Apollo 11 transcript starting at 03 05 32 45 on Spacelog

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03 05 32 45
Bruce McCandless (CAPCOM): That's affirmative.
03 05 33 09
Bruce McCandless (CAPCOM): 11, Houston. Do you read?
03 05 33 19
Neil Armstrong (CDR): Roger. We read you. It seems to be rather marginal on the high gain.
03 05 33 24
Bruce McCandless (CAPCOM): Roger. We concur.
03 05 33 42
Buzz Aldrin (LMP): Houston, Apollo 11. Could you give us a time of crossing the prime meridian 150 west? Over.
03 05 33 47
Bruce McCandless (CAPCOM): Roger. Stand by about a half a second, here. Okay. Your time of crossing the 150 west meridian will be 77 50 05. Over.
03 05 34 10
Buzz Aldrin (LMP): Thank you.
03 05 34 24
Bruce McCandless (CAPCOM): 11, this is Houston. We have about 6 minutes remaining until LOS, and in order that we may configure our ground lines, we'd like to know if you're still planning to have the TV up with the beginning of the next pass. Over.
03 05 34 48
Neil Armstrong (CDR): Roger, Houston. We'll try to have it ready.
03 05 34 50
Bruce McCandless (CAPCOM): This is Houston. We are inquiring if it is your plan to. Over.
03 05 35 00
Neil Armstrong (CDR): It never was our plan to; but it's in the flight plan, so I guess we'll do it.
03 05 35 07
Bruce McCandless (CAPCOM): Houston. Roger. Out.
03 05 35 47
Bruce McCandless (CAPCOM): 11, Houston.
03 05 35 53
Michael Collins (CMP): Roger. Go ahead.
03 05 35 54
Bruce McCandless (CAPCOM): For use in connection with the prime meridian crossing, you have an orbital period now of 2 hours 8 minutes and 37 seconds. Over.
03 05 36 10
Michael Collins (CMP): Thank you.
03 05 36 11
Bruce McCandless (CAPCOM): Roger. Out.
03 05 38 16
Bruce McCandless (CAPCOM): Apollo 11, this is Houston. A little over 2 minutes to LOS. All your systems parameters and orbit are looking good from the ground. We have AOS on the other side at 78 23 31. Over.
03 05 38 40
Neil Armstrong (CDR): Roger. 78 23 21.
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03 05 38 43
Bruce McCandless (CAPCOM): Roger. That was 31 on the end.
03 05 38 50
Michael Collins (CMP): Okay.
03 06 23 55
Charlie Duke (CAPCOM): Apollo 11, this is Houston. Over.
03 06 24 09
Buzz Aldrin (LMP): This is Apollo 11. Are you picking up our signals okay?
03 06 24 13
Charlie Duke (CAPCOM): Apollo 11, this is Houston. Affirmative. We are reading you loud and clear on voice and we have a good clear TV picture, a little bright crater in the —
03 06 24 23
Buzz Aldrin (LMP): — No, no, no —
03 06 24 24
Charlie Duke (CAPCOM): — the bottom of the picture. I guess that's the spot on the tube.
03 06 24 30
Buzz Aldrin (LMP): I'm sorry about that one.
03 06 24 33
Charlie Duke (CAPCOM): And if you give us P00 and ACCEPT, we will uplink our new state vector and target load to you.
03 06 24 45
Michael Collins (CMP): Okay.
03 06 25 30
Buzz Aldrin (LMP): Houston, Apollo 11. One of the larger craters on the back side—I noticed a small, dark speck on the outer wall and I put the monocular on it. I was able to see—oh, an area maybe a quarter of a mile in diameter. It was really a freshlooking dark colored pit, and that seems to be in contrast with all the other fresh little craters or holes that you can perceive on the walls of any of these craters. Around this particular one there seems to be two or three of these—especially the one that caught my attention. Quite remarkable. Over.
03 06 26 24
Charlie Duke (CAPCOM): Roger. Do you have a location on that one?
03 06 26 34
Buzz Aldrin (LMP): No, not a precise one. I've got several pictures of it, though.
03 06 26 38
Charlie Duke (CAPCOM): Roger. We copy.
03 06 26 47
Charlie Duke (CAPCOM): We're getting a beautiful picture in down there now, 11. The color's coming in quite clearly, and we can see the horizon and the relative blackness of space, and without getting into the question of grays and browns, it looks, at least on our monitor, sort of a brownish gray.
03 06 27 10
Buzz Aldrin (LMP): That's a good, reasonable way of describing it. It appears to me as though it made a difference just sitting back in the tunnel and gazing at all windows; it makes a difference which one you're looking out of. For example, the camera right now is looking out the number 5 window, and it definitely gives a rosier or tanner tinge, especially when you look straight through it and not at an angle. Over.
03 06 27 45
Charlie Duke (CAPCOM): Roger.
03 06 27 53
Buzz Aldrin (LMP): And if you rear back 95 or 100 degrees …
03 06 27 54
Multiple speakers: … Still holding … Okay.
03 06 28 02
Charlie Duke (CAPCOM): Say again, 11?
03 06 28 07
Buzz Aldrin (LMP): I'd say we're about 95 degrees east, coming up on Smyth's Sea.
03 06 28 11
Charlie Duke (CAPCOM): Roger. And for your information, we show you at an altitude of about 92 miles above the surface right now.
03 06 28 21
Buzz Aldrin (LMP): Okay.
03 06 28 22
Michael Collins (CMP): Houston, Apollo 11. Could you observe a difference in the N₂ pressures before LOI? It seems to me as though the two were not equal on the … B tank was a little low on pressure. Over.
03 06 28 57
Michael Collins (CMP): I'm flying it in SPS minimum impulse, Houston, and it's rather difficult to keep it on a constant data. The LM wants to wander up and down. I'm not sure if it's in response to MASCONN's or what, but I can get it completely stabilized in DATA and let it alone, and in another couple of minutes it will have developed its own rate.
03 06 29 22
Charlie Duke (CAPCOM): This is Houston. Roger.
03 06 29 30
Michael Collins (CMP): Houston, we'll be moving shortly from the side window to the hatch window, and we'll try and pick up some of the landmarks that we'll be looking at as we approach the powered descent. Over.
03 06 29 47
Charlie Duke (CAPCOM): 11, this is Houston. Roger. And we're through with the uplinks; the computer is yours. You can go to BLOCK and we'll have the information on nitrogen for you shortly. Over.
03 06 30 01
Michael Collins (CMP): Roger. Copy.
03 06 30 08
Buzz Aldrin (LMP): Okay, Houston. Several minutes ago I was exactly steady on data, and since then I have been moving toward the LM, pointed straight down toward the radius vector, and that's been despite a number of down minimum pitch impulses.
03 06 30 30
Charlie Duke (CAPCOM): Roger.
03 06 30 49
Buzz Aldrin (LMP): We're over Smyth's Sea right now.
03 06 30 51
Charlie Duke (CAPCOM): Roger.
03 06 30 56
Michael Collins (CMP): We're about 88 degrees east, I would estimate.
03 06 31 04
Charlie Duke (CAPCOM): We show you about south of the—southwest of the crater Jansky right now.
03 06 31 28
Michael Collins (CMP): Smyth Sea doesn't look much like a sea. It—The area which is devoid of craters, of which there's not very much, is sort of a hilly looking area. It's not like the maria at all.
03 06 31 41
Charlie Duke (CAPCOM): Roger. We copy that about the sea, and it looks like you were just giving us a view of the crater Neper, the large crater on the left, and Jansky on the right.
03 06 32 06
Michael Collins (CMP): We think you're close, but no cigar.
03 06 33 20
Charlie Duke (CAPCOM): 11, this is Houston. Would you care to comment on some of these craters as we go by?
03 06 33 29
Neil Armstrong (CDR): Roger. We're approaching the approach path to ignition. This is equivalent to 13 minutes before ignition, and we're at about 83 degrees, I guess—83 degrees east. That correspond to location you're holding there presently?
03 06 33 59
Charlie Duke (CAPCOM): Roger. We're showing your present position as about 77—76 degrees east looking back towards the east.
03 06 34 16
Michael Collins (CMP): Hey, you should be looking back at Smyth Sea now.
03 06 34 19
Charlie Duke (CAPCOM): Roger.
03 06 34 23
Neil Armstrong (CDR): Okay.
03 06 34 25
Michael Collins (CMP): Houston, what you're seeing in the middle of the screen now is the crater Schubert and Gilbert U is in the center right now; and this comes up at about—a little over 12 minutes before power decent. Instead of me looking—Instead of looking back at it, we'd be looking straight down at it in descent.
03 06 34 50
Charlie Duke (CAPCOM): Roger.
03 06 34 55
Charlie Duke (CAPCOM): And we show you at an altitude now of about 110 miles; and, of course, you'll be considerably lower at the initiation of powered descent.
03 06 35 18
Michael Collins (CMP): Okay, Houston. Look at register 3 on the DSKY data. This data is increasing toward my desired of 315; and I'll let the hand controller alone here, and I'll bet you it reverses itself.
03 06 35 46
Charlie Duke (CAPCOM): Roger, 11. We're watching the DSKY now, and it's still coming in beautifully on the TV.
03 06 35 59
Buzz Aldrin (LMP): Okay. There's—on the right side of the screen at the present time, there's a triple crater with—with a small crater between the first and second; and the one at the bottom of the screen is Schubert Y. Zoom in; it does have a central peak in Schubert Y. Actually, several of them, and you can observe those plus the rim craters at the bottom of your screen.
03 06 36 36
Charlie Duke (CAPCOM): Roger. We're seeing the central peak quite clearly now.
03 06 36 53
Buzz Aldrin (LMP): Okay. We're zooming in now on a crater called Schubert N. Schubert N, very conical inside walls and the bottom appears to be nearly flat.
03 06 37 11
Michael Collins (CMP): Look at data on the DSKY. It's stabilized and is holding steady now.
03 06 37 19
Charlie Duke (CAPCOM): Roger.
03 06 37 20
Buzz Aldrin (LMP): Looking out the window I can see a number of small craters on the bottom of Schubert N.
03 06 37 32
Michael Collins (CMP): We're coming up on the Foaming Sea where I'll be doing some P22 marking on a crater of my choice, name of crater, Camp.
03 06 37 41
Charlie Duke (CAPCOM): Okay. We'll be watching for Neper.
03 06 37 49
Michael Collins (CMP): And notice register 3 has reversed itself, and it's heading back the other way now without any pitch thruster firing.
03 06 37 56
Charlie Duke (CAPCOM): Roger, Mike. We confirm that you've changed the direction of your pitch rate.
03 06 38 28
Michael Collins (CMP): Generally speaking —
03 06 38 30
Buzz Aldrin (LMP): The crater —
03 06 38 31
Michael Collins (CMP): — The tendency seems to be to pull the LM down toward the center of the Moon there as in a gravity gradient experiment.
03 06 38 40
Charlie Duke (CAPCOM): Roger, 11. We copy —
03 06 38 43
Michael Collins (CMP): It may have something to do with MASSCON's or it may —
03 06 38 46
Charlie Duke (CAPCOM): Roger. We copy …
03 06 38 47
Buzz Aldrin (LMP): …
03 06 38 48
Michael Collins (CMP): It may have something to do with MASSCON's or it may just be the peculiarity of the DSKY display.
03 06 38 51
Charlie Duke (CAPCOM): Okay. We've observed the behavior of your DSKY, and I think we've got the data here to work on it. Let us grind around a little while on it, and we'll report back to you, probably in a REV or two.
03 06 39 08
Michael Collins (CMP): Okay. Well, in the meantime, I'm going to pitch down toward 315.
03 06 39 14
Charlie Duke (CAPCOM): Roger.
03 06 39 25
Buzz Aldrin (LMP): Three craters—three horizontal craters that you now have in the field of view are immediately underneath the ground track. The right hand is the largest crater that you see, Dubiago P.
03 06 39 49
Charlie Duke (CAPCOM): Roger. We concur on the identification of that crater.
03 06 40 01
Charlie Duke (CAPCOM): And we show you coming up on landmark Alfa 1 here shortly.
03 06 40 11
Buzz Aldrin (LMP): Roger. Mike's having his first look at Alfa 1 at the present time.
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03 06 40 22
Michael Collins (CMP): Yea. It's a very bright crater. It's not a large one but an extremely bright one. It looks like a very recent and, I would guess, impact crater with rays streaming out in all directions which should make my—Correction—the Foaming Sea easy to see coming up on it now. Crater Camp is one of the smaller ones out on the—on the floor of the Foaming Sea.
03 06 41 34
Charlie Duke (CAPCOM): Here we show you over the Sea of Fertility now, and we ought to have Langrenus down south of track a few degrees, about 9 degrees south of track.
03 06 41 48
Buzz Aldrin (LMP): Now the crater that's in the center of the screen now is Webb. We'd be looking straight down on it at about 6 minutes before power descent. It has a relatively flat bottom to the crater, and you can see maybe two or three craters that are in the bottom of it on the western wall, the wall that's now nearest the—the camera. Near the bottom of the screen, we can see a dimple crater, just on the outside. And then coming back toward the bottom of the screen and to the left, you can see a series of depressions. It's this type of connected craters that give us most interest to discover why they're in the particular pattern that they're in. I'll zoom the camera in now and try and give you a closer look at it.
03 06 42 48
Charlie Duke (CAPCOM): Roger. We're observing the dimple crater now. The central peak we can see on the Orbiter photos doesn't seem to stand out very well here.
03 06 43 02
Buzz Aldrin (LMP): Well, they're not central peaks. They're depressions in the center.
03 06 43 05
Charlie Duke (CAPCOM): Roger.
03 06 43 08
Michael Collins (CMP): And you'll notice on the pitch thruster activity, I've still—I've put in a dozen minimum impulses in pitchdown, and I'm still far from correcting back to 315.

Spacelog Apollo 11