In the Shadow of the Moon Page #8

from the other way.

Man:
[On radio]

Oh, look at this baby climb the hill.

[Music playing]

Duke:
I think the feeling

that I had was the whole time

was the feeling of awe.

The Moon was the most spectacularly

beautiful desert you can ever imagine.

Unspoiled, untouched.

It had a vibrancy about it

and the contrast between the Moon

and the black sky was so vivid and...

It just made this impression, you know,

of excitement and wonder.

Schmitt:

We were true scientific explorers.

We were looking at things

that human beings

had never seen before

or if they had seen them,

they weren't thinking about them

in terms of understanding our Earth

and our solar system

and indeed the universe.

And that's what we were.

That's what we were doing.

We were scientific explorers

right from the moment

we stepped out of the spacecraft.

Man 1:
[On radio]

Roger, Dave. Let's do a little geology.

Man 2:
[On radio]

Going to document the area first here, Joe.

Man 1:

If you come around there,

there's a rock in the near field on this rim...

I'd like you to pick it up as a ground sample.

I say, John, just look at that footprint.

Look underneath that [Indistinct]

when you picked that up.

...a centimetre or so under, it's white!

Absolutely white right here.

Man 2:

Gee, you got a bag?

All set.

Okay, I'm going to get the...

shadowed material...

Man 1:

Look, this is a real beauty!

[Music playing]

Collins:

l-I didn't have any great feeling of...

"Oh, we've done it!"

I mean, we've done part of it, but, uh...

I was a lot more worried, I guess,

about getting them up off the Moon

than I was about getting

them down onto the Moon.

The motor on the Lunar Module

was one motor

and if something went wrong with it,

you know, they were dead men,

there was no other way

for them to leave.

Announcer:

Ladies and gentlemen,

the President of the United States.

Good evening,

my fellow Americans.

Tonight, I want to talk to you

on a subject of deep concern

to all Americans

and to many people

in all parts of the world.

Collins:

"Fate has ordained

that the men who went to the Moon

to explore in peace

will stay on the Moon to rest in peace.

These brave men,

Neil Armstrong and Edwin Aldrin,

know that there is no hope

for their recovery,

but they also know that

there is hope for Mankind In their sacrifice."

I mean, this is, you know...

What a public relations

person would have to say.

Aldrin:
[On radio]

Nine, eight, seven, six, five...

Port stage, engine arm, ascent, proceed.

[Music playing]

Beautiful.

Armstrong:
[On radio]

Pitchover.

Aldrin:
[On radio]

Very smooth.

Balance couple, off.

Very quiet ride.

Capcom:
Eagle, Houston request

manual start override.

Man:
[On radio]

Capcom:
[On radio] Eagle, Houston,

one minute. You are looking good.

Collins:

Oh God, look... It's beautiful.

It's a beautiful little thing,

you see the L.M., you know,

a little golden bug down

there among the craters

and it gets slowly bigger and bigger.

They seem to be, you

know, like riding rails,

they were very precise.

And then it got right up next to me

and then it was my job, as before,

to make the connection

between the two vehicles.

[Music playing]

Finally, they got back

into the command module

and I grabbed Buzz by both ears

and I was going to kiss

him on the forehead,

I can remember that.

and I got him to right about here

and I said, "That's not a very...

good thing to do somehow,"

so I forgot,

whether I clapped him on the back

or shook his hand or did something.

And again, you don't have time

to sit around and reminisce

because you've got T. E.L. coming up

in another... little while,

so you've got to get ready for that

and come home.

[Music playing]

Mitchell:
The biggest joy

was on the way home.

In my cockpit window, every two minutes,

the Earth, the Moon, the Sun

and a whole 360 degree

panorama of the heavens.

And that was a powerful,

overwhelming experience.

And suddenly I realized

that the molecules of my body

and the molecules of the spacecraft

and the molecules in the bodies

of my partners

were prototyped and manufactured

in some ancient generation of stars.

And that was an overwhelming sense

of oneness, of connectedness.

It wasn't them and us,

it was, "that's me, that's all of it,

it's one thing."

And it was accompanied by an ecstasy,

a sense of, "oh my God. wow, yes,"

an insight, an epiphany.

[Music playing]

Duke:

Re-entry is very critical on Apollo.

The last time I looked at my computer,

we were accelerating

through 39,000 feet per second,

which is... uh, translates

to over 26,000 miles an hour.

A rifle bullet only

goes 2000 miles an hour.

Collins:

You are literally on fire.

Your heat shield is on fire

and it's streaming...

Its fragments are

streaming out behind you.

It's like being inside a gigantic light bulb.

Duke:

The re-entry started at 400,000 feet,

and by the time you've got to 90,000 feet,

you're basically coming

straight down, freefall.

Collins:
Well, then the final link

in the daisy chain is the...

is, well, there... Actually,

I guess I'd have to say

there may be two more,

but, uh... the important one

is that the parachutes open.

[Explosion]

Mains coming out,

huge explosion again

and these three

chutes come out.

[Music playing]

Collins:
The three orange and

white spheres of reassurance.

That was the end.

That was the last of the daisy....

Well, then we had to get out.

I can remember the beautiful water.

You know, we were out in the deep

ocean in the Pacific.

It was such a startling violet colour.

I remember looking at

the ocean and admiring,

"Nice ocean you got here,

planet Earth."

[Music playing]

To me, the marvel of it

is that it all worked like clockwork,

I almost said like magic.

There might be a little magic mixed up

in the back of that big clock somewhere...

Because everything worked

as it was supposed to.

Nobody messed up.

Even I didn't make mistakes.

[Music playing]

Aldrin:
I knew that anyone

who was on the first lunar landing

was certainly going to be propelled

into the public view in an enormous way.

That awareness was troublesome

and interfered during the mission.

But it's nothing like what happens

after the mission

and for the rest of your life.

You are the person now,

not just an average fighter pilot,

who did this and that pretty well,

but, "This guy walked on the Moon."

And now I have to sort of uphold that image

for the rest of my life, no matter what I do.

Bean:
Can't think of a negative thing

about Neil Armstrong.

I think it's wonderful

that he's been the first man on the Moon.

Even though

he's somewhat reclusive,

then that helps to preserve the image.

That's a tough role.

I'm glad... I'd love to do that,

but I'd hate to try to fill that role.

That's a tough role.

Yeah... Boy!

[Music playing]

Collins:

After the flight of Apollo 11,

the three of us went

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