crankyoldman | BUSTING THE MOON HOAX

Since I'm apparently the only person with cable of my main group of friends, this is totally a rundown of this awesome Mythbusters episode. It's wonderful seeing my childhood hopes and dreams not be crushed.

Claim: Photos were faked because the shadows aren't parallel

Result: BUSTED. Uh, the moon isn't flat and one light source will cause shadows that go off in directions. This is PURE PHYSICS. They used a mini model and one light source to do this.

Claim: Footprints were faked because there is no moisture on the moon

Result: First check: Moisture DOES help make footprints more distinct, just from sand. Second check: They went to a NASA TEST CENTER, used a VACCUUM CHAMBER, and some lunar dust simulated.

BUSTED. MOON DUST IS CRAZY STUFF, NOT LIKE SAND.

Claim: This photo of the astronaut being visible in the shadow of the lander is fake, because he's illuminated.

Result: BUSTED. Dude, the lunar surface dust (called regolith) is reflective! Light is kind of awesome. Clearly theorists needed some Electricity and Magnetism Physics classes. I TOOK IT TWICE. I TOTALLY CALLED IT.

Claim: The flag looks like it's flapping! THERE IS NO BREEZE ON THE MOON, IT IS A VACUUM.

Result: First off, there was a rod to keep it out. Secondly, after putting it in a VACUUM CHAMBER, just after wiggling it (which was what was happening, as the astronauts were planting the flag in the soil) the flag took a while to stop, because there was no air resistence. MOMENTUM. NEWTON'S LAWS. Seriously, conspiracy theorists, TAKE A PHYSICS CLASS.

Claim: The astronaut footage of them bouncing on the moon was done with camera tricks.

Result: First off, Adam totally had his own spacesuit (no really). It was pretty darn accurate. He's clearly a space nut. I love him. I want to keep a clip of him explaining how he added stuff to this generic suit to make it NEIL ARMSTRONG'S. Then they filmed and did the stuff at half speed to see how it looks. Then they simulated 1/6 gravity (I remember doing this at space camp it was fun) and filmed it. But this wasn't good enough, the rig wasn't perfect. So they went a step further.

They went to a company called Zero G to get the gravity. Adam's suit was more real this time, as they weight him down. Jamie was totally cool the whole time. It makes me really want to go do that.

BUSTED. Really. Microgravity is HARD to fake.

Claim: There's no reflector on the moon, because they didn't go, so they didn't leave anything!

Result: So they got a bigass laser. No really. There's a huge laser at an observatory. I want that job. So they pulsed the laser at the regolith... nothing. They then aimed the laser as the retro reflector... and BAM. WE GET SIGNAL.

BUSTED.

SO THERE WAS TOTALLY NOT A HOAX YEAH! TOLD YOU CRAZYHEADS!

Check the Discovery Channel site, they promise extra footage from this episode on there. Since it just finished airing, it should be up soon!

YAY SCIENCE.