In the early 1960's there was a race between the United States and the Soviet Union (Union of Soviet Socialist Republics) to be the first country to land on the Moon. The world watched for three days in 1969 as the Apollo 11 spacecraft flew at about 20,000 miles per hour towards the Moon. On July 20, the eyes of nearly the entire world watched as lunar module pilot Edwin Aldrin and Neil Armstrong set down on the Moon. A maritime student relates his feeling and thoughts as he watched the first steps of a human being on the lunar surface.
David Christianson
It was a hot July summer afternoon the day of the lunar landing. It was beautiful outside and the sky was left clear for the world's stares and hopes. The nation had been holding its breath for about three days now while waiting for the ship to reach the Moon. I was home from the Maritime Academy and was sitting in anticipation with my family. The event was being broadcast over the television, but when I looked up into the sky, then down at the TV, I couldn't connect them in my mind. It seemed so unreal and so impossible.
We watched on TV as Neil Armstrong took the first steps ever onto the moon's surface. The only way I could describe this would be disbelief. I had always had a strong interest in aviation so my mind wouldn't allow me to believe that this could be real. How could a ship get into orbit? How could an orbiting ship reach enough escape velocity to break free from orbit. There seemed to be too many factors to consider for error. I was amazed at how cool the engineers and scientists seemed to be during the take off and travel and return, but when that ship returned to earth they were jumping and screaming like the rest of us.
All I could think of was, `how are they going to get back, what if the engines didn't start?' It was crazy. My family felt the same disbelief that I had felt. Everyone kept saying, "Can you believe it? We put a man on the Moon."
What made the whole thing so monumental was seeing the broadcasts of all the other nations and people that had been watching the landing all over the world. I remember seeing broadcasts from China, Manila (Philippines), and Africa. There were people watching this broadcast that had never owned a television, and now they were watching someone land on the Moon.
The amount of energy this created was incredible. Magazines put out stories about it, about how we did it. There were even geographical maps of the Moon sold.
I had tried to look at this event from many points of view. I looked at it historically, and as a flier, and as a mechanic, but no matter which way I looked at it, it still seemed unreal.
Robert Pike
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