All language subtitles for From the Earth to the Moon - 1x05 - Spider.DVDRip.MEDiEVAL.en

We choose to go to the moon.

We choose to go to the moon.

We choose to go to the moon
in this decade and do the other things,

not because they are easy
but because they are hard.

- Look at that.
- That's beautiful.

It's gotta be one of the most proud moments
of my life, I guarantee ya.

Before painting the Sistine Chapel,

Michelangelo had to first construct
a massive scaffolding

to allow him access to the ceiling

without interfering with
the chapel's daily use.

He had to develop special wax models
so he could study the lighting effects

to be duplicated in the frescoes and come
up with a special slow-drying plaster.

He suffered constant deadline pressure
from frustrated church officials

and the Pope,
who just wanted the ceiling finished.

The work itself was
uncomfortable and unending

with wet paint and plaster
dripping in the face of the man

who was not, after all, a
painter but a sculptor.

Such challenges arise in all the
great works of human imagination,

be they the creation of our world
rendered upon the ceiling of a church,

or the view of our world
evident by making the voyage

from the Earth to the moon.

For a long time,
the only people who thought

of going to the moon
were science fiction writers.

In October, 1957, the Soviets launched
Sputnik and everything changed.

Suddenly, going to the moon
was a possibility.

The question was, how do you do it?

Four months after Sputnik, Wernher
Von Braun briefed the head of NACA.

He presented the two best options
for going to the moon.

There are two methods.
The first method we call Direct Ascent.

You build an enormous rocket,
put a capsule on top.

Boom, you go straight to the moon.

The other method we call
Earth Orbit Rendezvous.

Instead of using one huge rocket,

we perform several launches
with smaller rockets,

each carrying a component
of the spacecraft.

We put the pieces together in orbit...

and off we go.

And these two methods, these are
the only ways of getting to the moon?

Yes.

Actually, there were other ideas.

So we started thinking,
"What can we do right now?"

And then it hit us.

The moon!

You rendezvous on the surface of the moon.

- The problem isn't getting a man to the moon.
- Easy.

- It's not.
- Relatively.

- Pretty easy. The problem is getting him back.
- So we say...

You send up some ships to the moon with all
the extra fuel and supplies to get back.

That way, when the astronauts arrive,

everything they need to get home
is already there.

We put a man on the moon
as soon as possible.

Just get him there.

- We can keep sending supply ships.
- Until we figure a way to get him back!

Well, that's... That's...

No. I'm sorry, gentlemen.

There is no way on God's green Earth,
we would ever do anything like that.

I'm sorry.

It looked like either Earth Orbit Rendezvous
or Direct Ascent would be the way to go.

Either way we go, the spacecraft that lands
on the moon is going to look like that.

Yes, just like that.

No. It doesn't have to
look like this at all.

At Chance Vought Industries in Texas,

an engineer named Tom Dolan
hit upon an interesting idea.

You ever hear of a Russian rocket guy
named Yuri Kondratyuk?

No.

In 1916 he realised something
we seem to have forgotten today.

Getting to the moon
is going to be all about weight.

Look at the size of this thing.
It's gotta be 60-70 feet tall.

A couple of hundred tons at least.

Do you really need to take all that
to the surface? No.

What Kondratyuk wondered...

What I wonder is...

what if you took along a smaller vehicle,

lightweight, that you just used to land?

Something... like this.

But you could never
re-enter the atmosphere.

I know. You come back
on the spacecraft you took from Earth.

But that means you'd have to have
a rendezvous in lunar orbit.

Exactly. Von Braun calls his method
Earth Orbit Rendezvous.

I call this Lunar Orbit Rendezvous.

We don't know if rendezvous
is possible in Earth orbit

and you wanna do it around the moon?

Wouldn't that be kind of dangerous?

I don't know.

Would it?

Well, Mr Dolan, this is certainly
a very interesting idea.

Why don't you let us think about it?

- I've prepared a report.
- I have everything I need right here.

Thank you for your time.

Chances are, Lunar Orbit Rendezvous
would have ended up

as nothing more than a footnote
in the history of space exploration

if a report on the idea hadn't landed
on the desk of a NASA engineer

by the name of John Houbolt.

When he started reading the report,
Houbolt had the same reaction others did.

Lunar Orbit Rendezvous seemed like
just another far-fetched scheme.

But the more he read,
the more the idea made sense.

By the time John Houbolt finished
the report, he knew this was it.

This was how you get to the moon.

Now, over the past few weeks
I've prepared this report

on Lunar Orbit Rendezvous
and I think you'll find it interesting.

Look at Houbolt.

He reads the report and he's Moses,
come down from the mountain.

- So he's a little enthusiastic.
- He's making a fool of himself.

You hear what happened
in the Heaton Committee?

He wasn't even allowed
into the technical conference.

Well, he'll get the hint
and he'll give it up.

I hear he's going to write to Seamans.

- He doesn't report to Seamans.
- I know.

- He could get canned.
- I know.

"Dear Dr Seamans,
Somewhat as a voice in the wilderness,

"I would like to pass on
a few thoughts on matters

"that have been of a deep concern to me
over the recent months.

"I have tried, on numerous occasions...

"...to draw attention throughout NASA
to the concept of Lunar Orbit Rendezvous.

"Regrettably there has been
little interest shown.

"Now, do we wanna get to the moon or not?"

Yes, sir. Right away, sir.

It goes on like this for another eight pages
and then there's a 40-page report. Good Lord!

I can make a call. He won't do it again.

Hold on. I'll tell you what. Draft a reply.

Say that his idea has merit and that
I'm going to send it along to Brainerd

and then see if this Mr Houbolt
isn't due a vacation soon,

because, dear God, he needs one.

"Somewhat as a voice in
the wilderness." OK.

Does it have merit?

Well, actually it's an intriguing notion.

It's a little risky but it
could save a lot of weight.

There's no chance in hell Lunar Orbit
Rendezvous is the way we're gonna go

but it is interesting.

I'll see you at 3:00.

In July 1 962, the idea that didn't have
a chance in hell of succeeding succeeded.

NASA selected Lunar Orbit Rendezvous
as the way to go to the moon.

Now the question became,
who would build the lander?

My name is Tom Kelly.

On the day after election day, 1 962, I waited
with the rest of the Grumman lander team

for a call from my boss, Joe Gavin.

Whoever's tapping the pencil,
if you value your life, please stop.

Sorry.

Any word?

Yeah, Frank. We got the contract.

We're just observing a moment of silence
for the companies that didn't.

OK. Look, this is crazy. Let's...

I mean, this might not happen
for an hour or more.

Let's go back to work
and I'll let you know. OK?

Tom Kelly.

Hi, Joe.

We've been... I see.

OK. Thanks, Joe.

Bye.

I'm afraid you're gonna have to go tell
your wives and kids the bad news, fellas.

You won't see much of them
for the next couple years

because we got the contract!

You did it, Tom.

No, I'm trying to hit the flashing.

The contract. You did it.

Well, we did it. We all did it.

Quite a story, really.

- "Local Long Island boy makes good."
- Yeah, yeah.

"Local boy convinces government to give

"local Long Island company
half a billion dollars."

The rubber balls
you're gonna have to pay for yourself.

You know, if weight wasn't a factor,
we'd have this thing done in a year.

True enough. But weight's gonna be
the most important factor.

If we could find some teeny-tiny astronauts
we'd be done in a month.

They've given us seven years.
We might as well use 'em.

Seven years.

Well, let's get started.

OK, specs call for five legs.
I think four will be better.

It'll be as stable and we won't have to worry
about interference with the thruster quads.

Let's go with an octagonal descent stage.

I think a round one's gonna end up being
more trouble than it's worth.

Bob, how much do these windows weigh?

- I don't know. A couple ounces?
- Bob.

- The real ones?
- Yeah.

Five, six hundred pounds at least.

- Really?
- Yeah.

- Do we need 'em?
- Yeah, Tom.

I think the astronauts
might wanna see where they're going.

Do they need windows this big?

No. Of course they do. Otherwise they
wouldn't be able to see from their seats.

- What?
- What if they don't need seats?

- They have to have seats, John.
- Why? They can fly standing up.

- Yes, but they have to land.
- In 1/6 gravity.

And legs are great shock absorbers.

If they were standing,
they'd be a lot closer to the window,

increasing their field of view

and we wouldn't need
such big windows in the first place.

- What do you think?
- Well, I think it's interesting.

But I don't really see it. Sorry.

Good try, though.

Let's help him see it.

What the heck is that?

What we did instead of sleep.

Well, John. I can certainly see it now.

OK. Beautiful. I gotta call Joe Gavin
about the budget.

One more thing, thermal shields.

Costing us way too much weight
in the descent stage.

You know, I don't think we need shields.

Right, Frank. It's gonna be 250 degrees
in the sunlight

and minus 250 in the shade
but we don't need thermal shields.

Sarcasm's really helpful, Jim.

I mean maybe we can use something other
than the shielding that's been used before.

It'll look like that. Mylar film between layers
of kapton with an outer layer of nickel foil.

How thin is the Mylar?

- 1/8,000 of an inch.
- Oh, well.

As long as it's good and sturdy.

We'll use a couple dozen layers all around.

More where we need it, by the thrusters.
It'll do the job, Tom.

OK, well, we'll see how it goes in testing.

Now, hatches.

As it stands, we have two docking hatches.
We can't afford the weight.

I've been on the phone with Owen at NASA

and John Healey at North American
and we agree.

We're gonna go with
just one docking hatch up top

and use a forward hatch for egress.

When they come back
they'll have to rendezvous and dock blind.

We'll put a window up top
so the pilot can look up as he docks.

Another window?
How much is that gonna weigh?

I don't know. It's gotta be less
than a second docking hatch.

Tom, that will require the astronaut
flying the LEM

to make a 90-degree change in axis.

Left roll becomes left yaw.

- But left yaw becomes right roll...
- Arnold.

Astronauts are smart.
They'll figure it out.

OK. Apparently we're
not done with the hatches.

I just got off the phone with Pete Conrad.

Because of the square backpacks,
we're gonna have to put in a square hatch.

Did you like Ed swinging around
like Tarzan yesterday?

Yeah. Rope ladder's not gonna fly.

No. I'll call the
configuration control board.

We can put some rungs on the forward leg.

OK, one more thing. It's no longer
the Lunar Excursion Module any more.

Everybody feels that excursion sounds
like it's gonna go out on a school trip.

From now on it's just the Lunar Module.

I'm still gonna call it the LEM for short.

John, you do whatever makes you happy.

Well?

I guess we'd better start building them.

Let's make sure we film everything we do.

You wanna show NASA
where its 500 million is going?

Yeah. I wanna show my kids
where I was while they were growing up.

Every LEM
would have to be handmade.

There was no supplier
to order LEM parts from

and because everything on a LEM was new,

everything had to be tested
and tested again.

The thrusters,

the engines,

the deployment of the landing gear.

We had to know how a LEM would react

when exposed to intense sunlight
or when pelted with dust.

We had to know how the landing gear
would perform coming down on a slope.

Thousands of tests day after day...
for years.

Some of the tests went well.

And some did not.

Is this why the leg snapped?

Apparently I made the initial
miscalculation a few months ago.

Everything has been based
on that since then.

Mr Kelly, I'm sorry.

- When did you find this out?
- Last night.

After the test I decided
to go over my figures.

I understand if you...

You know.

Go home.

And get some rest.

Look...

Did you come to me right away when you
found out or did you try to cover your ass?

You did a good thing.

Not this.

This is bad.

But as long as people speak up
about their mistakes, we've got a shot. OK?

They try to sweep it under the rug

and we're not gonna go to New Jersey,
let alone the moon.

Get some rest.

Truth be told, we were behind schedule
from the beginning.

But mistakes and miscalculations
were only a small part of it.

The real problem is that
a LEM isn't one spacecraft but two.

The lower half of the LEM,
the descent stage,

contains the engine that the astronauts
will use to control their landing.

After the moonwalks, the descent stage
will serve as a launch platform

for the ascent stage,
the cockpit of the LEM,

which the astronauts will
fly into lunar orbit

for their rendezvous
with the command module.

Now, this particular ascent stage
belonged to LEM 3.

LEM 1 and 2 were designed and built
for unmanned test flights.

LEM 3 would be the first
to be flown in space by astronauts.

We worked hand in hand with the astronauts
from the beginning of the LEM programme.

They showed us what we were doing right...

and what we were doing wrong.

From early on much of their attention
was given to LEM 3

but it wasn't until a
day in November, 1 966

that NASA decided which crew
would be the one to actually fly her.

I just got off the phone with Deke Slayton.

The crew assigned to take
the LEM 3 into space

on the first manned flight
of a lunar module is as follows.

Commander Jim McDivitt, a Gemini vet,
one of the best pilots in the programme.

Command Module Pilot Dave Scott,
another Gemini vet.

And flying right beside McDivitt as
his LMP, Rusty Schweickart, a rookie.

Now... any crew is a good crew
but these guys...

well, I think we're pretty fortunate

because, gentlemen,
this won't be an easy mission.

We're off the lake, Jim.
Can we talk business now?

Well, if you insist.

I've been going over the mission plan
and it looks a little rough.

- It is kind of ambitious, Jim.
- Heck, it's not ambitious.

It's impossible.

Look, everyone's focusing on us flying
the LEM. It's only a small part of it.

Every mission's got a few things never
been done before. This one's got about ten.

First manned launch of a LEM,
first docking extraction of a LEM,

first men in a LEM in space.

And we just go out and fly the LEM, right?

Wrong.

Before we can even undock the LEM
from the command module,

we gotta make sure we can do
an emergency transfer outside the craft.

Which means, Rusty,

you're gonna have to do an EVA
on the PLSS backpack, first use of that.

Dave, we're gonna leave you alone
in the command module.

First time that'll have happened.

Then the real fun begins.

First I pop the thruster,
see if the LEM can fly.

If it can, Rusty and I fire the descent
engine, take the thing on its maiden voyage.

We go out a hundred miles or so.

God willing, the ascent engine lights,
first firing of that in space.

Then Rusty and I head back to you for
the first docking of a two-man spacecraft.

All right, so it's only nine things
never been done before.

Give me a hand with the trailer.

But you guys are right.
It's a lot for one mission. Maybe too much.

If we get even half of it done
we can call it a success.

I can't wait!

While Scott went to Downey
to work on the command module,

McDivitt and Schweickart
joined us on Long Island.

So you wanna take the vehicle for a spin?

- Gee, Dad. Can we?
- Sure.

As long as you don't bring her back empty.

The hardest part of getting
the first LEMs to fly

was getting the thousands of systems
and subsystems to work together.

Mostly it was like having
a ballroom full of dancers

dancing different steps to music
that wasn't quite right for any of them.

- Bring that TL up.
- Roger, TC.

And TTCA four jets down.

Copy, TC.

TTCA four jets down.

Well, that can't be good.

Now let's cycle that one more time.

Yep. Roger, TC.

For the...

You know, you look more and more
like Steve McQueen in The Great Escape.

Funny you should say that. I got guys
digging a tunnel under the east fence.

Should reach the trees by Sunday.

Ready to start up again.

We think we've got it.

Let's do it.

- TFI telemetry cal off.
- Copy, TC.

- TFI power off.
- Roger, TC.

- R&D A off.
- Copy that, TC.

God bless it!
Tom, what's up with the radar?

Tom Kelly.

Hi, Lou.

Yeah, I know... Well...

I know what we're up against, Lou.

We will make the date.

I need to know if we can make the date.

If we can't, I'm gonna have to take cash
from the safe and move to South America.

OK. Bob?

Yep.

- Arnie?
- Sure.

- John?
- Yes, sir.

The other John?

Sorry, Tom. The cockpit's gonna take
another three weeks.

- We could use a few weeks ourselves.
- Us too.

If we had it, we could certainly use it.

You know, Tom, I hear Bolivia is
really nice this time of year.

You know, this is so bad
I can't even joke about it.

Perhaps we were behind schedule
and over budget

because budgets and schedules
are based on

previous experience with similar projects.

We didn't know how much it'd cost to build
the LEMs or how long it would take.

All we really knew
was how much time we'd been given

and that was running out.

LEM 3 was scheduled
to be launched in the fall of 1 968.

To make the launch, NASA needed
delivery some time that spring.

We were working as fast as we could,
24 hours a day, seven days a week

and it wasn't enough.

In June, 1 968 it was decided
that we'd ship LEM 3 to NASA as she was

and finish the work at the Cape.

You know, I don't know
what I'm so worked up about.

I mean, what's the worst that could happen?

Well, we ship the LEM to NASA,

we never get it to fly,
the Russians beat us to the moon

and within ten years we're all living
under the iron thumb of Communism.

Exactly.

Remember when seven years
seemed like a long time?

Remember when this whole thing
was only gonna cost 500 million?

You know, I can't even remember
when it was gonna cost a billion.

Unfortunately, moving LEM 3 to the Cape did
little to ease the pressure we were under.

Tom, there's still 100
things wrong with it.

- We'll get it fixed in time.
- No, you won't.

There is no way that in three months
that thing is gonna be ready to fly.

Look, Jim, it's...

It's a good machine. Just needs a
little fine-tuning. That's all.

You don't have to whisper.
It can't hear you.

Look, I want it to go up as much as you do.

I know we're running out of time.
It's 18 months to the end of the decade

and we still haven't had a single
manned Apollo flight, I know that.

But that doesn't change the facts.
LEM 3 is not ready to fly.

And it won't be any time soon.

That's gonna have to be
my recommendation to headquarters.

Now, with the LEM 3 not ready to fly

after Wally and the 7 crew
go up with the CSM in October,

that means there won't be
another Apollo flight until the spring.

- Right.
- Well, maybe not.

George has come up with a rather wild idea.

How wild?

Frank's mission is being scrubbed.

We've created a new C-Prime mission
which will precede your mission.

What's the mission?

Well, we're gonna send the command
and service module, no lunar module...

on a flight around the moon in December.

Really?

What's Frank think about that?

I haven't talked to Frank yet.
I'm talking to you first.

I don't want to lose
your crew's experience with LEM 3.

That's why we decided to send Frank
on this mission ahead of you.

But I wanted to see what you had to say
about it before I told Frank.

I told him we'd stick
with the mission we got.

Good.

Going around the moon sounds like a blast
and all but I really wanna fly the LEM.

That's pretty much what Dave said.
I called him in Downey.

He said he really wanted
to fly the command module solo,

get us out of his hair for a few hours.

I don't know, though.
Maybe we're making a mistake.

Maybe we're missing out
on some historical voyage.

I don't know, Jim. Maybe. But it sounds
like they're just gonna be sightseeing.

With all the things we gotta do,
our mission's fun.

Yeah, we got a great mission.

Providing that thing will fly.

In the fall of 1 968
while work continued on LEM 3,

the Apollo programme
finally got off the ground.

On October 1 1th, just a few miles
from where LEM 3 was being fine-tuned,

Apollo 7 was launched.

Two months later, Frank Borman,
Jim Lovell and Bill Anders

took Apollo 8 on its historic flight
around the moon.

All that time, LEM 3
was being worked on around the clock.

By February 1 969, George
and the rest of the Grumman crew

had tested every circuit
and tightened every bolt.

LEM 3 was ready.

- I like the call sign.
- Spider?

It seemed appropriate.

- How about the command module?
- Gumdrop.

When it came from North American
it was wrapped in blue plastic.

It's sort of what it looked like.

Maybe you should go up with us,
make sure everything's OK.

I'd love to go up with you.

She's ready.

I know.

We'd better get back to the sim.

- She's a beautiful machine, Tom.
- Isn't she?

- You think it's beautiful?
- It looks like a toaster with legs

but I'm not gonna tell him that.

- Hold on a minute, Bill.
- I gotta get him to the airport.

Look, he spent the last seven years
of his life building that thing.

Let's give him a moment to say goodbye.

It stays up there, remember?

As far as LEM 3 was concerned
that should have been it for me.

I should have been able to sit back in the
SPAN room in Houston and watch the show.

But in the early hours of launch day,

the pressure in one of LEM 3's fuel tanks
was reading disturbingly high.

It's the helium tank?

Actually, sir, the super critical helium.

- How's it reading now?
- Still on the edge.

Meaning?

Meaning we'd like to be down the middle
of the tolerance band but we're not.

Give me the worst case.

When the LEM heads away from the
command module and they're throttling up,

the tank could over-pressurize
and the burst disk could blow.

We would lose helium on the descent stage.

They would not be stranded.
They'd still have the ascent engine.

But it would kill the mission.

Tom, I'll need the official
Grumman position on this.

We're still within the limits.

It'll fly.

In the last few minutes before launch

I managed to put the tank pressure problem
out of my mind for a moment.

I tried to imagine what it was like
in LEM 3 just then.

Astronauts have said that sitting in
the command module during a countdown

can be almost peaceful.

Must have been even more peaceful
in LEM 3. At least until...

For the next ten minutes it must have been

like LEM 3 was stuck
in a paint mixer in a hardware store.

And when it must have seemed
the shaking would never stop, it did.

On the second day of the mission,

Rusty became the first person
to enter a LEM in space.

Later that day, shortly after Rusty
and Jim extended the landing gear,

something happened
which brought the mission to a halt.

OK, I got gear out in front of me now.

OK, landing gear deploy, safe?

Roger, safe.

Sequence camera, off.

GET is 45-1-1-3-5.

TFI telemetry cal off.

TFI power, off.

TFI, off.

- R&D A, off.
- TFI power, off.

R&D instrumentation A, off.

R&D instrumentation A, off.

OK, Deke.

I'm gonna have to recommend
we scrub the EVA tomorrow.

We got you, Jim.

Jim, if Rusty doesn't do the EVA...

I understand the ramifications, Dave.

I just don't think it's
safe for you to do it.

I don't think we can put you in a pressurized
suit if it looks like you're gonna throw up.

We'll proceed with the checklist tomorrow.

Check out as many systems
as we can without undocking.

It's just gonna have to be it.

If Rusty were to throw up in a suit,
he'd likely asphyxiate and die

before Jim could get him
back into the LEM and repressurize.

But if Rusty didn't test the backpack,

the LEM couldn't undock
from the command module.

When Jim canceled the EVA,
we all understood but we were devastated.

LEM 3 would not fly.

Next day, as Rusty and Jim went through
the checklist, the mood at NASA was grim.

The mood lifted a little when one of
Jim's transmissions made everyone smile.

Well, almost everyone.

- Houston, this is Apollo 9.
- Go ahead, Apollo 9.

Houston, if some of our friends
from Grumman are listening in,

I suggest on the next LEM
they give a go with a vacuum cleaner.

We got a few odds and ends
floating around in here.

Roger, Apollo 9. We'll pass that along.

Oh, well. In a few minutes,
even I would be smiling.

You look like you're feeling better.

I am. I feel good.

How good?

Real good.

What do you say you go outside?

I think that's a good idea.

- Gumdrop, this is Spider.
- Roger, Spider.

Dave, Rusty's feeling a lot better
and he looks better too.

I thought maybe he should go out
on the porch and get some fresh air.

Hey, man! I like the sound of that.

For 45 minutes,
every available camera on Apollo 9

was put to use filming the first two-man
space walk in history.

While Rusty stood on LEM 3's porch,

Dave stood in the hatch of the command
module to film Rusty's test of the backpack.

When one of Dave's cameras broke

he went back inside to fix it.

That gave Rusty something unheard of
on an EVA, free time.

For three minutes there was nothing
for him to do but look at the Earth.

With the backpack tested,

it was time to see if LEM 3 could fly.

That's a nice-looking machine.

It's not like an F-86, I'll tell you that.

It's an ungainly beast.

But it really flies.

Houston, Spider. We are preparing
to throttle up the descent engine.

Roger, Spider.

Then it was time to see if the decision
I had made just before the launch

was the right one.

The tank'll be fine.

It'll hold.

Throttle to 20%.

It's a little rough there.

Wasn't it?
I think we swallowed a little helium.

Let's try it again.

Throttle to 40%.

Houston, Spider.

Everything looks good here.

It was a good burn.

Keep track of us, will you, Davey?

Roger that. See you in a while.

Jim and Rusty took LEM 3 out
1 1 0 miles from the command module.

To get back to Dave they had
to separate from the descent stage,

then fire the ascent engine.

Thirteen feet per second.

Nine feet per second. I
have the interconnects.

Five, four, three, two,
one, we have shutdown.

Roger. We have a good burn.
No residuals.

And there goes half our spacecraft.

A short time later, LEM 3 redocked
with the command module.

Her mission was over.

That's a song I haven't
heard in a long time.

- You all set, Rusty?
- Yeah, Jim.

All right. I'll see you up at CSM.

I don't suppose they're gonna let
anybody back up they think'll get sick?

I don't know, Rusty.

I'll tell ya,

those few minutes I had outside
while Dave was working on the camera...

that was something special.

I just wanted to say thanks.

The only reason it was a question
is I didn't want you to kill yourself.

And I'll try not to for
the rest of the mission.

All right. I'll see you inside.

Yep.

LEM 3 would fly one last time
but this time she would fly alone.

OK, the tunnel's closed out,
the pyros are armed.

We're all set.

All right.

So long, Spider.

Hope I didn't leave anything in there.

When I first saw the LEM I thought,
"You gotta be kidding."

But it kind of grows on you.

It really is a beautiful machine.

Listen to me. I sound like Tom Kelly.

But you guys are right.
It's a lot for one mission.

Maybe too much.

If we get even half of it done
we can call it a success.

I can't wait!

Apollo 9 had shown that a LEM could fly.
At least in Earth orbit.

Two months later on Apollo 1 0,
Tom Stafford and Gene Cernan

took LEM 4 down to within 50,000 feet
of the lunar surface.

Look at that. There's enough boulders
to fill up Galveston Bay!

Houston, we is goin',
and we is down among 'em, Charlie!

Now only one question
about the LEM remains.

The biggest question of all.

And it will be up to the
next LEM to answer it.

When I said goodbye to LEM 3,
I felt like a proud parent

watching a child go off to college.

As I say goodbye to this LEM,
I feel like a parent of centuries past

saying farewell as his child embarks
for the New World.

To some people, that might sound
like I'm stretching the point.

A LEM is not a child, it's a machine
and a machine doesn't have a soul.

We may yell at our toasters
and give names to our cars

but in the end even a LEM
is just a collection of wires

and circuits and nuts and bolts.

I don't know.
I think each LEM does have a soul.

It's a soul of all the people who built
her, designed her, first dreamed of her.

- What number is this one?
- This one is LEM 5.

- Thank you for inviting us here today.
- You're welcome, Mr Houbolt.

Without you guys there might not be
anybody here today.

- Someone would have thought of it.
- Maybe.

And this is the actual machine
that's gonna land on the moon?

Yep.

- What are they calling this one?
- This one?

This one is the Eagle.