'We leave as we came' - Gene Cernan 1934-2017

[Simpo Two]

https://www.nasa.gov/astronautprofiles/cernan

[anonymous-user]

Half of the moon walkers gone now

RIP Gene

[jmorgan]

Just saw it on the BBC website.

Time to dig out his autobiography again. Never finished it.

Edit. Netflix has a bio documentary, last man on the moon.

Edited by jmorgan on Monday 16th January 21:04

[Caruso]

Just finished reading his autobiography over Christmas, it's definitely one of the better ones. Very sad to see another one go.

[Eric Mc]

Same here. I'm a bit surprised to learn he's gone as he always seemed one of the fittest and most active of the moon walkers.

Need to get his DVD.

His book is good and I've read it a few times now.

[MarshPhantom]

Shame he's gone, but plenty of people do dangerous jobs. Looking back, the moon landings just appear to be a bit of pointless willy-waving by the Yanks.

[peterperkins]

Willy waving? Hmm.. More like one of the most incredible achievements of man so far.

He must have used up most of his nine lives and a few others besides pretty early on.
Going into space three times and the moon twice...

[MarshPhantom]

But what was the point and what did it achieve?

Gil Scott Heron - Whitey on the Moon

www.youtube.com/watch?v=PtBy_ppG4hY

He clearly wasn't impressed either.



"You know I've just about had my fill of Whitey on the moon"

[Eric Mc]

It all depends on what you define as "worth it" .

All I know is that we would be living in a very different world without the challenge of "The Space Race" - and we might might not even be chatting on an internet forum.

I also know is that it was one of the most fascinating and exciting periods of human history - ever. And I am so glad I lived through it and was old enough to appreciate what was happening.

I truly wish, for the future of our species, that something like "The Space Race" returns and kicks manned space flight in the butt and gets it moving again.

The signs are that this is now beginning to happen and I am overall optimistic that the nay sayers and negative types who decry the maned exploration of space can crawl back into their negative little hidey holes and wither away whilst the human races marches on.

Gene Cernan was a great advocate for a vigourous and exciting manned space programme. I really hope his hard work in this area, post Apollo, pays off.

[MarshPhantom]

Didn't the Americans spend millions developing a pen that wrote in space, the Russians took a pencil?

I hope that's true, even if it isn't.

[Eric Mc]

It isn't.

Sorry to disappoint you.

[Einion Yrth]

Pencils aren't that good an idea, graphite's quite conductive; not something you want floating around close to electronics.

[Eric Mc]

I didn't really want to deviate into silly space stories as Captain Cernan deserves better really BUT for decades one of the "tools of the trade" for test pilots has been the chinagraph or wax pencil. These have been used to write notes on thigh pads when conducting test flights - and were also used by astronauts (as they were, in the main, ex-test pilots).

A wax pencil is less likely to cause problems with dust.

In fact, ball point pens and felt markers work OK in Zero G too.

[Simpo Two]

MarshPhantom said:

Shame he's gone, but plenty of people do dangerous jobs. Looking back, the moon landings just appear to be a bit of pointless willy-waving by the Yanks.

It's the same basic human instinct/desire that got your tribal ancestors out of their cave 1,000,000 years ago and one of the reasons we're not wrapped up in bits of clingfilm in supermarkets being eaten by something else.

[Skii]

RIP Gene

always felt he was one of the most likeable and affable moonwalkers, "Last man on the moon" is a cracking documentary and a must watch.

[XM5ER]

MarshPhantom said:

Shame he's gone, but plenty of people do dangerous jobs. Looking back, the moon landings just appear to be a bit of pointless willy-waving by the Yanks.

Jeez, what a miserable world view you have.

[FidoGoRetroGo]

Yep, RIP Gene. Left the planet for the fourth and final time.

I recall Tom Stafford pushed quite hard to not let him be part of the Apollo 17 crew, but he got the gig and flew an absolutely perfect mission.

I have a signed copy of this:

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Marketing-Moon-Selling-Ap...

His book, The Last Man on the Moon is right up there with the best, and I've read them all.

Apollo 16 the only mission now where all three crew members are still alive (John Young, Charlie Duke and Ken Mattingly).

[Eric Mc]

All of Apollo 8 and Apollo 9 crews are still around - although they didn't land on the moon, of course.

Apart from Apollo 1, the only Apollo mission where an entire crew have passed away is Apollo 14 -

Alan Shepard,
Ed Mitchell
Stuart Roosa

[FidoGoRetroGo]

Yes, I was referring to the moon landing missions, should have made that clearer.

[Eric Mc]

And if we want to be picky, there were four additional flights in the Apollo series after Apollo 17 - Skylabs 2,3 and 4 in 1973/74 and the Apollo ASTP flight in 1975.