"Where is the moon?" "Right straight ahead of you, John."
April 3, 2013 9:30 AM Subscribe
Distractions in Space: Because astronauts also have problems with directions, coworkers, and poop.
The full Apollo 10 command module transcript is here if you want to look for yourself. I just scrolled to a random page and the first thing I saw was
posted by theodolite at 9:42 AM on April 3, 2013
CDR: (Laughing) No. John, we're awfully glad to be back, but we've got to reshuffle this shit here. Got that ... barbecue ... barbecue.
LMP: I thought they didn't want us to dump; they told us to roll over, or some goddam thing! ... yaw. Those bastards are going to kill us yet.posted by theodolite at 9:42 AM on April 3, 2013
CDR: Yes, I've got to close this hatch, don't I?
CMP: Yes.
CDR: Pardon me?
CMP: Yes, you ain't never closed it?
CDR: Close what?
CMP: What'd you say?posted by theodolite at 9:45 AM on April 3, 2013
CMP: Please don't open any hatches while you guys are dicking around up there.posted by theodolite at 9:46 AM on April 3, 2013
05 17 44 30 CMD I know that's not mine, because mine don't stink. Now, where's the goodam moon?
05 17 44 35 LDR Yeah but yours are stickier than mine. The moon's over there.
05 17 44 40 CMD Can we throw this thing out the window? (ha ha ha)
05 17 44 45 LDR (ha ha) No, but we can't let it just keep floating around in here.
05 17 44 55 HST You guys do know that you're transmitting, right?
posted by mule98J at 9:46 AM on April 3, 2013 [3 favorites]
05 17 44 35 LDR Yeah but yours are stickier than mine. The moon's over there.
05 17 44 40 CMD Can we throw this thing out the window? (ha ha ha)
05 17 44 45 LDR (ha ha) No, but we can't let it just keep floating around in here.
05 17 44 55 HST You guys do know that you're transmitting, right?
posted by mule98J at 9:46 AM on April 3, 2013 [3 favorites]
It would be pretty funny if NASA planned to approve a last-minute descent to the lunar surface for Apollo 10, but changed their mind after hearing these exchanges, preferring to wait for the more sober Buzz and Neil.
posted by RobotVoodooPower at 9:48 AM on April 3, 2013 [2 favorites]
posted by RobotVoodooPower at 9:48 AM on April 3, 2013 [2 favorites]
This makes "Deep Space Homer" seem more like a documentary than I would have expected.
posted by MCMikeNamara at 9:52 AM on April 3, 2013 [6 favorites]
posted by MCMikeNamara at 9:52 AM on April 3, 2013 [6 favorites]
The reason Apollo 10 didn't land on the Moon was because they spent too much time around Uranus.
posted by Philosopher Dirtbike at 9:54 AM on April 3, 2013
posted by Philosopher Dirtbike at 9:54 AM on April 3, 2013
"Now look where the Earth is! Pull over and let me drive!"
posted by Zed at 10:01 AM on April 3, 2013 [1 favorite]
posted by Zed at 10:01 AM on April 3, 2013 [1 favorite]
2) Apparently you can un-confidentialize things just by scribbling over the "confidential" stamp. Good to know.
Heh. Kids, don't try that at work without attaching the documentation to the file saying that you have permission to do so.
There's a real reason -- in the USG, you have to treat any material with a classification mark as classified. So, when something is declassified, you have to remove it. You mark every page, in case one is misplaced, which means someone has to cancel that mark on every page. And, in the case where there are two, you have to treat it as the higher of the two, so you can't just slap an unclassified stamp onto the thing.
The fun ones are the ones that started Top Secret/SCI, and stepped down from there, so there's four or five classification marks, all scrubbed out. Sometimes, it gets very hard to find a safe spot to put the new stamp.
posted by eriko at 10:34 AM on April 3, 2013 [1 favorite]
Heh. Kids, don't try that at work without attaching the documentation to the file saying that you have permission to do so.
There's a real reason -- in the USG, you have to treat any material with a classification mark as classified. So, when something is declassified, you have to remove it. You mark every page, in case one is misplaced, which means someone has to cancel that mark on every page. And, in the case where there are two, you have to treat it as the higher of the two, so you can't just slap an unclassified stamp onto the thing.
The fun ones are the ones that started Top Secret/SCI, and stepped down from there, so there's four or five classification marks, all scrubbed out. Sometimes, it gets very hard to find a safe spot to put the new stamp.
posted by eriko at 10:34 AM on April 3, 2013 [1 favorite]
Much nicer interface for the transcripts, no Apollo 10 yet though.
Ugh, I hate that interface. All that whitespace and all those icons eating up valuable reading space. Screw the facebookification of the web, give me clean text and lots of it. I want to read, not scroll!
Here, have a better one. IMHO. It doesn't have Apollo 13, 14 or 17 fully transcribed yet, but here's the raw transcripts for Apollo 13, Apollo 14 and Apollo 17. Those are rough, but the finished ones (Apollo 7-12, 15 and 16) are excellent.
For the landings, the Apollo Lunar Surface Journal has all the landings. There's also a great deal of background material in both journals, and explanations of some of the jargon, such as maneuver PADs, etc.
It also has frames, alas, and it's not as clean as the flight journals.
posted by eriko at 10:44 AM on April 3, 2013
Ugh, I hate that interface. All that whitespace and all those icons eating up valuable reading space. Screw the facebookification of the web, give me clean text and lots of it. I want to read, not scroll!
Here, have a better one. IMHO. It doesn't have Apollo 13, 14 or 17 fully transcribed yet, but here's the raw transcripts for Apollo 13, Apollo 14 and Apollo 17. Those are rough, but the finished ones (Apollo 7-12, 15 and 16) are excellent.
For the landings, the Apollo Lunar Surface Journal has all the landings. There's also a great deal of background material in both journals, and explanations of some of the jargon, such as maneuver PADs, etc.
It also has frames, alas, and it's not as clean as the flight journals.
posted by eriko at 10:44 AM on April 3, 2013
Reading through the interface that neustile linked. These folks were certainly polite back then. ;)
Thanks for this!
posted by blurker at 10:46 AM on April 3, 2013
Thanks for this!
posted by blurker at 10:46 AM on April 3, 2013
The funny part is that Apollo 10 was the most experienced crew at the time, with five previous missions between them. All three crew members went on to command later Apollo missions, with two of them, CMP John Young and LMP Gene Gernan, walking on the Moon.
Tom Stafford could have walked on the moon, but elected to get into management, before deciding to command the Apollo-Soyuz Test Project. Go figure.
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 11:55 AM on April 3, 2013
Tom Stafford could have walked on the moon, but elected to get into management, before deciding to command the Apollo-Soyuz Test Project. Go figure.
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 11:55 AM on April 3, 2013
MetaFilter: problems with directions, coworkers, and poop.
posted by Splunge at 12:37 PM on April 3, 2013 [2 favorites]
posted by Splunge at 12:37 PM on April 3, 2013 [2 favorites]
It's hard to be sure what they were really saying as they had their own internal language. For example "8-ball" could be code for the navigation gimbal which looks like an 8-ball (in Gene Gernan's memoir he compares the Gimbal with an 8-ball and I think even called it one).
posted by stbalbach at 12:38 PM on April 3, 2013
posted by stbalbach at 12:38 PM on April 3, 2013
A few months ago during one of our Apollo threads I came up with an idea for a blog called "funny things said in space" but never did much about it.
It would appear that someone am else has gone ahead and filled in for me. Thanks!
posted by ShutterBun at 12:52 PM on April 3, 2013
It would appear that someone am else has gone ahead and filled in for me. Thanks!
posted by ShutterBun at 12:52 PM on April 3, 2013
This is Cernan striking a pose to inspire science fiction writers how to describe asteroid miners on the job.
posted by aught at 1:11 PM on April 3, 2013
posted by aught at 1:11 PM on April 3, 2013
a pose to inspire science fiction writers how to describe asteroid miners on the job.
Looked to me more like the teary last broadcast home shortly before the climax of an sf horror movie.
"I'm sorry I'm not going to make it to your baseball game, Ike."
posted by Zed at 1:31 PM on April 3, 2013 [1 favorite]
Looked to me more like the teary last broadcast home shortly before the climax of an sf horror movie.
"I'm sorry I'm not going to make it to your baseball game, Ike."
posted by Zed at 1:31 PM on April 3, 2013 [1 favorite]
The transcripts are the best proof that the landing was not faked. No government could/would come up witha script like that. It's too real — the write stuff, one might say.
posted by five fresh fish at 2:25 PM on April 3, 2013 [2 favorites]
posted by five fresh fish at 2:25 PM on April 3, 2013 [2 favorites]
Gene Cernan doesn't look too happy with his career choice.
posted by chimaera at 9:40 PM on April 3, 2013
posted by chimaera at 9:40 PM on April 3, 2013
I laughed when I saw this. I've been writing a little goof-around story about astronauts and, seeing that it isn't supposed to be taken seriously, I just wrote a bunch of weird, random horsing around dialog for it. I assumed that there was no way the real astronauts would be so unprofessional. I assumed that I was getting it so wrong that I'd be tempted later to go back and re-write it heavily. I've seldom been happier to be proven so very, very wrong. Once again, real life is more awesome and more hilarious than anything imagined.
posted by amc.concepts at 5:39 AM on April 4, 2013 [1 favorite]
posted by amc.concepts at 5:39 AM on April 4, 2013 [1 favorite]
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1) Kept reading that as "urine durp" and thought "wow, so ahead of their time!"
2) Apparently you can un-confidentialize things just by scribbling over the "confidential" stamp. Good to know.
posted by phunniemee at 9:33 AM on April 3, 2013 [3 favorites]