Apollo 11 at 40

Forty years ago on July 20 I excitedly jumped out of bed at the sound of the alarm clock—at somewhere in the vicinity of two am. If things were going well, NASA’s lunar lander, the Eagle, would be spiraling down to the moon’s surface in another hour or so. I dragged three sleepy kids from bed, to allow them to witness this incredible achievement. They sat sleepy-eyed and I teary-eyed, as Neil Armstrong coolly piloted the lander to its resting spot, with a few precious seconds of fuel left.

I didn’t feel pride at America’s beating the Russians there, or even see it as the culmination of some long-held national dream. As an engineer, I was simply thrilled by the success of such a bold effort. It was a first for the human species, which compared in my mind to building the Pyramids or the creation of the first alphabet. And I was present to witness it!

The Apollo program had come to fruition in an amazingly short time. From Kennedy’s brash speech in 1961 to the lunar landing: eight brief years. Unfortunately, Apollo then faded even faster. The public’s attention was diverted elsewhere, the last three Apollo missions were cancelled, and NASA stumbled on to other efforts—never again rising to the heights scaled in the 1960s.

Much has been written and debated about the subsequent triumphs and flops of NASA. Many questions have been raised as to the general inconsistency of the American space program, the failures of the Space Shuttle and the dubious scientific value of the Apollo program and the International Space Station. The relative merits of unmanned missions to the planets, as compared to low-Earth orbit manned missions have been passionately argued.

I have no space or inclination here to enter those contested arenas. It simply seems a shame that the American public and Congress have been so fickle in their support of the space program. A consistent, well thought-out direction has been utterly lacking. How much farther in space exploration we could have been by now, with coherent planning and commitment! I’ve always thought it strange that the public readily accepts huge military budgets that have created so much suffering around the world, while begrudging the tiniest fraction of that money being spent on something positive: the acquisition of knowledge about the marvelous universe we inhabit.

Now at Apollo 11’s 40th anniversary we see humans regaining an interest in the moon. But I fear the efforts are just as political and are motivated by petty national competition as they were in 1969. It feels too much like grandstanding. Give me a quiet little Mars Rover any day!