back to article Lunar orbiter beams back first Moon snaps

NASA's Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) has beamed back its first snaps of the Moon - images from the Mare Nubium region captured by the spacecraft's Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter Camera, aka LROC: LRO image from the Mare Nubium region. Pic: NASA LROC Principal Investigator Mark Robinson of Arizona State University …

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  1. Colin MacLean

    Fake shmake

    Even if they find footprints, the conspiracy idiots will say they were created by special NASA robots - a bit like the chap in the first Wallace & Gromit feature...

    Or maybe these new pictures are fakes too, taken in a subterranean bunker somewhere on an airforce base in Arizona...

  2. John Routledge

    Probably won't be able to see the landers

    Resolution: 1 metre. Size of the Apollo Lander: four metres across. So theoretically possible, but the best you're going to get is a few fuzzy pixels of a slightly different colour to the rest of the surface. And since the images are in b/w, even harder to distinguish.

    So we might get images of the landers, but they won't be good enough to be sure that's it's actually them. Shame really.

    Anyway, nothing will satisfy the conspiracy nuts, they'll claim any images are faked anyway.

  3. Annihilator
    Coat

    Loon-ar conspiracy

    "This, of course, comes as welcome news to those of us eagerly awaiting snaps of the Apollo 11 landing site, which will finally reveal whether Aldrin and Armstrong ever really set foot on the Moon"

    Not really, the key is the fact they've only got a calendar that will resolve to 1 metre. Unless they've got massive footprints, there will still be enough for the "we believe they sent robots there, but not people" nuts to cling to.

    All they've done is added to the conspiracy:

    "Why did they only equip it with a camera capable of such low resolution - what don't you want us to see NASA!!"

    Mine's the one wrapped in tinfoil... Ta

  4. NogginTheNog
    Happy

    Too late to 'fess up?!

    "This, of course, comes as welcome news to those of us eagerly awaiting snaps of the Apollo 11 landing site, which will finally reveal whether Aldrin and Armstrong ever really set foot on the Moon."

    Yeah, 'cos like if they can fake a whole series of lunar expeditions they can't knock up a doctored photo of the surface to keep the pretence going...?! :-)

  5. Anonymous Coward
    Troll

    More trickery!

    "those of us eagerly awaiting snaps of the Apollo 11 landing site, which will finally reveal whether Aldrin and Armstrong ever really set foot on the Moon"

    Duh? If they can fake all six Apollo landings with 60s/70s technology how difficult will it be to use 2009 technology to fake photos from the Lunar Orbiter to show the landing sites?

    </windup>

  6. twelvebore
    Black Helicopters

    Landing site

    Let's be clear about this, images of the Apollo 11/etc. landing sites will *not* quash conspiracy theories. Anyone willing to believe a conspiracy spanning four decades and involving several hundred thousand NASA employees isn't going to be swayed by some nifty snaps of "Buz woz here, summer '69" written on the surface of the Moon. These are digital images after all, and I dare say the Conspir-o-Loonies will be quick to point out that the World Government could buy many hundreds of Photoshop licenses to less than the price of a single black helicopter.

  7. mccp
    Headmaster

    Politically correct units

    I'm sure it would have been safe to edit NASA's prose to remove the unneccesarily distracting imperial conversion of metric measurements. And while you were at it, you could have corrected their spelling of the word metre (although your comment box spell checker also gets it wrong).

    /pedantry

  8. Torben Mogensen

    Conspiracy theories

    I doubt the people believing in the "Moon hoax" will be satisfied with new pictures. For conspiracy theorists, any evidence against their theory is just part of the conspiracy.

  9. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Moon Landings

    Anyone believing the moon landings were fake is an utter moron, and hopefully we will have proof in a few days (not that any more proof needs to be waved in the idiots' faces).

    On the other hand, the conspiracy morons will only claimed the photos were doctored or something.

  10. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Apollo 11 landing site

    They'll just fake it up won't they?

  11. Baskitcaise
    Alien

    Elvis?

    Is that him saying Ooo?

    And I don`t want to know what that is half way down on the left.

  12. Andy C
    Black Helicopters

    Landing site...

    It will be photoshopped... Not that I'm a cynic at all... No...

  13. Tom 35

    which will finally reveal whether Aldrin and Armstrong ever really set foot on the Moon

    They will still say it's fake (and that they can tell because the shadows are wrong) same as always.

  14. Steve Jones 2
    Black Helicopters

    Oh Yeah??

    "which will finally reveal whether Aldrin and Armstrong ever really set foot on the Moon."

    Ever heard of Photoshop??

  15. Anonymous Coward
    Black Helicopters

    I'd only belive them

    If the Russians had a separate satellite with photos that matched!

    Back in 1990

    http://www.againstbombing.org/bush.htm

    I also recall the US claiming satellite evidence of arms movements in breach of a cease fire in Bosnia that was contradicted by the Dutch commander located in the area.

    The American government has consistently lied when it comes to information that it believes it has a monopoly over, so if they do provide images I wouldn't consider it to be conclusive proof.

  16. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Victor Meldrew would be proud...

    "This, of course, comes as welcome news to those of us eagerly awaiting snaps of the Apollo 11 landing site, which will finally reveal whether Aldrin and Armstrong ever really set foot on the Moon"

    Why would the tin-foil hat wearing lunatics who still don't believe we landed on the moon despite the vast array of evidence believe that these pictures are any more legit??

  17. Andus McCoatover

    Golf, anyone?

    Looks like a nice - exclusive - golf course. The green (cheese) needs a bit of watering and a trim, but the rough looks interesting enough.

    Can we get Alan Shepard to pop back and have another round?* After all, he had a golf buggy, PLUS a suited and booted caddie. Unfortunately both were replete of the obligatory Rupert Bear trousers - but they did have the silly shoes that golfers seem to need.

    Remembering, of course that the '19th hole' is the LEM.

    But then again, I've no sense of the scale of those holes. Imagine if Armstrong'd popped Apollo 11 into one. Like I said in a previous post, they're far, far braver buggers than me. I shi*t myself on a stepladder.

    * Nah. He pitched his 9-iron into the Final Bunker in July 1998. Fantastic life, though.

  18. Scott Mckenzie

    Wow.

    They look quite similar to the pictures they used when they faked the moon landings....

  19. jai

    i for one...

    ...demand a PlayMobile reconstruction of the orignal Capricorn One project... i mean the original moon landing

  20. Secretgeek
    Stop

    Don't slate the conspiracy nuts.

    The world would be a duller place if they all went 'Oh, look at that, we did walk on the Moon. Wow, I appear to have wasted a siginificant portion of my life. I suppose I ought to get on and get a hobby that's a bit less mental.'

    Every loon we lose, is one less person to make us smile (or to laugh at depending on how cruel you're feeling).

    Is there anyone out there in the Reg comment wasteland that used to believe the conspiracy theory but now doesn't?

  21. Tom Kelsall

    @Angus

    Hehehe - can you imagine what you could DO with a driver on the moon? I reckon you'd send a standard golf ball into orbit... and the ball off your pitching wedge would probably come back a week or so later...

  22. Colin MacLean

    A load of Schmidt

    As Harrison Schmidt (Apollo 17) put it, 'To those who believe the moon landings were faked: Why fake it six times?'

  23. Nano nano

    Never heard of them

    Who are all these so-called conspiracy theorists anyhow, are you sure they exist - I've never met anyone who didn't believe there were manned moon landings anyhow.

    AND the TV coverage at the time was presented by (Sir!) Patrick Moore and James Burke, and you can't get much better than that.

  24. No, I will not fix your computer
    Happy

    Chinese cameras

    They'll be higher resolution, smaller, cheaper etc.....

    Wouldn't it be great if they released photos of the moon that they photoshopped to remove any evidence of a moon landing, or (even funnier) flew there and burried all the evidence, If I was in the chinese government that's what I'd do, after all it's going to be the biggest economy, so much so that reserve capital of the world will no longer be dollars by 2030, why not rewrite a bit of history, land some men on the moon (America is no longer capable), get rid of any previous evidence and then claim they were first (hehe....)

  25. Anonymous Coward
    Black Helicopters

    The Truth

    The truth is, both sides of the moon landing conspiricy are right,

    They did land on the Moon but they also shot fake footage of the landing as a backup.

    The USA could not risk being beaten to the Moon by Russia, in the event that the moon landing mission failed they would show the faked footage and when the orbiter didnt make it back to earth they could make up anything they wanted.

    Either way the fact would remain that the US made it onto and then back from the moon First!

    The problems started when they actually used some of the FAKE footage during the mission to the moon because the REAL images were not of good enough quality for public viewing.

    There is still some questions about who reached the moon first, there is evidence that Russia managed to Oribt the moon first but the mission failed as the astronought did not survive re-entry.

    The truth is out there and very boring!

  26. Anonymous Coward
    Joke

    I think all the conspiracy theorists have been faked...

    Everything is real except the conspiracy nuts---who are paid well by the government to be pedants to deflect the focus from real-world problems. It's a government conspir...

    Oh wait... never mind.

  27. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    'suggesting a craggy and inhospitable surface'

    With no atmosphere and a - 233C to +123C temperature variation I think it's more than 'suggesting' it's inhospitable.

  28. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    LROC resolution

    Is 50cm per pixel (http://lroc.sese.asu.edu/EPO/LROC/lroc.php?pg=specifications)

    And the LMs won't be slightly different from the surface, they will be blindingly different - the lunar surface is very dark, they are covered in reflective mylar; they will also be casting shadows. Depending on the angle of the Sun it should also be reasonably easy to see the trails left by the lunar rovers and hopefully also by the Soviet Lunokhods.

    Whether we can find Al Shepard's Apollo 14 golf ball is another question.

  29. Onionman
    Unhappy

    Already covered by the lunatics

    One of the conspiracy nuts has already said there is no evidence that could make him change his mind (now THERE'S scientific rigour for you). He said even if they found landers, they must have been sent on later when technology allowed.

    That's the joy of these idiots: give them a bit of damning evidence and all they have to do is invent a way to fake it so it's part of the conspiracy. There is literally no way to convince them.

    What sad little lives they must lead.

    O

  30. Nano nano

    Not quite

    "I reckon you'd send a standard golf ball into orbit." - well with 'g' on the moon being 1/6 that on Earth, you would require to get it to 1/6 Earth orbital velocity, around 1 km/sec (depending on the orbit) - can you hit a ball that fast ?

  31. Anonymous Coward
    Happy

    If you look carefully

    you can see a kangaroo

  32. Stevie

    Bah!

    I see The Register has bought into the transparently fake "lunar probe" hoax NASA is perpetrating.

    The photo shown is obviously that of a badly lit model constructed from plaster laid over plaster bandage supported on a chicken wire armature, probably housed in the otherwise empty Fab Building at the Kennedy Space Center. Why else would they need a huge warehouse with no windows if not to fake space photography? Where do you think all those "miraculous" Hubble Space telescope pictures came from?

    Everyone knows that rockets can't work in space because there's no air for them to push against.

  33. Captain DaFt
    Flame

    I for one, am NOT impressed!

    First, for all you "Lunar conspiracy looneys"... ODFO. It's old, it's asinine, and nobody cares.

    Second, You can find the same release, nearly word for word, in any public library's archives, FROM 1962!

    Think about it, nearly half a decade later, and we're back to square one as far as manned spaceflight is concerned!

    By the late 1970s, we had the capability, we had the plans, we were building the spaceship to Mars... and scrapped the whole thing! Since then, it's been unmanned probes only past LEO, with humans frittering away their time in a can that only served as a destination for Soyuz and the occasional shuttle. What happened? Did our alien overlords post "No trespassing" signs? If so, I for one do NOT welcome them, and will lead the resistance when they invade.

    Flames, because this missive'll probably qualify me for FOTW.

  34. Goat Jam
    Flame

    @Colin MacLean

    "As Harrison Schmidt (Apollo 17) put it, 'To those who believe the moon landings were faked: Why fake it six times?'"

    Apollo program Taxpayer Bill - Cost of faking the Apollo program = $PROFIT!

  35. Sorry that handle is already taken. Silver badge

    Re: I for one, am NOT impressed!

    "By the late 1970s, we had the capability, we had the plans, we were building the spaceship to Mars... and scrapped the whole thing!"

    If this is indeed true, the ridiculous cost of doing so killed it.

  36. Neoc
    FAIL

    @mccp

    "And while you were at it, you could have corrected their spelling of the word metre (although your comment box spell checker also gets it wrong)."

    Actually, the first I'd do is get you to download the en-GB dictionary for FireFox (I assume you use FF) since FF is the one doing the spell-checking on the comment boxes. Said box (should you care to check the Page Source using Ctrl+U) is a simple TextArea form element, with no associated scripts.

    </pedantry * 2>

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