The real reason we drove on the moon

The Lunar Rover was an incredible feat of engineering. But it was a feat of political engineering, too.

At the end - a question for you!

How this video happened

I think when I was researching my Earthrise video I stumbled on footage of the LRV (Lunar Roving Vehicle, a NASA-ism I don't actually use in the video). I thought it was captivating and planned on doing an explainer of the challenges and tech.

The angle changed a bit as I did my research. Earl Swift's great book — linked below — made it clear that this story had broader themes of politics and funding. And in a brief chat with my friend Sam of Search Party, he mentioned that his big question was if the LRV was really necessary.

I had some trepidation bringing in current events to the story and potentially alienating people with polarizing figures. I also feel like NASA coverage is so earnest that this might be seen as heretical. But the research really buoyed me and convinced me that a more nuanced take is key, perhaps more for the biggest space fans than anyone.

Check out more

Here's a link to the reaction video (for some paid tiers).

High school physics on the moon

Have you seen the feather drop? (This GIF is the size of the sun, so you can find the video here)

What's going on here? As lovingly depicted in this NASA flight journal, NASA astronaut David Scott is on the surface of the moon performing an experiment: does gravity really operate on objects at the same speed as Galileo predicted?

Scott says:

"Well, in my left hand, I have a feather; in my right hand, a hammer. And I guess one of the reasons we got here today was because of a gentleman named Galileo, a long time ago, who made a rather significant discovery about falling objects in gravity fields. And we thought where would be a better place to confirm his findings than on the Moon."

As you can (hopefully) see in the GIF above, or in the linked video, it worked — and I'll say here that it really is cool to see them fall at the same time, despite the fact that I'm supposed to know that would happen. It wasn't that notable at the time — such experiments had been done in earth-bound vacuum chambers before (and have been done since), but seeing it on grainy video is still neat.

The feather itself came from an Air Force Academy falcon (how's that for pedigree?). The hammer was a 39 cm one, but details on that are scant.

And that's it, right? A fun experiment that school children could enjoy. However, despite the fact that I've spent a couple weeks convincing myself into believing that rock experiments are interesting, even something cooler like this has limits. It's hard not to see this demo as a sign that the NASA program, c. 1971, was spinning its wheels, looking for the next big thing.

In the previous Apollo Mission, Alan Shepard had created a viral moment by hitting a golf ball on the moon, and this was one of the sequels. NASA astronauts were beginning the transition from fighter pilot jocks to scientists, but they were also beginning to become content creators in search of moments that might win the program publicity and affection. In light of where the program was, and the budget cuts that would come, it's hard for me not to see this stunt as just that — a stunt.

Researching the video above made me see the later Apollo missions as flails at a purpose for NASA — a transition moment between the initial adrenaline-fueled landing on the moon and some dreamed of future with moon bases, and Mars bases, and an entire space-world. The new era they thought had just begun was already being budget-cut to a close as the Cold War fizzled. Reading too much into one stunt would be a mistake — after all, even in the exciting days of Gemini, astronauts brought bells and saw Santa. Still, even on the moon, gravity wins.

Even worse, the hammer and feather drop may not have been the most viral moment from the Apollo 15 mission. That title likely belongs to a stamp smuggling scandal that is so embarrassingly petty and dull it makes rock drama look incredible. I feel bad that these goofy experiments, done in the shadow of a lunar rover that would never reach mass production, were all that came of their ambition.

Budgetary discipline makes me curb that space sentimentality a bit. Adjusted for inflation, the $40 million LRV would be almost $300 million today. But you have to admit that there's something bittersweet about a feather plucked from a bird and dropped on the moon when the falcon, probably, ended up flying longer than the Apollo program.

Sources for the video

• Check out Across the Airless Wilds by Earl Swift if you want to go deep on Lunar Rover lore. I have to say, this book is quite in depth and I was surprised it was a mass publication book, since the level of attention is really quite academic (which might make it a bit in the weeds for some). I tried to chat with Earl for this video, since I leaned on his book to find a few sources, but he was hiking the Appalachian Trail! Anyways, if this video made you curious, check it out.

•  Once again, the NASA Technical Reports Server was my main resource for the tech papers you see in the video. There were, I think, 28 I downloaded/excerpted, so too many to link here - but let me know if you need a specific one and, if nothing else, here's the lunar worm.

• Check out the full Apollo 15 NASA Doc, In the Mountains of the Moon.

• Want to explore the Apollo sites and EVAs? I'm not sure if there's an easier way to do this, but I did it via Google Earth Pro. They did a collab with NASA and it's really cool to see landmarks and routes on the actual moon.

• Much of the Apollo 15 footage is from here. 

• The super dusty trip on the rover is known as the Lunar Grand Prix. I don't use upscaled or augmented footage in my videos (feels a little too inaccurate, except in some extreme cases, but this is a version that's fun to watch nevertheless).

• This is a pretty awesome moon rover chase scene from a rather mediocre movie. Is this a source? No. Did it inhabit my brain for the past two weeks, only to be cathartically rewatched before I typed this sentence? Yes.

A poll? Or...not.

As this Patreon grows, I am trying to think of more benefits for paid and free members (even though my bandwidth is somewhat scarce). Any preferences? Another newsletter article on my off weeks? A podcast? Livestream? It's hard for me to know what sounds cool. Feel free to reply to this or spam the comments, I'm just trying to get an idea.