the moon landings revisited.

[Juliette]

the biggest stumbling block i have is STILL the van allen belt and the solar winds, no one, not even NASA has explained how they survived it, thats like me saying i took a merry go round trip inside a giant microwave without any kind of sheilding and lived to tell the tail

Explain to me how this Van Allen Belt works and how it would kill me.
Do you entirely understand the matter, or are you trusting some 'source' who posted a youtube vid saying they're a respectable doctor in astrophysics and that Van Allen Belt = Crispy Death.

I ask this, because that's Phils habit. (Not buck, other Phil.. I think..)

[[KMA]Avenger]

as i understand the van allen belt (and from memory), its radiation held in place (or trapped) by the earth's magnetic field. on the side facing the sun the belt looks flattened due to the solar winds while on the backside it looks elongated. and nope, haven't seen any vids on youtube (or any other tube) about it, its common knowledge...unless i am mistaken?

[Juliette]

Yeah, from what I can tell, that is a pretty accurate description.
I think your "giant microwave" is a gross overestimation of largely empty space.. but I am going to keep the sarcasm back on this one.

I read this bit about the Van Allen belt and how it would affect astronauts, pretty down-to-earth story by a "Mad Scientist" (he calls himself this, but from what I can tell he has an absurd sense of humour).

http://www.wwheaton.com/waw/mad/mad19.html
(Link taken from: http://spider.ipac.caltech.edu/staff/waw/mad/mad.html, which is a Fun-part of this Caltech Staff page: http://spider.ipac.caltech.edu/staff/waw/)


While I wouldn't blindly trust one guy, he does provide a few good references (I checked 2 and they checked out with his use of them).. so maybe his piece can be a stepping stone towards research, if you are really interested?

[Kit-Fox]

Astronauts are protected by many things when they go up into space. With the space shuttles remaining in low orbit most of the protection is no longer needed but indeed remains.

For example the spacesuits, that is those used for EVA are lined with protective layers of material. Some of these layers are designed to 'reflect' the radiation back out away from the suit and some are designed out of materieals that will absorb & stop the radiation from progressing any further.

The Capsules that the moon landings were conducted with were all lined just inside the surface with reflective material (or so i am led to believe) just inside from the outer shell of metal. Metallic surfaces as most are well aware reflect and stop a fair bit of radiation.

All of this taken into account it is rather easy to understand how those who went to the moon survived.

Not to mention your argruments (KMA) about the Van Allen belts assume that they did indeed pass through these belts and passed through them for long enough to recieve such a radiation dose (despite the shielding) to be fatal. As I am sure you have discovered during your research the Van Allen belts are not prefectly sphere shaped and nor do they surround the whole planet, it is perfectly plausible for the mission to have either avoided the belts (unlikely but possible given their shape and how they change) or that they passed through a very small portion of it and as such were protected by their shielding.

And yes by the 60s we knew enough about radiation to shield from it and it wasnt exactly hard, it was just expensive.

[Juliette]

And yes by the 60s we knew enough about radiation to shield from it and it wasnt exactly hard, it was just expensive.

Not to mention that aluminum, which was the material of choice for shell construction, has a pretty good rad reduction rate, or so (I) was told. I'm thinking there's a lot of luck involved in that shielding thing though.. because how would they know there's such radiation around the atmosphere? Did the Russians tell them? *grins about silly question*


Nevertheless, I find this debate interestingly calm. *nods head in approval*

[[KMA]Avenger]

hmmm...all good explanations *also nods head in approval*

but from what i've seen on tv (non-moon landing or conspiracy related programming) and read about the solar winds, and the radiation in the van allen belt, the shielding required to guard against exposure was some inches thick of lead (8 inches thick i believe it was but not sure). as i am obviously no expert i don't throw my full weight (or argument) behind such allegations....


if i don't ask i don't get (or learn as the case maybe )

@k-f, indeed you are correct that the belt is not a uniform shape and as such may have holes (for lack of a better term) in the belt that could be exploited. tho i find that improbable, i wouldn't say its 100% impossible, just improbable when you take into account fuel is measured to the milidrop and also how would one measure the fluctuations and openings in the belt? (if such things do exist)

anyone want to watch the film? (link posted on page 1) i'd be interested to see what you guys think of the end footage of the film. its only 47 mins long so not to much time needed



@Universe, interesting link that first one, tho a little (just a little ) to heavy for me lol

[spoiler]*is now unsure who to trust after reading the first link Universe supplied *[/spoiler]

[Jack]

Of all the anti moon landing evidence, I find the radiation stuff the weakest. If there is a problem with the shielding that we know they used(or didn't use for that matter) then it could easily be just dismissed as being classified. It's not at all unreasonable to believe that there are still elements of the Apollo program that remain closely guarded secrets. Had our government devised some sort of highly advanced method for protecting someone from radiation it is likely that they would wish for it to remain secret. Remember that radiation was not an issue exclusive to Astronauts, but one faced by the military and that by the time of the Apollo missions, they would have had around 20 or so years worth of radiation research. It's plausible that they made some huge break through in radiation defense and don't want the rest of the world to know about.


I mean, that's really not any less believable than the moon landings being a hoax.

[[KMA]Avenger]

the only reason i can see for NASA not releasing hi tech light weight shielding to the mainstream is if that shielding was reverse engineered alien tech...

but that would be ridiculous, right?!

[Kit-Fox]

the only reason i can see for NASA not releasing hi tech light weight shielding to the mainstream is if that shielding was reverse engineered alien tech...

but that would be ridiculous, right?!

I'm gonna have to side with Jack on this (I know I must be going mad ) but they wouldnt release it if it was created by military research. They especially wouldnt release it if it was used anywhere else like say in command bunkers or on NBC protected vehicles.

Just because its a well kept secret doesnt make it alien tech or any other sci-fi explanation. Besides a sufficently advanced society that could cross the vast interstellar distances between inhabitable worlds would probably have some sort of 'force-field' like shielding as any psyhical kind would be overwhelmed eventually by the types of interstellar drives we can dream of.

[[KMA]Avenger]

all reasonable explanations and ones i'm not dismissing

i dunno what it is with the moon landings but something just doesn't feel right on the one hand i think we went (i say we because in the future if the moon landings really did take place, our space fairing children's children will see it as man's accomplishments and not one single nations accomplishment), and on the other, something doesn't add up...[spoiler]maybe its the arm in front of the camera in the film i listed on page 1, and yet might be something else[/spoiler]

as i said, on the fence with this one.

[[KMA]Avenger]

dont worry about disagreeing with me since i don't have a definitive opinion 1 way or the other.

link works fine for me mate


http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid ... 7520427064

if the link don't work just go to google video and search for "A Funny Thing Happened On The Way To The Moon".