Longtime T-D science writer recalls covering first moon landing

Memories of details dim, but memories of impressions and feelings endure.

From the two weeks of covering the Apollo 11 moon-landing mission at the Manned Spacecraft Center near Houston, the memories that come back strongly are those of working at crowded tables in the atrium of the NASA auditorium, of the hordes of news people from throughout the world, of noise, of television crews lights, and rushes to a central mailbox-like setup to get the latest, hastily prepared transcripts of spacecraft-mission control conversations.

We all had an overriding sense of an unfolding, gigantic historical event the possibility of human beings stepping on another body in the solar system for the first time in the history of the human race. At stake was the prestige of the United States, which was in a Cold War struggle with the Soviet Union.

Just eight years earlier, President John F. Kennedy committed the nation to achieve a landing of men on the moon before the decade of the 1960s ended. The commitment was a promise of our technological prowess, to demonstrate to the world that we were superior to the Soviets after all, even though they were beating us in space spectaculars at the time. The race to put men on the moon first was more about international politics than scientific exploration.

Although we were all infused with the overriding, enormous meaning of what was taking place during those mid-July days in Houston, our uppermost concerns were with the moment-by-moment details of the mission. The launch was perfect, the Earth-orbit leg of the journey went well, the firing of the rockets that sent Neil Armstrong, Buzz Aldrin and Michael Collins toward the moon occurred on schedule. The coast to the moon was, in the language of mission control, nominal.

After all, trips to the moon had been accomplished before Apollo 8 in late December 1968 and Apollo 10 in May 1969. But they were only dress rehearsals for the main event of landing men on the moon and returning them safely to Earth.

So the days between the July 16 launch and July 20 were routine for most of us -- as far as the Apollo 11 mission was going.

The serious business of the mission started shortly after 3:30 p.m., Eastern Daylight Time, Sunday afternoon, July 20. That's when the lunar module, Eagle, separated from the command module, Columbia, to start the descent to the moons surface. Collins remained in Columbia, and Armstrong and Aldrin were in Eagle.

Some of us joked at the time, The trick question on history exams 30 years from now will be, "Who was the third crew member of Apollo 11 who didn't walk on the moon?"

Again, impressions -- of listening with rapt attention to the mission control-Eagle chatter as Armstrong and Aldrin descended from 50,000 feet to a few hundred above the lunar surface; of talk about computer alarms going off; of Aldrin reading altitude and speed numbers; more computer alarms; 50 feet, 20 feet; moon dust blasted up from Eagles rocket; and finally, Aldrin saying, Contact light. That light indicated the Eagle was on the surface.

Then, Armstrong's words: Houston, Tranquility Base here. The Eagle has landed.
I remember the response from Mission Control saying something about a bunch of guys here about to turn blue from lack of breathing. (The exact quote, from transcripts, was, "Roger, Tranquility, we copy you on the ground. You got a bunch of guys about to turn blue. Were breathing again. Thanks a lot.")

The landing occurred at 4:17 p.m. Eastern Daylight Time.

Mission controllers cheered.

Outside, on the Manned Spacecraft Centers campus-like grounds, a group broke into a singing demonstration at the foot of a full-scale model of the lunar lander, asking that Americas next goal be the elimination of hunger and poverty.

Slightly more than 6 hours later, Armstrong began descending Eagles ladder to step onto the moon. Most of us were watching a projection of the TV signal onto a large screen in the NASA auditorium.

The first images were incomprehensible blobs of black on white, until someone at a control panel somewhere inverted the image. Then came the shadowy figure of Armstrong's descent. Foreign journalists seated in many rows behind me cheered when Armstrong stepped on the moon and delivered his famous line, "That's one small step for a man, one giant leap for mankind." (The word a was lost in radio transmission.)

They rose to their feet in a standing ovation and cheered when Armstrong and Aldrin placed the American flag on the lunar surface. There was a phone call from President Richard M. Nixon, who noted that this was probably the most historic phone call ever made from the White House.

As Armstrong and Aldrin walked on the moon, placing scientific instruments and collecting samples, we listened acutely for their descriptions of the stark lunar world, the color and nature of its soil. "Magnificent desolation" was Aldrin's quotable description.

Around the spacecraft center that night and the next day, NASA workers were elated.

The remainder of the mission from lunar liftoff to landing and recovery in the Pacific Ocean was, again, entirely nominal.

Then came the post-mission news conferences during which top space officials tried to express the significance of Apollo 11. New era for mankind was an oft-heard phrase. So were comparisons with Christopher Columbus discovery of a new world.

Wernher von Braun, who guided the development of the powerful Saturn rocket system that delivered the men to the moon, likened the mission to the first time ocean-dwelling creatures crawled out to begin the long road of evolution on dry land. He said the mission "has virtually assured mankind of immortality because Apollo 11 showed that humans can travel to and live on other worlds."

But then the enchantment of moon travel -- and manned space travel in general -- waned. The programs budget was slashed; missions were canceled; and many brilliant engineers, scientists and technicians who were among the 400,000 workers at NASA, its many contractors and subcontractors who had been involved in the Apollo program were laid off. The last manned landing on the moon took place in December 1972. Three more such landings had been scheduled, but cut.

Now, 40 years later, the Apollo program is mostly memories and impressions of something very special and important that took place in the '60s.
Back then, Kennedy was fond of a then-current musical called Camelot by Alan Jay Lerner and Frederick Loewe that contained some lines applicable to that past space adventure:

"Ask every person if he's heard the story,

And tell it strong and clear if he has not,

That once there was a fleeting wisp of glory

Called Camelot [Apollo]."

Beverly Orndorff reported for The Times-Dispatch about the space program from its inception until his retirement in 1997.