Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Preface
- Acknowledgements
- Chapter 1 The Importance of the Moon
- Chapter 2 First Steps
- Chapter 3 Moon/Mars
- Chapter 4 An International Flotilla
- Chapter 5 The Moon Rises from the Ashes
- Chapter 6 Moons Past
- Chapter 7 The Pull of the Far Side
- Chapter 8 Water in a Land of False Seas
- Chapter 9 Inconstant Moon
- Chapter 10 Moonlighting
- Chapter 11 Lunar Living Room
- Chapter 12 Lunar Power
- Chapter 13 Stepping Stone
- Chapter 14 Return to Earth
- Glossary
- Appendix A Von Braun et al. Space and Lunar Exploration Issues
- Appendix B Topics in Transient Phenomena on the Moon
- Index
- References
Chapter 2 - First Steps
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 05 September 2014
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Preface
- Acknowledgements
- Chapter 1 The Importance of the Moon
- Chapter 2 First Steps
- Chapter 3 Moon/Mars
- Chapter 4 An International Flotilla
- Chapter 5 The Moon Rises from the Ashes
- Chapter 6 Moons Past
- Chapter 7 The Pull of the Far Side
- Chapter 8 Water in a Land of False Seas
- Chapter 9 Inconstant Moon
- Chapter 10 Moonlighting
- Chapter 11 Lunar Living Room
- Chapter 12 Lunar Power
- Chapter 13 Stepping Stone
- Chapter 14 Return to Earth
- Glossary
- Appendix A Von Braun et al. Space and Lunar Exploration Issues
- Appendix B Topics in Transient Phenomena on the Moon
- Index
- References
Summary
That’s one small step for (a) man, one giant leap for Mankind.
– Neil Armstrong, July 20, 1969With these words, Armstrong concluded the competition that had gripped the world for years between the two most powerful nations – the United States and the Soviet Union – on Earth and now the Moon. Six and a half hours earlier, he and Edwin “Buzz” Aldrin set their 8-ton spacecraft carefully onto the lunar surface with fewer than 45 seconds of fuel left, fulfilling a promise made eight years before by their martyred president. Stepping onto the Moon, they reached the apex of a perilous journey that in several days would fulfill the president’s second promise – to return them safely to Earth. Their success engaged the work of hundreds of thousands of people and the attentions of billions of people. It was a cosmic and geopolitical culmination that, with the following lunar landings, bears on any future human exploration of space, as we will see.
Armstrong had much on his mind, but his terseness also reflected his characteristic lack of self-absorption. [BOX 2.1] He was selected in part for his steely, split-second ability to make the right choice concerning balky, expensive, and complex flying machines. He had made the right choices in combat, as a test pilot, in Earth’s orbit, in training for lunar landing, and in the landing that day at Tranquility Base, or else he would not have lived to step onto the Moon. He was not easily distracted from the mission. [BOX 2.2]
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- Information
- The New MoonWater, Exploration, and Future Habitation, pp. 18 - 57Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2014