Was the moon landing faked?
On the 20th of July 1969, the first ever moon landing occurred, or was stated to have by the American space team of Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin of NASA. They spent two hours on the surface of the moon once Apollo 11 had landed and took multiple pictures. Nearly 5% of Americans population state to believe that the landing was faked and an even larger percentage are said to have doubts. These mainly exist because of the pictures produced and claims exist that Stanley Kubrick had involvement. The motivation behind the faked moon landing was claimed to be from faults within the mission that needed to be covered up, such as the astronauts landed but were not able to walk on the moon’s surface. Or due to a lack of technology, as America was competing to beat Russia in landing on the moon first, and the produced pictures may have confirmed their win as a country.
Theories
- The Van Allen Belt. There are two large belts which surround the earth and produce radiation. They are influenced by the suns winds and earth’s magnetic belt and many argue this radiation would have made it impossible for The astronauts to have passed without serious radiation poisoning. However, very low levels of radiation were being produced at the time of the launch and landing. An estimated 18 rads would have been transferred to the astronauts during their two hours on the moons surface and 0.18 rads each day in the shuttle. NASA said to combat possible radiation poising through ship insulation and noted that radiation sickness occurs from 200 - 1000 rads.
- The flags movement - no wind or air exists on the moon so for the flag to be caught waving is used as proof of fake pictures. The explanation exists that the flag itself was disturbed from the metal flag pole during the planting of it into the moon, and because of the gravity it remained in the same position and looked fluid. Further suspicions arise because of a gif which looks like the flag is waving. This is described by the two frames with this gif having different levels of contrast and angles depicting a change in movement that hasn’t actually taken place.
- Stars weren’t visible in the photographs - conspiracy theorist call this a major mistake in the editing of the fake pictures. Scientists combat this through the use of contrasts of brightness in space. The moon reflects sunlight, thereby appearing brighter in pictures, and due to the contrast of the darkness of space the camera struggles and the stars do not appear on film.
- Unusual shadows - shadows of weird lengths, and double shadows were reflected in some of the moon landing pictures. As the sun is the only source of light, so why do the shadows present themselves in multiple directions. Scientists credited that Rough uneven surface.
- The rock labelled with a C - One picture shows a rock labelled with a C on it, a technique used on sets to refer to the location of a prop. However, another picture of the same rock without the letter C. Scientist argue that the C never existed and that the photo was scanned and a fibre was on the screen which looked like a C. Theorist state that the lighting of the picture made it so the C was not visible in the second picture, but it still existed.
- Astronauts footprints- these can still be found on the moon today. Some argue they are from robots, some say they are from astronauts but at a later date than the stated moon landing. Other use the footprints as proof of the Apollo 11 mission. Furthermore, the footprints may be real, but it is debated whether they are from the 1969 landing or later.
- 382 kilograms of moon rocks that were brought back - evidence does suggest these are in fact moon rocks and were presented at the time of the landing. However, were the rocks presented gathered from the landing or from robot gatherings earlier?
- slow motion wires - conspiracy theorists argue that the pictures and videos may have faked the effect of different braving through wires allowing the astronauts to move how they did. Furthermore, they state the films were slowed down for this effect. Members of NASA argued that dust gathers in clouds on earth and, whereas it does not float on the moon and this is what can be seen in the photos.
Strong arguments exist for both sides but the answer remains unknown.