollo lunar soil samples chemically matched the Russian [[Luna programme|Luna]] space probe’s lunar soil samples. In addition, unlike the Antarctic lunites, the rocks recovered from the moon do not exhibit the effects of atmospheric friction.''

4. The presence of deep dust around the module; given the blast from the landing engine, this should not be present.
:*''The dust around the module is called [[regolith]] and is created by [[ejecta]] from asteroid and meteoroid impacts. This dust was several inches thick at the Apollo 11 landing site. The regolith was estimated to be several meters thick and is highly compacted with depth. In an atmosphere, we would expect a rocket engine to blast all the surface dust off the ground for tens of meters. However, dust was only removed from the area directly beneath the Apollo landing engine. The important observation here is "atmosphere". Powerful engines set up turbulence in air which lifts and carries dust readily, far beyond the engine itself. However, in a vacuum, there is no air to disturb. Only the actual engine exhaust's direct pressure on the dust can move it.''<ref name="plait2002" /><sup>, pp. 163&ndash;165</sup>

''Note: In addition, moving footage of astronauts and the lunar rover kicking up lunar dust clearly show the dust particles kicking up quite high due to the low gravity, but settling immediately as there is no air to support it. Had these landings been faked in a sound stage, or in the desert - where there is air - dust clouds would have formed (which could be seen in the movie LOST MOON, where [[Jim Lovell]] (played by [[Tom Hanks]]) visualized walking on the lunar surface). This one facet clearly shows the astronauts to be (a) in low gravity and (b) in a vacuum.''

5. The flag placed on the surface by the astronauts flapped despite there being no wind on the Moon <ref>http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e8fCxRQJS9M Bart</ref>. Sibrel said "The wind was probably caused by intense air-conditioning used to cool the astronauts in their lightened, uncirculated space suits. The cooling systems in the backpacks would have been removed to lighten the load not designed for Earth’s six times heavier gravity, otherwise they might have fallen over".
:*''The astronauts were moving the flag into position, causing motion. Since there is no air on the Moon to provide friction, these movements caused a long-lasting undulating movement seen in the flag. There was a rod extending from the top of the flagpole to hold the flag out for proper display (visible under the fabric in many photographs). The fabric's rippled appearance was due to its having been folded during flight and gave it an appearance which could be mistaken for motion in a still photograph. The top supporting rod of the flag was telescopic and the crew of Apollo 11 found they could not fully extend it. Later crews did not fully extend this rod because they liked how it made the flag appear. A viewing of the videotape made during the Moonwalk shows that shortly after the astronauts remove their hands from the flag/flagpole, it stops moving and remains motionless. At one point the flag is in view for well over thirty minutes and it remains completely motionless throughout that period (and all similar periods).'' (''See [[inertia]]''.) See the photographs below.
{| align="center"
| [[Image:AldrinFlag1a.jpeg|thumb|270px|Cropped photo of Buzz Aldrin saluting the flag (Note the fingers of Aldrin's right hand can be seen behind his helmet).]]
| [[Image:AldrinFlag2a.jpeg|thumb|270px|Cropped photo taken a few seconds later, Buzz Aldrin's hand is down, head turned toward the camera, the flag is unchanged.]]
|}
{| align="center" colspan="2"
| [[Image:As11-40-5874-75.gif|thumb|400px|Animation of the two photos, showing that the flag is not waving.]]
|}
<div style="clear: both"></div>

:''The flag is not waving, but is swinging as a [[pendulum]] after being touched by the astronauts. [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n1UEv2PIzl4 Here] is a three-minute video from Apollo 15 showing that the flag does not wave except when the astronauts move it. [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IrI3iQqTdns Here] is a thirty-minute Apollo 11 video showing that the flag does not move.''

6. The Lander weighed 17 tons and sat on top of the sand making no impression but directly next to it footprints can be seen in the sand.
:*''The lander weighed less than three tons on the Moon. The astronauts were much lighter than the lander, but the area of their boots was also much smaller than that of the lander's pads. Pressure, or force per unit area, rather than force, determines the depth of compression of the soil. An example would be driving a car (heavy) on sand, then getting a person (light) to walk on the same surface. You will often find the depth of tracks to be about the same.''

7. The air conditioning units that were part of the astronauts' spacesuits could not have worked in an environment of no atmosphere. There is no way to dissipate heat without being able to transmit energy through an atmosphere. {{Fact|date=February 2007}}
:*''While heat [[convection]], as proposed here, would require an atmosphere, [[thermal radiation]] would not. The latter process is how heat from the sun can reach the Earth through the vacuum of space. However, in this case, thermal radiation was not relied upon.) In the case of Apollo, the space suits had no air conditioning units; instead, one of the many layers was the LCG (Liquid Cooling Garment), essentially a pair of long-johns embedded with a network of thin plastic tubes. The excess heat was picked up by water circulating through the tubes. The water was pumped into the backpack, where it was cooled by means of a [[heat exchanger]], then pumped back into the circuit (closed-loop system). The water-based heat exchanger comprised an open-circuit system, its warmed feedwater being expelled in the vacuum through a sublimator unit in the backpack. There was a 12-pound feedwater reserve, which provided some eight hours worth of cooling. Thus, excess heat was removed from the spacesuits by transferring that heat to water, and then removing that heated water. [[Radiative cooling]], although allowing for a much simpler system, is a process too slow to be of any practical use in a spacesuit. [[Radioisotope thermoelectric generator]]s, for example, use radiative cooling because the volume constraints (required for the large heat-radiating fins) are not as tight as those for a spacesuit.

[[Image:GPN-2000-001316.jpg|thunb|right|300px|Surveyor 3 with Apollo 12 LM in background.]]
8. Although [[Apollo 11]] had made an almost embarrassingly imprecise landing well outside the designated target area, [[Apollo 12]] succeeded, on [[November 19]], [[1969]], in making a pin-point landing, within walking distance (less than 200 meters) of the ''[[Surveyor 3]] ''probe, which had landed on the Moon in April 1967.

:*''The Apollo 11 landing was not 'embarrassingly imprecise'. Armstrong took manual control of the lander and directed it further down range when it was noted that the intended landing site was strewn with boulders. (This same boulder field was later visited by the astronauts for scientific examination.) Apollo 14 landed even closer to the planned landing site.''
:*''The Apollo astronauts were highly skilled pilots, and the LEM was a maneuverable craft that could be accurately flown to a specific landing point. During the powered descent phase the astronauts used the PNGS (Primary Navigation Guidance System) and LPD (Landing Point Designator) to predict where the LEM was going to land, and then they would manually pilot the LEM to a selected point with great accuracy.''

===Moon rocks===

The Apollo Program collected a total of 382 kilograms of [[Moon rocks]] during the [[Apollo 11]], [[Apollo 12|12]], [[Apollo 14|14]], [[Apollo 15|15]], [[Apollo 16|16]], and [[Apollo 17|17]] missions. Analyses by scientists worldwide all agree that these rocks came from the Moon—no published accounts in peer-reviewed scientific journals are known that dispute this claim. The Apollo samples are easily distinguishable from both meteorites and terrestrial rocks<ref>{{cite web | author=Tony Phillips | url=http://science.nasa.gov/headlines/y2001/ast23feb_2.htm | title=The Great Moon Hoax: Moon rocks and common sense prove Apollo astronauts really did visit the Moon | publisher=Science@NASA}}</ref> in that they show a complete lack of hydrous alteration products, they show evidence for having been subjected to impact events on an airless body, and they have unique geochemical characteristics. Furthermore, most are significantly older than the oldest rocks found on Earth (by up to 700,000,000 years). Most importantly, though, they share the same characteristics as the Soviet lunar samples that were obtained at a later date.<ref>{{cite journal | last = James Papike, Grahm Ryder, and Charles Shearer | title = Lunar Samples | journal = Reviews in Mineralogy and Geochemistry | volume = 36 | pages = 5.1–5.234 | date = 1998 }}</ref>

Hoax proponents argue that [[Wernher von Braun]]'s trip to [[Antarctica]] in 1967 (two years prior to the Apollo missions) was in order to study and/or collect [[lunar meteorite]]s to be used as fake [[Moon rock]]s. Because von Braun was a former [[Schutzstaffel|SS]] officer (though one who had been detained by the Gestapo),<ref>{{cite web | url = http://www.reformation.org/wernher-von-braun.html | title = Wernher von Braun in SS uniform}}</ref> hoax proponents have suggested<ref name="Moonhoaxcom"/> that he could have been susceptible to pressure to agree to the conspiracy in order to protect himself from recriminations over the past. While NASA does not provide much information about why the MSFC Director and three others were in Antarctica at that time, it has said that the purpose was "to look into environmental and logistic factors that might relate to the planning of future space missions, and hardware".<ref>{{cite web | url = http://history.msfc.nasa.gov/yy/y1967.html | title = Marshall Highlights for 1967 | publisher = Marshall Space Flight Center History Office}}</ref> An article on Sankar Chatterjee at Texas Tech University states that von Braun sent a letter to F. Alton Wade, Chatterjee's predecessor, and that "Von Braun was searching for a secretive locale to help train the United States’ earliest astronauts. Wade pointed von Braun to Antarctica." Even today, NASA continues to send teams to work in [[McMurdo Dry Valleys|parts of Antarctica that are very dry]] and mimic the conditions on other planets such as [[Mars]] and the Moon.

It is now accepted by the scientific community that rocks have been ejected from both the Martian and lunar surface during [[impact crater|impact events]], and that some of these have landed on the Earth in the form of [[Martian meteorite|Martian]] and [[lunar meteorite]]s.<ref>{{cite journal| last =James N. Head, H. Jay Melosh, and Boris A. Ivanov | title=High-speed ejecta from small craters | journal=Science | volume=298 |pages=1752–1756 | date = 2002 | doi=10.1126/science.1077483 | pmid=12424385}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal |title = The Great Interplanetary Rock Swap | last = Bill Cooke | journal = Astronomy |volume = 34 (August)| date = 2006 | pages= 64–67}}</ref> However, the first antarctic lunar meteorite was collected in 1979, and its lunar origin was not recognized until 1982.<ref name="Korotev2005">{{cite journal | last = Randy Korotev | title = Lunar geochemistry as told by lunar meteorites | journal = Chemie der Erde | volume= 65 | pages = 297–346 | date=2005 | doi = 10.1029/2005JE002516.}}</ref> If scientists did not already possess lunar samples to compare with, it would be difficult to conclusively prove that these meteorites were in fact derived from the Moon {{Fact|spectrographic analysis? Circular logic?|date=June 2007}}. Furthermore, lunar meteorites are so rare that it is very improbable that they could account for the 382 kilograms of Moon rocks that NASA obtained between 1969 and 1972. Currently, there are only about 30 kilograms of lunar meteorites in existence, even though private collectors and governmental agencies worldwide have been searching for these for more than 20 years.<ref name="Korotev2005" />

Even if the Apollo Moon rocks were collected from the lunar surface, some hoax proponents argue{{Fact|date=February 2007}} that they were collected robotically. However, the large combined mass of the Apollo samples makes this scenario implausible. While the Apollo missions obtained 382 kilograms of Moon rocks, the Soviet [[Luna 16]], [[Luna 20|20]], and [[Luna 24|24]] robotic sample return missions only obtained 326 grams combined (that is, more than 1000 times less). Indeed, current plans for a Martian sample return would only obtain about 500 grams of soil,<ref>{{cite web | url = http://www.esa.int/SPECIALS/Aurora/SEM1PM808BE_0.html | title = Aurora exploration programme: Mars sample return | publisher = European Space Agency}}</ref> and a recently proposed [[South Pole-Aitken basin]] sample return mission would only obtain about 1 kilogram of Moon rock.<ref>{{cite journal | title = [http://www.cosis.net/abstracts/COSPAR02/02218/COSPAR02-A-02218.pdf South Pole-Aitlen basin sample return mission] | journal =COSPAR | date = 2002 | last = Michael Duke}}</ref> If a similar technology to collect the Apollo Moon rocks was used as with the Soviet missions or modern sample return proposals, then between 300 and 2000 robotic sample return missions would be required to obtain the current mass of Moon rocks that is curated by NASA.

Concerning the composition of the Moon rocks, Kaysing asked: <blockquote>Why was there no mention of gold, silver, diamonds, or other precious metals on the Moon? It was never discussed by the press or astronauts.<ref name="kaysing2002" /><sup>, p. 8</sup></blockquote>

Geologists realize that gold and silver deposits on Earth are the result of the action of hydrothermal fluids concentrating the precious metals into veins of ore. Since even in 1969 water was known to be absent on the Moon, no geologist would bother discussing the possibility of finding these on the Moon in any significant quantity

===Deaths of key Apollo personnel===
In a television program about the hoax allegations, [[Fox Entertainment Group]] listed the deaths of ten astronauts and of two civilians related to the manned spaceflight program as having possibly been killed as part of a cover-up.
* [[Ted Freeman]] ([[T-38 Talon|T-38]] crash, 1964)
* [[Elliott See]] and [[Charles Bassett|Charlie Bassett]] (T-38 accident, 1966)
* [[Gus Grissom|Virgil Ivan "Gus" Grissom]] ([[Apollo 1]] fire, January 1967). His son, Scott Grissom said the accident was a murder.<ref name="not_faked">[http://pirlwww.lpl.arizona.edu/~jscotti/NOT_faked/FOX.html Comments on the FOX special on the Hoax<!-- Bot generated title -->]</ref> [[Bill Kaysing]] also makes this claim.<ref name="kaysing2002" /><sup>, p. 41</sup>
* [[Edward Higgins White|Ed White]] (Apollo 1 fire, January 1967)
* [[Roger Chaffee]] (Apollo 1 fire, January 1967)
* [[Edward Givens|Ed Givens]] (car accident, 1967)
* [[Clifton Williams|C. C. Williams]] (T-38 accident, October 1967)
* [[X-15]] pilot [[Michael J. Adams|Mike Adams]] (the only X-15 pilot killed during the X-15 flight test program in November 1967 - not a NASA astronaut, but had flown X-15 above 50 miles).
* [[Robert Henry Lawrence, Jr.|Robert Lawrence]], scheduled to be an Air Force [[Manned Orbiting Laboratory]] pilot who died in a jet crash in December 1967, shortly after reporting for duty to that (later canceled) program.
* NASA worker [[Thomas Baron]] (automobile collision with train, 1967 shortly after making accusations before Congress about the cause of the Apollo 1 fire, after which he was fired.) Ruled as suicide. Baron was a quality control inspector who wrote a report critical of the Apollo program and was an outspoken critic after the Apollo 1 fire. Baron and his family were killed as their car was struck by a train at a train crossing.<ref name="not_faked" /><ref>[http://history.nasa.gov/Apollo204/barron.html NASA Apollo Mission Apollo-1- Baron Report<!-- Bot generated title -->]</ref>
* Lee Gelvani said he almost convinced [[James Irwin]], an Apollo 15 astronaut whom Gelvani referred to as an "informant", to confess about a cover-up having occurred. Irwin was supposedly going to contact Gelvani about it; however he died of a [[myocardial infarction|heart attack]] in 1991, before any such telephone call occurred.

All but one of the astronaut deaths (Irwin's) were directly related to their job with NASA or the Air Force. Two of the astronauts, Mike Adams and Robert Lawrence, had no connection with the civilian manned space program. Astronaut James Irwin had suffered several heart attacks in the years prior to his death. There is no independent confirmation of Gelvani's claim that Irwin was about to come forward. All but one of the deaths occurred at least one or two years ''before'' Apollo 11 and the subsequent flights.

Contemporary with the deaths of the Apollo-related astronauts, other astronauts and cosmonauts died without having had a connection to Apollo:<ref>Furnis, T.: ''Spaceflight - the records'', 1985, Guinness Superlatives Ltd., ISBN 0-85112-451-8</ref>
*[[Grigori Nelyubov]] — [[February 18]] [[1966]] (Soviet cosmonaut)
*[[Joseph Albert Walker|Joseph Walker]] — [[F-104]] crash [[June 8]] [[1966]] (X-15 program)
*[[Vladimir Mikhaylovich Komarov|Vladimir Komarov]] — [[Soyuz 1]], [[April 24]] [[1967]]
*[[Russell L. Rogers]] — [[F-105]] crash [[September 13]] [[1967]] ([[Dyna Soar]] program)
*[[Michael J. Adams|Mike Adams]] — X-15 crash [[November 15]] [[1967]]
*[[Robert Henry Lawrence, Jr.|Robert Lawrence]] — F-104 crash [[December 8]] [[1967]] ([[Manned Orbiting Laboratory]] program)
*[[Yuri Gagarin]] — [[MiG 15]] crash [[March 27]] [[1968]]
*[[Pavel Belyayev]] — [[January 10]] [[1970]] (Soviet cosmonaut)
*James M. Taylor — T-38 crash [[September 4]] [[1970]] (MOL program) <!-- not [[James Taylor]] or any so-named person on the disambig page -->
*[[Georgi Dobrovolski]] — [[Soyuz 11]] [[June 29]] [[1971]]
*[[Vladislav Volkov]] — Soyuz 11
*[[Viktor Patsayev]] — Soyuz 11

===Gravity on the Moon===
The hoax investigation site xenophilia.com claims that versions of the ''Encyclopædia Britannica'' from the 1960s (pre-Apollo missions) have the neutral point between the Earth and the Moon 20,520 miles from the Moon. "In theory," the site claims, "a Moon with 1/6 Earth's gravity should have a Neutral Point between 22,078 and 25,193 miles from the Moon's surface. Yet after the Apollo missions, ''Time'' magazine July 25, 1969 said 'At a point of 43,495 miles from the Moon, lunar gravity exerted a force equal to the gravity of the Earth, then some 200,000 miles distant.'" The site claims that the 1973 ''Encyclopædia Britannica'' gave a new neutral point distance of 39,000 miles.<ref>[http://www.xenophilia.com/zb0003u.htm#bal Xenophilia - Moon Hoax Debate<!-- Bot generated title -->]</ref>

* ''The [[surface gravity]] of an astronomical body such as the Moon is not directly related to the position of the [[Lagrange point|neutral point]] between it and the planet it orbits. The neutral point between the Earth and Moon depends on the mass of the Earth, the mass of the Moon, and the current distance between them—which varies between the [[apogee]] of 405,500 km and [[perigee]] of 363,300 km, due to the Moon's [[orbital eccentricity]] of 0.055. In contrast, the surface gravity of the Moon depends only on the [[gravitational constant]], the mass of the Moon, and the radius of the Moon (see the equation at [[surface gravity]], and see [[Moon]] for the mass and radius of the Moon). The surface gravity does not depend on the distance to Earth or the Earth's mass, so the "neutral point" and "sphere of influence" are irrelevant to the Moon's surface gravity. The Moon's surface gravity is very close to one-sixth that of Earth's.''<ref>''Horizons: Exploring the Universe'', Michael A. Seeds, [[Wadsworth (publisher)|Wadsworth]], 1995, p. 378. ISBN 0-534-24889-6.</ref>

* ''Spacecraft from several nations have traveled to or past the Moon,<ref>[http://sci.esa.int/science-e/www/area/index.cfm?fareaid=10 ESA Science & Technology: SMART-1<!-- Bot generated title -->]</ref><ref>http://nssdc.gsfc.nasa.gov/nmc/tmp/1990-007A.html </ref><ref>[http://www.russianspaceweb.com/spacecraft_planetary_lunar.html Russia's unmanned missions toward the Moon<!-- Bot generated title -->]</ref> so unless all their space programs are part of the conspiracy, at least one should have indicated by now if the mass of the Moon was incorrect. Similarly, if lunar gravity was four times as high as generally believed, it would be demonstrable on Earth in unexpectedly large [[tide|tidal action]], the Moon's [[orbit|orbital characteristics]], and the Earth's wobble. The [[Surveyor program]] Moon landers had an engine thrust of 150 pounds and their landing weight was approximately 660 pounds on Earth. Five of these spacecraft soft-landed on the Moon in 1966-68. If the Moon's surface gravity was much larger than one-sixth that of Earth's, the spacecraft would not be able to soft-land on the Moon.''

* ''The website appears to be confusing the Moon's sphere of influence and the point at which the Moon's gravitation and Earth's are equal. NASA were concerned with the Moon's sphere of influence, which starts around 40,000 miles from the Moon, and marks the point where the Moon's gravity has more influence on the spacecraft's trajectory than the Earth's. The 'Apollo 16 Flight Journal'<ref>[http://history.nasa.gov/ap16fj/09_Day3_Pt2.htm Apollo 16 Flight Journal Chapter 9: Day 3 Part 2: Lunar Module Activation and Checkout<!-- Bot generated title -->]</ref> comments on this: "we're scheduled to cross that mythical line known as the lunar Sphere of Influence, the point of which we begin calculating the increasing of the lunar gravity on the spacecraft. Our displays here in Mission Control shortly after that point are generally switched over to Moon reference from Earth reference. The velocities that we have been watching decrease steadily up to now, will then begin to increase as the spacecraft is accelerated toward the Moon.." The point where the lunar gravity and Earth's gravity are equal is around 25,000 miles, so there's no discrepancy to explain: they appear to be measuring different things.''

* ''The site fails to note that the flight paths of the Apollo crafts were curved, not straight-line, so the neutral point within their flight paths would be significantly larger than the straight-line neutral point range of 22,000-25,000 miles (for illustration, see the bands of gravitational influence in the diagram accompanying [[Lagrangian point]]). The 'Time' article's statement would then be equally as true as the early 1960s 'Britannica'. The statement that the 1973 'Britannica' reported a different figure is currently unverified. The 1966 edition of The World Book Encyclopedia (volume 13, page 650) gives the Moon's surface gravity as one-sixth that of Earth's.''

*Video of eyewitness account of moon gravity: Dr Buzz Aldrin talks about moon gravity and walking on the moon [http://www.history.com/classroom/apollo/interviews.html]

=== Involvement of the Soviet Union ===
A primary reason for the race to the Moon was the [[Cold War]]. The Soviets, with their own competing [[Soviet Moonshot|Moon program]] and a formidable scientific community able to analyze NASA data, could be expected to have cried foul if the USA tried to fake a Moon landing<ref name="plait2002" /><sup>, p. 173</sup>, especially as they themselves had been unsuccessful in their own man-on-the-Moon program. They would have scored enormous status in the eyes of the rest of the world by doing so.

For more on conspiracy theories within the Soviet space program, see [[Soviet space program conspiracy accusations]].

Bart Sibrel said, in response, that "the Soviets did not have the capability to track deep spacecraft until late in 1972, immediately after which, the last three Apollo missions were abruptly canceled."<ref>http://www.Moonmovie.com/Moonmovie/default.asp?ID=8</ref>

* ''However, the Soviet Union had been sending unmanned spacecraft to the Moon since 1959.<ref>[http://www.nasm.si.edu/exhibitions/gal114/SpaceRace/sec300/sec361.htm Soviet Lunar Programs<!-- Bot generated title -->]</ref> and "during 1962, deep space tracking facilities were introduced at IP-15 in [[Ussuriisk]] and IP-16 in [[Evpatoria]] (Crimean Peninsula), while Saturn communication stations were added to IP-3, 4 and 14",<ref>[http://www.russianspaceweb.com/kik.html Russia's space command and control infrastructure<!-- Bot generated title -->]</ref> the latter having a 100 million km range.<ref>[http://www.astronautix.com/articles/sovstems.htm Soviet Space Tracking Systems<!-- Bot generated title -->]</ref>

* ''Apollo 18 and Apollo 19 were canceled on [[September 2]] [[1970]], due to budget cuts by the [[US Congress]].<ref>[http://www.astronautix.com/flights/apollo18.htm Apollo 18<!-- Bot generated title -->]</ref> Apollo 20 had been canceled earlier on [[January 4]] [[1970]].<ref>[http://www.astronautix.com/flights/apollo20.htm Apollo 20<!-- Bot generated title -->]</ref> (See [[Canceled Apollo missions]].)''

==Individuals featured in the controversy==
{{main|Apollo Moon landing hoax accusers}}
===Major hoax proponents and proposals===
* [[Bill Kaysing]] (1922-2005) an ex-employee of [[Rocketdyne]],<ref>[http://www.clavius.org/kaysing.html Clavius: Bibliography - bill kaysing<!-- Bot generated title -->]</ref> (the company which built the [[F-1]] engines used on the [[Saturn V]] rocket). Kaysing was not technically qualified, and worked at Rocketdyne as a librarian. Kaysing's self published book, ''We Never Went to the Moon: America's Thirty Billion Dollar Swindle''<ref name="kaysing2002" /><ref name="plait2002" /><sup>, p. 157</sup>, made many allegations, effectively beginning the discussion of the moon landings possibly being hoaxed. NASA, and others, have debunked the claims made in the book.
* [[Bart Sibrel]], a filmmaker and investigative journalist, produced and directed four films for his company ''AFTH, LLC''<ref>[[Dun & Bradstreet]] information republished at "{{cite web | url=http://www.manta.com/coms2/dnbcompany_0snyh | title=AFTH, LLC - Nashville, Tennessee (TN) Company Profile | format=reprint | publisher=[http://www.manta.com Manta] | year=2007 | accessdate=[[2007-12-20]]}}" show Sibrel is listed as a former partner in the firm</ref><ref>[http://moonmovie.com AFTH, LLC website]</ref>, including a film in [[2001 in film|2001]] called ''[[A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Moon]]''<ref>[http://moonmovie.com/afthft.htm Moon Hoax MOONMOVIE.COM A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Moon DVD - Front Cover & Bart Sibrel<!-- Bot generated title -->]</ref>, examining the evidence of a hoax. Again, the arguments put forward therein have been debunked by numerous sources, including svector's video series ''Lunar Legacy'' <ref>[http://www.geocities.com/wideflare index<!-- Bot generated title -->]</ref> which attempts to disprove the documentary's primary argument that the Apollo crew faked their distance from the Earth [[Apollo Command Module|command module]], while in low orbit. Sibrel believes that the effect on the shot covered in his film was produced through the use of a transparency of the Earth. Sibrel was also famously [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mQKxAqpjroo&feature=related punched in the face by Buzz Aldrin] while accusing the [[Buzz Aldrin|former astronaut]] of being "a coward, a liar, and a thief." Sibrel attempted to press charges against Aldrin but the case was thrown out of court when the judge ruled that Aldrin was within his rights given Sibrel's invasive and aggressive behaviour.
* William L. Brian, a nuclear engineer who self-published a book in 1982 called "''[[Moongate (book)|Moongate: Suppressed Findings of the U.S. Space Program]]''," in which he disputes the Moon's surface gravity.
* [[David Percy]], TV producer and expert in audiovisual technologies and member of the [[Royal Photographic Society]], is co-author, along with [[Mary Bennett]] of ''Dark Moon: Apollo and the Whistle-Blowers'' (ISBN 1-898541-10-8) and co-producer of ''[[What Happened On the Moon?]]''. He is the main proponent of the "whistle-blower" accusation, arguing that the errors in the NASA photos in particular are so obvious that they are evidence that insiders are trying to 'blow the whistle' on the hoax by deliberately inserting errors that they know will be seen.<ref>[http://www.clavius.org/bibcast.html Clavius: Bibliography - dramatis personae<!-- Bot generated title -->]</ref>
* [[Ralph Rene]] - An inventor and 'self taught' engineering buff. Author of ''NASA Mooned America'' (second edition {{OCLC|36317224}}).
* Charles T. Hawkins - Author of ''How America Faked the Moon Landings'',
* [[Philippe Lheureux]] - French author of ''Moon Landings: Did NASA Lie?'', and ''Lumières sur la Lune (Lights on the Moon): La NASA a t-elle menti!''.
* James M. Collier (d. 1998) - American journalist and author, producer of the video ''Was It Only a Paper Moon?'' in 1997.
* Jan Lundberg - A technician for [[Hasselblad]], the company that developed and manufactured the cameras used by the astronauts.
* Jack White - American photo historian known for his attempt to prove forgery in photos related to the assassination of U.S. President John F. Kennedy.
* [[Marcus Allen (publisher)]] - British publisher of [[Nexus magazine]] said that photographs of the lander would not prove that the US put men on the Moon. "Getting to the Moon really isn't much of a problem - the Russians did that in 1959 - the big problem is getting people there."<ref>[http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2002/11/24/1037697982142.html Telescope to challenge moon doubters - smh.com.au<!-- Bot generated title -->]</ref>
* Aron Ranen - Directed ''Did we go?'' (co-produced with Benjamin Britton and selected for the 2000 "New Documentary Series" Museum of Modern Art, NYC, the 2000 Dallas Video Festival Awards and the 2001 Digital Video Underground Festival in San Francisco''). He received a Golden Cine Eagle and two fellowships from the National Endowment for Arts.
* [[Clyde Lewis]] - Radio talk show host.<ref name="clydelewis">[http://www.groundzeromedia.org/dis/gorsky/gorsky.html Good Luck, Mr. Gorsky!<!-- Bot generated title -->]</ref>
* Dr. David Groves - Works for Quantech Image Processing and worked on some of the NASA photos. He said he can pinpoint the exact point at which the artificial light was used. Using the focal length of the camera's lens and an actual boot, he has calculated (using ray-tracing) that the artificial light source is between 24 and 36 cm to the right of the camera.<ref>[http://www.ufos-aliens.co.uk/cosmicapollo.html The Apollo Hoax<!-- Bot generated title -->]</ref><ref>http://mrbasheer.tripod.com/Moonwalk.htm</ref>

===Large telescopes and the Moon hoax===
Another component of the moon hoax theory is based on the argument that professional observatories and the [[Hubble Space Telescope]] should be able to take pictures of the lunar landing sites. The argument runs that if telescopes can "see to the edge of the universe" then they ought to be able to take pictures of the lunar landing sites. This implies that the world's major observatories (as well as the Hubble Program) are complicit in the moon landing hoax by refusing to take pictures of the landing sites.

To see the 1.2 meter long flag left on the Moon, an Earth-based telescope would have to be 200 meters wide, whereas the [[List of largest optical reflecting telescopes| largest telescope]] on Earth is only about 10 meters across. Furthermore, such a telescope would have to mitigate against the effects of [[astronomical seeing|seeing]], beyond what is currently possible with [[adaptive optics]]. The Hubble Space Telescope can only see objects on the Moon as small as 60 meters across.<ref>[http://science.nasa.gov/headlines/y2005/11jul_lroc.htm NASA - Abandoned Spaceships and Moon Buggies<!-- Bot generated title -->]</ref><ref name="Astronomy2007">{{cite journal | last = anon|title = Ask Astro | journal = Astronomy | volume = 35, #11 | pages = 62 | date = 2007 }}</ref>

===People accused of involvement in the hoax===
* [[Deke Slayton]], NASA Chief Astronaut in 1968: Some hoax proponents (for example, the 'NASA Scam'<ref>[http://www.geocities.com/apollotruth/ Apollo Truth<!-- Bot generated title -->]</ref> website, and Clyde Lewis<ref>http://www.groundzeromedia.org/dis/Moondoggle/Moondoggle.htm</ref>) say that Slayton was one of the primary leaders of the hoax. He visited the film set of ''[[2001: A Space Odyssey (film)|2001: A Space Odyssey]]'', in the UK, which he referred to as "NASA East".
* [[Stanley Kubrick]] is accused of having produced much of the footage for Apollo 11 and 12.<ref name="clydelewis"/> It has been claimed, without any evidence, that in early 1968 while ''[[2001: A Space Odyssey (film)|2001: A Space Odyssey]]'' (which includes scenes taking place on the Moon) was in [[post-production]], NASA secretly approached Kubrick to direct the first three Moon landings. In this scenario the launch and splashdown would be real but the spacecraft would have remained in Earth orbit while the fake footage was broadcast as "live" from the lunar journey. Kubrick did hire [[Frederick Ordway]] and [[Harry Lange]], both of whom had worked for NASA and major aerospace contractors, to work with him on ''2001''. Kubrick also used some 50mm f/0.7 lenses that were left over from a batch made by [[Zeiss]] for NASA. (However, Kubrick only acquired this lens for ''[[Barry Lyndon]]'' (1975). The lens was originally a still-photo lens and required modifications to be used for motion filming.)''

==Other evidence and issues==
===NASA book commission and withdrawal===
In 2002, NASA commissioned [[James Oberg]] $15,000 to write a point-by-point rebuttal of the hoax claims, and, in the same year, cancelled their commission in the face of complaints that the book would dignify the accusations. Oberg said that he intends (funding allowing) to finish the project.<ref name="oberg1"/><ref>[http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/2424927.stm BBC NEWS | Science/Nature | Nasa pulls Moon hoax book<!-- Bot generated title -->]</ref> In November 2002 [[Peter Jennings]] (ABC’s World News Tonight anchor) said "[NASA] is going to spend a few thousand dollars trying to prove to some people that the United States did indeed land men on the Moon." Jennings said "[NASA] had been so rattled, [they] hired [somebody] to write a book refuting the conspiracy theorists."

===Academic work===

In 2004, Drs Martin Hendry and Ken Skeldon at [[Glasgow University]] were awarded a grant by the UK based [[Particle Physics and Astronomy Research Council]] to investigate 'Moon Hoax' proposals.<ref>[http://www.cafescientifique.org/glasgow1.htm Cafe Scientifique<!-- Bot generated title -->]</ref>

In November of that same year, they gave a lecture at the [[Glasgow Science Centre]] where the top ten lines of evidence advanced by hoax proponents were individually addressed and refuted.<ref>[http://www.dimaggio.org/Glasgow/SPST/nov_2004.htm Nov 2004<!-- Bot generated title -->]</ref>

===Attempts to view the landing site===
[[Leonard David]] published an article on [[space.com]],<ref>[http://www.space.com/missionlaunches/missions/apollo15_touchdown_photos_010427.html Apollo 15 Landing Site Spotted in Images<!-- Bot generated title -->]</ref><ref name="apolloclempix">[http://www.tass-survey.org/richmond/answers/lunar_lander.html Can we see Apollo hardware on the Moon?<!-- Bot generated title -->]</ref> on [[27 April]] [[2001]] showing a picture taken by the [[Clementine mission]] which shows a diffuse dark spot at the location that NASA says is the Lunar Module Falcon. The evidence was noticed by [[Misha Kreslavsky]], of the Department of Geological Sciences at [[Brown University]], and [[Yuri Shkuratov]] of the [[Kharkov Astronomical Observatory]] in [[Ukraine]].

The [[European Space Agency]]'s modern Moon probe, the [[SMART-1]] unmanned probe, sent back imagery to the ESA of the Apollo Moon landing sites, according to [[Bernard Foing]], Chief Scientist of the ESA Science Program.<ref>http://www.space.com/missionlaunches/050304_Moon_snoop.html</ref> Given SMART-1’s initial high orbit, however, it may prove difficult to see artifacts, said Foing in an interview on the website "space.com'. No photos have so far been released, according to the website.

The ''[[Daily Telegraph]]'' published a story in 2002 saying that European astronomers at the [[Very Large Telescope]] (VLT, the most powerful telescope in the world) would use the [[telescope]] to view the remains of the Apollo lunar landers. According to the article, Dr. Richard West said that his team would take "a high-resolution image of one of the Apollo landing sites". Marcus Allen, a Moon hoax believer, pointed out in the story that no images of hardware on the Moon would convince him that manned landings had taken place<ref>[http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2002/11/24/nmoon24.xml World's biggest telescope to prove Americans really walked on Moon], Robert Matthews, ''[[The Daily Telegraph]]'' (online), [[November 23]], [[2002]]</ref> (Allen believes robot missions placed objects there). The article greatly overstates the power of the VLT (it can show details only as small as 130m at the distance of the Moon) and so it is not surprising that no images sharp enough to resolve the lander have been forthcoming.<ref name="apolloclempix" /> Such photos, if and when they become available, would be the first non-NASA produced images of the site at that definition.

The [[Hubble Space Telescope]] can resolve objects as small as 280 feet (86 meters) at the distance of the Moon; again, not good enough to settle this issue.

Alex R. Blackwell, of the University of Hawaii has pointed out that photos taken by Apollo astronauts<ref name="apolloclempix" /> are currently the best available images of the landing sites; they show shadows of the lander, but not the lander itself. NASA's [[Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter]] (planned for 2008) is slated to produce better pictures as part of its mission.<ref>[http://science.nasa.gov/headlines/y2005/11jul_lroc.htm NASA - Abandoned Spaceships and Moon Buggies<!-- Bot generated title -->]</ref>

==Apollo hoax in popular culture and parody==
{{main|Apollo hoax in popular culture and parody}}

==See also==
*[[Jim Lovell]] - was unsuccessfully sued by Kaysing for libel.
*[[Astronauts Gone Wild]]
* [[In the Shadow of the Moon]]
* [[Dark Side of the Moon (documentary)]]

==References==
{{reflist|2}}
{{refbegin}}
<!-- add references here -->
{{refend}}

==External links==
<!--===========================({{NoMoreLinks}})===============================
| PLEASE BE CAUTIOUS IN ADDING MORE LINKS TO THIS ARTICLE. WIKIPEDIA IS |
| NOT A COLLECTION OF LINKS. |
| |
| Excessive or inappropriate links WILL BE DELETED. |
| See [[Wikipedia:External links]] and [[Wikipedia:Spam]] for details. |
| |
| If there are already plentiful links, please propose additions or |
| replacements on this article's discussion page. Or submit your link |
| to the appropriate category at the Open Directory Project (www.dmoz.org)|
| and link back to that category using the {{dmoz}} template. |
===========================({{NoMoreLinks}})===============================-->

* {{dmoz|Science/Science_in_Society/Skeptical_Inquiry/Hoaxes/Lunar_Landing|Hoax: Lunar Landing}}
* [http://select.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=F20F12F739581B7493CAA81789D95F4D8685F9 A Moon Landing? What Moon Landing?], John Noble Wilford, ''The New York Times'', [[December 18]] [[1969]], p. 30.

===Television specials===
*{{imdb title|id=0277642|title=Conspiracy Theory: Did We Land on the Moon? (2001) (TV)}}
*{{imdb title|id=0344160|title=Opération lune (2002) (TV)}}

{{Conspiracy theories}}

[[Category:Apollo Moon Landing hoax accusations| ]]
[[Category:Apollo program]]
[[Category:Conspiracy theories]]
[[Category:Denialism]]

{{Link FA|de}}

[[bg:Съмнения за фалшификация на стъпването на човек на Луната]]
[[da:Konspirationsteorier om månelandingen]]
[[de:Verschwörungstheorien zur Mondlandung]]
[[et:Apollo vandenõu]]
[[es:Acusaciones de falsificación en los alunizajes del Programa Apolo]]
[[fr:Accusation de canular relative au programme Apollo]]
[[it:Dubbi sull'allunaggio dell'Apollo]]
[[he:תאוריית הקשר אודות זיוף הנחיתה על הירח]]
[[nl:Apollo-maanlandingscomplottheorie]]
[[ja:アポロ計画陰謀論]]
[[pl:Teorie spiskowe o lądowaniu Apollo na Księżycu]]
[[pt:Acusações de falsificação nas alunissagens do Programa Apollo]]
[[ro:Acuzaţii de falsificare a programului Apollo]]
[[ru:Лунный заговор]]
[[sk:Spochybnenie pristátia na Mesiaci]]
[[fi:Apollo-ohjelmaa koskevat huijaussyytökset]]
[[sv:Konspirationsteorierna om månlandningarna]]
[[th:ข้อกล่าวหาเรื่องมนุษย์คนแรกเหยียบดวงจันทร์เป็นเรื่องลวง]]
[[tr:Apollo Ay inişi aldatmacası suçlamaları]]
[[zh:阿波罗登月计划阴谋论]]

Revision as of 20:50, 18 June 2008

People that believe this sack of shit are dumb fuckers who should get a life. The U.S.A. did not fake the landings, but China will.

Yeah, whoever's IP address this is: 76.179.50.177. Go fuck yourself you cock-sucking, ass-raping, shit-eating, mother fucking SON OF A BITCH!!!!!!!!

and someone please erase this fucking article, because you'd have to be a fucking dumbass to believe this bullshit.

Have a nice day.

Retrieved from "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Moon_landing_conspiracy_theories&oldid=220220883"