Buzz Aldrin (LMP)

We're moving the camera over to the right window now to give you Langrenus, its—its several central peaks and -

Charlie Duke (CAPCOM)

Roger. We got Langrenus in our screen now.

Charlie Duke (CAPCOM)

Okay, 11. This is Houston. We're getting a beautiful picture of Langrenus now with its rather conspicuous central peak.

Michael Collins (CMP)

The Sea of Fertility doesn't look very fertile to me. I don't know who named it.

Neil Armstrong (CDR)

Well, it may have been named by a gentleman whom this crater was named after, Langrenus. Langrenus was a cartographer to the King of Spain and made one of the—one of the early reasonably accurate maps of the Moon.

Charlie Duke (CAPCOM)

Roger. That's very interesting —

Neil Armstrong (CDR)

… at least it sounds better for our purposes than the Sea of Crises.

Charlie Duke (CAPCOM)

Okay. It looks like you're coming inside now on the camera.

Buzz Aldrin (LMP)

Well, I can't get behind to see the monitor. I'll bring the focus in, but we're going to be looking down past one of the LM quads and one of the antennas almost straight down at the ground track that we'll be seeing coming in now. I guess there's maybe 2 or 3 minutes before power descent.

Buzz Aldrin (LMP)

All right, that should put the LM structure about in focus, and I'm going to move it out to infinity and then expand the field of view.

Buzz Aldrin (LMP)

Crater Secchi is out my window now, window number 2.

Charlie Duke (CAPCOM)

Hello, Apollo 11. This is Houston. We show you coming up on the terminator at 78 53, about 7 minutes from now, and we've also got the LOI 2 and TEI 5 PAD's ready for you after the TV whenever you want to terminate. Over.

Charlie Duke (CAPCOM)

And we're getting a good view of the track leading into the landing site now and -

Charlie Duke (CAPCOM)

Okay, And it looks like we got Secchi K, went by about 10 seconds ago; coming up on Apollo Ridge.

Charlie Duke (CAPCOM)

And in the right hand portion of our screen right now, we can see Messier Alfa and Bravo with the light colored rays streaming off in one direction.

Buzz Aldrin (LMP)

I don't know if you can make out, but in the Sea of Fertility there are a number of craters that are just barely discernible, old, old craters whose outlines are just barely able to be seen.

Charlie Duke (CAPCOM)

Roger. I think we can make them out. The color really enhances our ability to discern features and craters over what we see in real time on our black and white monitor.

Buzz Aldrin (LMP)

Right. The—At these low Sun angles, there's no trace of brown, it's now returned to a very gray appearance and, like the 8 crew says, it has a look of plaster of paris to it at this Sun angle, which is completely lacking in …

Buzz Aldrin (LMP)

Okay. This is very close to ignition point for power descent. Just passing Mount Marilyn that—that triangular shaped mountain that you see in the center of the screen at the present time with crater Secchi Theta on top of the far northern edge of the mountain.

Charlie Duke (CAPCOM)

Roger. We're getting a good view of Mount Marilyn and the Secchi Theta.

Buzz Aldrin (LMP)

And now we're looking at what we call Boot Hill; occurs 20 seconds into the descent.

Buzz Aldrin (LMP)

The bright, sharp rimmed crater at the very right edge of the screen, Censorinus T. Now passing the—the 1 minute point in power descent.

Charlie Duke (CAPCOM)

Roger. And for your information, your current altitude is 148 nautical miles above the surface.

Michael Collins (CMP)

I'm unable to determine altitude at all looking out the window. I couldn't tell whether we were down at 60 or up at 170.

Charlie Duke (CAPCOM)

I bet you could tell if you were down at 50,000 feet.

Michael Collins (CMP)

I wouldn't be surprised.

Buzz Aldrin (LMP)

We're passing some steep ridges here. The edge of some old craters that were photographed by Apollo 10; and those—the crew of Apollo 10 was very impressed with the steepness of these ridges when they came over them at about 50,000 feet.

Charlie Duke (CAPCOM)

Roger. We can observe they're also steep even from this altitude. You got quite a shadow being cast by the Sun at these low angles.

Buzz Aldrin (LMP)

The entire surface is getting considerably darker than the surface that we looked at previously when the Sun was quite high above us. The crater in the—bright crater in the center of the screen,—well, the smaller one is Censorinus.

Charlie Duke (CAPCOM)

Roger. And we show you low over 1 minute from the terminator at the present time.

Buzz Aldrin (LMP)

How's the brightness of the picture you're receiving? You think we ought to open f stop some as we approach the terminator?

Charlie Duke (CAPCOM)

Yes. The brightness is still doing quite well. You can go ahead and open it up a stop or two. The automatic light level compensation seems to be working beautifully.

Buzz Aldrin (LMP)

There's a good picture of Boot Hill.

Buzz Aldrin (LMP)

Three minutes and 15 seconds into the descent.

Charlie Duke (CAPCOM)

Roger. We're seeing Boot Hill now.

Buzz Aldrin (LMP)

The next crater coming into the bottom, that's Duke Island right there, and to the left, the crater—the largest of the craters near the center of the picture right now is Maskelyne W. This is a position check during descent at about 3 minutes and 39 seconds, and it's our down range position check and cross range position check prior to yawing over face up to acquire the landing radar. Past this point, we would be unable to see the surface below us until getting very near the landing area.

Charlie Duke (CAPCOM)

Roger. I imagine you'll get a—you'll get a real good look at that tomorrow afternoon.

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Spoken on July 19, 1969, 8:25 p.m. UTC (54 years, 8 months ago). Link to this transcript range is: Tweet

Buzz Aldrin (LMP)

Sinuous Rille is the one that was referred to in Apollo 10 as Sidewinder.

Michael Collins (CMP)

That's a good name, too: Sidewinder and Diamondback. It looks like a couple of snakes down there in a lake bed.

Buzz Aldrin (LMP)

And we're approaching the terminator now. See the —

Buzz Aldrin (LMP)

Contrast has increased and only the sunlit side of these ridges remain illuminated, while the dark sides and the shadow will become completely black.

Charlie Duke (CAPCOM)

11, this is Houston. The picture's getting a little grainy now. You might go ahead and open up the f stop.

Buzz Aldrin (LMP)

Landing point is just barely in the darkness. That one crater, the upper part of which you see, lower part completely in darkness. The small, well defined crater is Moltke, which is about abeam of the landing sight.

Charlie Duke (CAPCOM)

Roger. We can just see; it looks like a little less than half of its rim right now.