Winding up

On the plan, 30 minutes had been allocated to documented sampling, which was to be a two-man activity. The first task envisaged Aldrin hammering a core tube into the surface. Armstrong was to take pictures prior to sampling, with the tube in the ground, and following its extraction. They were then to collect a number of rocks, each of which was to be photographed in situ, carefully lifted, and inserted into an individual sample bag. Although the lunar material was to be put inside a vacuum – sealed rock box, some material was to be put into a can which, when sealed, would retain any readily volatised constituents that would otherwise be difficult to preserve when the rock box was opened in the laboratory. Finally, if time permitted, they were to collect a second core sample. But when McCandless announced that only 10 minutes was available for this sampling it was decided to forgo the documentation.

While Aldrin prepared a core tube at the MESA, Armstrong disappeared out of sight of the television. Although he had been surprised to discover that, on looking east, he could not see the boulders that surrounded the large crater where Eagle’s computer would have tried to land, Armstrong was able to see the smaller crater over which he had passed just prior to landing. As this was only 200 feet away he decided to inspect it. Saying nothing of his intention, he set off, carrying the ALSCC.14 On reaching the southwestern rim of the crater he shot a sequence of 8 frames across the pit ranging from up-Sun, around the northern horizon and on down-Sun to Eagle. The crater had a raised rim and an interior strewn with rocks. He yearned to enter it to collect a rock as a treat for the scientists, but the pit was 70-80 feet in diameter and 15-20 feet deep and, in any case, he had to rush back. In all, his excursion had lasted just over 3 minutes. He had no difficulty sustaining a ‘loping’ gait, which the timing indicated to have been at 2 miles per hour.

‘‘Buzz,’’ McCandless called while Aldrin was still at the MESA attaching the extension handle to the core tube, ‘‘You’ve got about 10 minutes left now prior to commencing your EVA termination activities.”

“f understand,’’ replied Aldrin. A minute later he took the core tube and went to sample some already documented ground near the SWC. This ‘soil mechanics’ study was to determine soil density, strength and compressibility as functions of depth. ft would also reveal layering, either in terms of the chemical composition of the loose material or its physical characteristics, such as grain size. The plan called for the hollow tube to be driven to a depth of 18 inches. The staffs of the flag and the SWC had indicated that the surface material was consolidated at a depth of several inches, but Aldrin hoped that by hammering on the core tube he would be able to drive it in.

Armstrong would later express surprise that he had lugged Gold’s camera around with him for so long.

The extension handle came up to waist height. At first Aldrin raised the hammer only to chest level, but then he increased this to head level in order to generate the additional force. A complication was that the tube gained little support from the material it penetrated, and he had to maintain a grip on the tool with one hand throughout. As he became more determined, he observed that the hammer was denting the top of the handle. “I hope you’re watching how hard I have to hit this into the ground to the tune of about 5 inches, Houston,’’ he said pointedly. In fact, his hammering drove the tube in only 2 inches beyond the depth to which he had inserted it by hand. Giving up, he withdrew the tube from the ground. The finely grained material coated the section that had penetrated the ground. “It almost looks wet,’’ he noted. To his relief, the material did not dribble out of the open end. On his return, Armstrong snapped pictures of Aldrin at work, then accompanied him to the MESA to help him to cap the tube. A post-mission investigation concluded that the design of the aperture of the tube had inhibited penetration. In the expectation that the surface material would be loose to considerable depth, the core tube had been designed with an internal bevel to compact the material entering the tube as it was hammered into the ground, but because the lunar material at a few inches depth was close to its maximum density, it jammed in the aperture. This discovery made even more ludicrous the idea that the lunar surface was a dust trap that would swallow a spacecraft!

“Neil and Buzz,’’ McCandless called. “We’d like y’all to get two core tubes and the Solar Wind.’’ At Aldrin’s suggestion, Armstrong completed capping the first core tube, and Aldrin took the second sample 15 feet beyond where he had taken the first. “Buzz,’’ McCandless called as Aldrin hammered the second tube, “in approximately 3 minutes you’ll have to commence your EVA termination activities.’’ On realising that he was gaining no greater penetration than before, Aldrin withdrew the tube and returned to the MESA to cap it.

“Neil, after you have got the core tubes and the Solar Wind, anything else that you can throw into the box would be acceptable,’’ McCandless called.

“If you want to pick up some stuff,’’ Aldrin said to Armstrong, “I’ll get the Solar Wind.’’ Aldrin detached the collector sheet from its staff, rolled it up, and stuffed it into a bag. He discarded the staff. He deposited the SWC on the MESA next to the core tubes, ready for Armstrong to stow in the second rock box.

Meanwhile, Armstrong had used a pair of long-handled tongs to collect rocks for the ‘suite’ – a field geologist’s term for a collection of rocks representative of a site, including both the typical and the exotic. This was essentially as planned, but without documentation and with the rocks going into a single large bag rather than into individual bags.

‘‘Buzz,’’ McCandless called. ‘‘It’s time for you to start your EVA close-out.’’

‘‘That’s in progress,’’ Aldrin replied.

As the moonwalkers began to wrap up in silence, Columbia once again flew ‘over the hill’ and out of communication.

‘‘We’d like to remind you of the Close-up Camera magazine before you start up the ladder, Buzz,’’ McCandless called.

‘‘Have you got that over with you, Neil?’’ Aldrin asked.

Armstrong had dispensed with the ALSCC in order to collect samples. “No, the Close-up Camera’s underneath the MESA.” Having made an early report of what appeared to be vesicular rock and then retracted this claim, Armstrong had located some genuine examples, “I’m picking up several pieces of really vesicular rock out here, now.’’

“You didn’t get any environmental samples, did you?’’ Aldrin asked, referring to the material they were to have sealed into cans.

“Not yet,’’ replied Armstrong.

“Well, I don’t think we’ll have time.’’

“Neil and Buzz,’’ McCandless called. “Let’s press on with getting the Close-up Camera magazine and closing out the sample return containers.’’

Aldrin went to the MESA and, supporting himself with one hand, bent down to retrieve the ALSCC. After removing the film, he asked Armstrong to assist in inserting the magazine into his thigh pocket. “Anything more before I head on up, Bruce?’’

“Negative. Head on up the ladder, Buzz.’’

“Remember the film off of that,’’ Aldrin reminded Armstrong, referring to the Hasselblad.

“I will,’’ Armstrong promised.

“I’ll head on in, and get the LEC ready for the first rock box,’’ Aldrin said. As he ascended the ladder he noticed that the dust coating his boots made the rungs seem slippery. Armstrong was to have tried to dust him off, but there was no time.

Armstrong carried the bulk sample box from the MESA out in front of Eagle and hooked it to the LEC, then added the Hasselblad magazine to the same hook. “How are you doing, Buzz?’’

“I’m okay,’’ replied Aldrin, who was now inside the cabin. “Are you ready to send up the LEC?’’

The method for hoisting the box to the hatch required Armstrong to pull on the loop as if drawing washing along a clothes line. Watching, Joan Aldrin laughed, “God bless the rock box. I feel as if I’ve lived with that rock box for the last six months.’’ As the scene played out, she was amazed, “This is like a Walt Disney cartoon, or even a television show – it’s all too much to believe or understand.’’ As the lanyard thrashed in the weak lunar gravity, the film pack detached and fell to the ground by the forward leg. With the leading edge of the box nudging the upper rim of the hatch, Aldrin asked Armstrong to slacken off the tension in the tether in order to lower the box sufficiently to enable it to enter. While Aldrin was stowing the box, Armstrong retrieved the Hasselblad magazine. Because this had fallen beside the foot pad, he decided not to fetch his tongs from the MESA, and instead gripped the ladder with one hand and, bending at the waist, leaned to lift the magazine which, as with everything else that came into contact with the lunar surface, was coated with fine black dust.

“This one’s in. No problem,’’ reported Aldrin, having stowed the first box in its receptacle in the cabin.

At this point McCandless asked Armstrong for an “EMU check’’. Although this was nominally a request that he read out the status of his PLSS systems, the flight surgeon was concerned that in manhandling the rock box and working the LEC, his heart rate had shot up to 160 beats per minute, and the EMU check was a hint that he should take a rest.

“How’s it coming, Neil?” Aldrin asked a minute later.

Having placed the bag of rocks, core tubes and SWC into the second box and sealed it, Armstrong tethered the box and added the recovered magazine. “Boy,” he observed, “that filth from on the LEC is kind of falling all over me while I’m doing this.’’

“All that soot, huh?’’

To give Armstrong a rest, Aldrin suggested they revise the procedure for hauling up the box, “If you can just kind of hold it, I think I can do the pulling.’’

“Stand by a minute. Let me move back,’’ said Armstrong. He backed away to tension the LEC. Once the box was up, Aldrin detached the LEC from the pulley and tossed the cable out through the hatch. The uploading of the boxes had taken rather longer than in training, and repeatedly working against the restraint system built into the shoulder joints of the suit was the greatest exertion of the moonwalk.

“How about that package out of your sleeve, did you get that?’’ Armstrong enquired.

This was a reference to a small canvas bag of mementoes Aldrin had carried in his shoulder pocket with the intention of leaving it on the surface prior to his ingress; he had forgotten. Armstrong proposed that Aldrin pass him the bag once he was on the porch, but Aldrin tossed the bag out through the hatch and it landed at Armstrong’s feet. It contained a gold medallion bearing a representation of the ‘olive branch’ motif – one of four that Aldrin had in his personal preference kit, the others being destined for the astronauts’ wives. There was also an Apollo 1 mission patch in memory of Gus Grissom, Ed White and Roger Chaffee, who died when their capsule caught fire on the pad on 27 January 1967. On returning from his visit to the Soviet Union, Frank Borman handed over two medals that his hosts had requested be left on the Moon. These honoured Yuri Gagarin, the first man to orbit Earth, who died in an aircraft accident on 27 March 1968, and Vladimir Komorov, who died on 24 April 1967 when the parachute of Soyuz 1 failed to open. A more formal memento was a text bearing statements issued by Presidents Eisenhower, Kennedy, Johnson and Nixon, a message from the Pope, and messages of goodwill from the leaders of 73 countries of the United Nations. Some messages were handwritten, others typed, in a variety of languages. It also included a listing of the leadership of the Congress in 1969, a list of members of the committees of the House and Senate responsible for NASA legislation, and the names of NASA management. It was photographed and reduced by a factor of 200, transferred to glass for use as a mask for etching by ultraviolet light onto a 1.5-inch-diameter silicon disk – the same technology as was used to etch integrated circuitry. The disk bore the inscription ‘Goodwill messages from around the world brought to the Moon by the astronauts of Apollo 11’. Around the rim was ‘From Planet Earth’, and ‘July 1969’. Although silicon was chosen for its ability to withstand the temperature extremes of the lunar surface, it was enclosed in an aluminium container to protect the delicate crystal from shock. If it had been intended to mark the placement of these items, the moment had been lost.

Meanwhile, Houston, oblivious to what was going on, was eager to confirm that everything that was to have been loaded was indeed on board. “Neil, did you get the Hasselblad magazine?”

Armstrong had just stepped onto the foot pad. “Yes, I did. And we got about, I’d say, 20 pounds of carefully selected, if not documented, samples.’’

“Well done.’’

Grasping the ladder with both hands for stability, Armstrong adopted a deep knee-bend, then jumped, and his feet landed on the third rung from the bottom of the ladder! It was a shame, he would reflect, that they had not been able to remain out for longer. He had hoped to inspect the boulders off to the north, which, while distance was difficult to judge, appeared to be several feet across.