Neil Armstrong’s biggest fear was failure, not Moon death: Lost Tapes reveal
Neil Armstrong’s biggest fear before Apollo 11’s mission to the Moon has been unearthed on previously lost tapes.
Astronaut Neil Armstrong’s biggest fear in the lead-up to the Apollo 11 mission wasn’t dying or never seeing his family again.
It was failure, previously unreleased audio has revealed.
As the world prepares to celebrate 50 years since Commander Armstrong and Lunar Module Eagle Pilot Buzz Aldrin stepped foot on the moon and won the space race for America, never before heard audio reveals the pressure and pessimism the Apollo 11 astronauts felt in the lead-up to July 20, 1969.
The ‘lost tapes’ will be aired for the world to hear on Foxtel on July 20.
They reveal that Armstrong wasn’t concerned about safety or the high likelihood of dying in space but he was extremely stressed by the pressure his country put on him to pull off the near impossible feat.
“We weren’t really concerned about safety, it was a matter of mission success … the nation was staking its reputation on Apollo 11,” Armstrong said.
“A failure to complete the landing would undoubtably result in a certain tarnish on the US image.”
Fortunately for Armstrong, Apollo 11 was a success, with him declaring his iconic words — “that’s one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind” — as he planted his boot on the Moon’s surface.
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That happened four days after he was blasted into space alongside Aldrin and the mission’s third astronaut, Columbia Module Pilot Michael Collins.
Collins piloted Columbia as it circled the Moon while Armstrong and Aldrin walked on the surface.
The tapes show all three were well aware of the enormous challenge ahead of them.
“That challenge has been there ever since man has looked up to the moon,” Aldrin was recorded saying.
Recordings of Collins give an insight into just how pessimistic he was about the technology the astronauts were relying on to get them to the Moon and back.
“The problem is on a flight like this that its just an extremely long, long, fragile daisy chain of events. I was somewhat pessimistic about our chances to carry the whole thing off,” he said.
“Any chain as long and as tenuous as this one, I know must have a weak link.”
Collins had stressed that he didn’t hold much faith in the gear they were relying on as they plunged into the depths of space.
“Closer and closer you come to it probably the more your apprehension is built. Just playing a game of probability and saying ‘geeze how long can you expect all this sophisticated, complicated gear to keep just purring right along?’ It seems like a little much to expect everything, all those thousands of little components, each one of them to do its job perfectly. It just seems like a bit more than you could ask for.”
As Columbia and The Eagle orbited the Moon, the tapes show Armstrong was anxious about the mission’s fuel supply. Rightly so as The Eagle landed with only 25 seconds of fuel remaining as Collins and Columbia waited for updates in orbit 112km above.
The Australian premiere of Moon Landing: The Lost Tapes airs on Foxtel’s History Channel on Saturday July 20, 7.30pm.
ASTRONAUTS ‘PREPARED TO DIE’
All three Apollo 11 astronauts were prepared to die for the Moon mission.
None of them could afford life insurance so before leaving behind their wives and children to blast off into space, each signed hundreds of autographs to serve as valuable ‘astronaut covers’ in case they never returned.
On eBay this week, autographs of Armstrong, Aldrin and Collins were attracting bids of over $4000.
Armstrong’s autograph alone can fetch up to $2000 on the auction site.
Then US president Richard Nixon, who phoned the Moon from the White House also expected the astronauts to die in space.
His speech writer had prepared a eulogy in case Armstrong and Aldrin needed to be abandoned on the Moon. If they weren’t able to get back to Columbia to come home they would either starve or die by suicide.
The lost tapes show Armstrong didn’t fear death, despite losing close friends to a mission test run tragedy only 18 months before leaving Earth.
Three astronauts from Apollo 1, Gus Grissom, Ed White and Roger Chaffee died in a horrific fire while locked inside a command module.
Audio recorded the crew screaming for help seconds before flames charred everything and everyone inside.
“Those were very traumatic times and you’re much more likely to accept the loss of a friend in flight but it really hurt to lose him in a ground test,” Armstrong said of the Apollo 1 deaths, veteran astronaut Ed White was his neighbour.
“That’s not the way you want it to happen.”
The Australian premiere of Moon Landing: The Lost Tapes airs on Foxtel’s History Channel on Saturday July 20, 7.30pm.
Originally published as Neil Armstrong’s biggest fear was failure, not Moon death: Lost Tapes reveal