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October 2004
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Parkes Radio Telescope, NSW Australia |
Parkes and the Apollo 11 moon landing
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(Note that this is actually a picture of Aldrin, not, as is often implied, of Armstrong. The pictures of Armstrong descending were vastly inferior in quality.) |
"One small step for man, one giant leap for mankind." - Neil Armstrong
"On 21 July 1969 at 12:54:00 (AEST) [Edwin] Aldrin pushed in the TV circuit breakers and activated the lunar television camera. Three stations were tracking the LM at that time: the 64 metre antennas at Parkes [NSW Australia] and Goldstone [California USA] as well as the 26 metre antenna at Honeysuckle Creek [ACT Australia]." - Parkes Home Page
About 2 and a half minutes later, Neil Armstrong takes his first step on the moon, and utters the well known words. At that time, the broadcast pictures are still being sourced from Honeysuckle Creek, however some 9 minutes later Houston TV control switched to the much superior Parkes signal, and remained with it until the camera was switched off about 3 hours later.
It is also interesting to note that, due to the 300ms satellite delay, and NASA's decision to add a 6 second delay to their broadcast in case of catastrophe, Australians actually got to see the event some 6.3 seconds before the rest of the world.
"Before the mission, John Bolton [then Parkes Director] had agreed to a one-line contract with NASA: 'The Radiophysics Division would agree to support the Apollo 11 mission'."
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Battling adverse conditions, the Parkes Radio Telescope provided the world with amazing pictures of the historic event. This photo, taken by Michael Collins from the Command Module, clearly shows Australia, and the front passing over the south-east of the continent at the time. Gusts up to 110km/h were recorded during the EVA. Parkes was used in all subsequent Apollo missions, including the ill fated Apollo 13 and 16 missions. |
My MOC
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At 20cm, my re-creation is definitely micro-scale, however it does not look out of place in a minifig scale display. The dish can be deployed to an angle of about 25 degrees, and rotate 360 degrees.
Here it is shown in it's stowed position.
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Here is a picture of the actual dish for comparison. Note that the "solid" centre section was not part of the original design - it was modified later.
Photo courtesy CSIRO
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Thanks to Tom Rafert for the sheep design, and to Janey Redbrick for explaining it to a silly nut. And thanks to the CSIRO for the use of photos from their site.
You might also want to check out "The Dish", a movie by Rob Sitch. But be warned - it is an Australian comedy, so if you're not familiar with our sense of humour, you may not find it to your liking...
References
The Parkes Observatory Home Page
The Honeysuckle Creek Page
JPL's Goldstone Page
Tom Refert's sheep
My gallery
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