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Introduction
This website replays the Apollo 11 mission as it happened, 50 years ago. It consists entirely of historical material, all timed to Ground Elapsed Time--the master mission clock. Footage of Mission Control, film shot by the astronauts, and television broadcasts transmitted from space and the surface of the Moon, have been painstakingly placed to the very moments they were shot during the mission, as has every photograph taken, and every word spoken.
Interface
Upon starting the application, select whether to begin one minute before launch, or click "Now" to drop in exactly 50 years ago, to-the-second during the anniversary.
Navigate to any moment of the mission using the time navigator at the top of the screen. The top bar is the entire mission with two bars below it providing magnification. Selecting transcript items, photos, commentary items, or guided tour moments, also jumps the mission time to the moment they occurred.
Main mission audio consists of space-to-ground (left ear), capcom loop (right ear), and on-board recorder (center, when available). Selecting a Mission Control audio channel mutes the main audio, opens the Mission Control audio panel, and plays the "live" audio of that Mission Control position. Change channels by selecting the seats in mission control. Closing the Mission Control audio panel will unmute the main audio and continue mission playback.
These 50 channels of Mission Control audio have only recently been digitized and restored, and are made publicly available here for the first time. They total over 11,000 hours in length.
The space mission software had to be man-rated. Not only did it have to work, it had to work the first time. Not only did the software itself have to be ultra-reliable, it needed to be able to perform error detection and recovery in real time. Our languages dared us to make the most subtle of errors. We were on our own to come up with rules for building software. What we learned from the errors was full of surprises.
Women got those men to the moon. And home again.The recent PBS documentary on the Apollo missions featured assorted interviews with Poppy Northcutt. That is, interviews with her today, but also cheesy mid-60s-vintage interviews where they kept asking if the presence of an attractive blonde in a miniskirt isn't a distraction to her coworkers. I was a bit disappointed that Young Poppy didn't think to reply huffily that the question is an insult because her coworkers are all highly trained, educated professionals, and if they're distracted by a miniskirt they have no business being there.
