Tuesday, October 28, 2008

Lunar Site Preservation

Preserving Tranquility - Seed - Should the sites of lunar landings be protected as part of our cultural inheritance?

Here's Buzz Aldrin's perspective:

As part of his Apollo 11 moonwalk, Buzz Aldrin deployed a solar-powered seismometer near the spacecraft. "The seismometer experimenter told me, 'After you deploy the solar panels in the sunlight, don't walk in front of them, or you might interrupt the flow of electricity and damage things,'" Aldrin recalls. "Well, if you look very carefully in front of those panels, you'll see some footprints there. I guess I wouldn't mind too much if somebody went up there to brush those away."