How Do Astronauts React to Lunar Landing Conspiracy Theories?

Fringe theorists sometimes question whether the 1969 moon landing actually happened. In this episode of BrainStuff, we explore how astronauts Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin have reacted when asked whether it's all a conspiracy.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:02):
Welcome to brain Stuff from How Stuff Works, Hi brain
Stuff Lauren Vogelbaum here about the lunar landing, astronaut Neil
Armstrong once said it would have been harder to fake
it than to do it. On July twentieth, nineteen sixty nine,
Armstrong and Edwin buzz Aldrin Jr. Became the first human
beings to ever walk on the Moon during NASA's Apollo

(00:23):
eleven mission. Orbiting above them at the time was the
third number of their crew, aviator Michael Collins, who was
piloting their command module. Together, these three entered the history books.
The lunar landing was a defining moment, a technical achievement
made possible by centuries of scientific progress and the hard
work of more than four hundred thousand people. But according

(00:44):
to a Pole seven million Americans think that the entire
thing never happened, and a sixteen British poll found that
more than half fifty two percent of Brits think that
the Apollo eleven moon landing was faked, including an astonishing
seventy percent of Brits aged twenty five to thirty four.
On December eighteenth, nineteen sixty nine, four months and twenty

(01:05):
five days after Armstrong, Aldrin, and Collins returned to Earth,
John Noble Wilford of The New York Times ran a
story about a few stool warmers in Chicago bars who
had gone on record to claim that all the Apollo
eleven moonwalk footage was fake and must have been secretly
filmed somewhere out in the Nevada Desert. The popularity of
this misguided belief mushroomed during the Watergate scandal, an actual

(01:27):
government conspiracy that seems to have left people more susceptible
to believing other big government cover ups were plausible. In
nineteen seventy four, writer Bill Casing self published a pamphlet
called We Never Went to the Moon. Casing's writings alleged
that any sort of lunar landing would have been impossible
to carry out. In nineteen sixty nine, NASA, he concluded,
staged the moonwalk in a makeshift studio and then swore

(01:50):
the astronauts secrecy. Later, he added that the Challenger explosion
wasn't an accident either. Casing accused NASA of sabotaging the
spacecraft before the crew of seven got the chance to
expose the Apollo eleven cover up. His pamphlet gave the
so called lunar truther or movement its first manifesto. Deniers
like Casing saw their cause enjoy a modern renaissance in

(02:10):
two thousand one, when the Fox Network aired a documentary
called Conspiracy Theory Did We Land on the Moon? A
forty seven minutes special. The program featured interviews with Casing
and other Apollo eleven skeptics. One of them was Bart's Sabrell,
a filmmaker who has released two documentaries of his own
on the subject. The Fox program enjoyed great ratings, as
did a rebroadcast of the show that aired a month later. However,

(02:33):
scientists overwhelmingly denounced the one sided special. The turn of
the millennium also saw an explosion of Internet conspiracy sites,
which further the spread of lunar trutherism. All that negative
attention was bound to generate some uncomfortable moments for the
Apollo eleven crew. In the year two thousand, Neil Armstrong
was celebrating his seventieth birthday. One of the cards he

(02:53):
received came from a school teacher who wrote, Dear Mr Armstrong,
I would like to point out that you and the
other astronauts are making yourselves a worldwide laughing stock thanks
to the Internet. From there, the author encouraged Armstrong to
visit a favorite conspiracy website. Armstrong forwarded the card to NASA,
asking if the agency had ever publicly refuted these allegations.

(03:15):
He said, I occasionally asked questions in public forums and
feel I don't do as good a job as I
might with more complete information. NASA had, in fact rebuffed
the claims way back in seven that June, a press
release from the organization dismantled casing's major arguments. After the
two thousand one Fox special, the Space Agency reissued the document. Still,

(03:35):
the dabters were not satisfied. While making one of his documentaries,
Bart Sabrill and a cameraman ambushed Armstrong at a two
thousand one aerospace event in New York City. James Smith,
then the president of the event's sponsoring corporation, recalls its
Sabrell held up a Bible and demanded that Armstrong place
a hand on it and swear that he had really
gone to the moon. The conspiracy theorist was swiftly ejected.

(03:56):
This wasn't the only time Sabrell filmed himself accosting an
appalled a veteran, he issued the same spontaneous Bible challenge
too many other space travelers, including Apollo fourteens Edgar Mitchell, and,
as Michael Collins told Aaron Space Magazine in twenty sixteen,
the fringe theorist once tried to corner him in a supermarket.
For the record, Collins says that he finds lunar hoax
theories laughable. Buzz Aldrin, on the other hand, sure wasn't

(04:20):
amused when Sabrill and a cameraman ran up to him
outside of Beverly Hills Hotel in two thousand two. Sabrill
had lured Aldrin there under the false pretenses of an interview.
Once Aldren arrived with his stepdaughter in tow, Sabrill started
poking him with a Bible and unleashed a torrent of insults. Finally,
the seventy two year old had had enough. With a
swift left hook, Aldrin punched Sabrill in the jaw. Sabrill,

(04:43):
who quickly fled the scene, tried to sue Aldron for assault,
but the charges were dropped. The filmmaker has since apologized
for his behavior. In Armstrong Gave What was to be
his last interview before his death at age two. During
a taped exchange with Australian CEO Alex Malley, the First
Man on the Moon talked about everything from his Ohio
childhood to NASA's future. Perhaps inevitably, Armstrong was asked point

(05:07):
blank if the moon landing had been a hoax. He replied,
people love conspiracy theories. I mean, they are very attractive,
but it was never a concern to me because I
know that one day somebody is going to fly back
up there and pick up that camera I left. Today's
episode was written by Mark Mancini and produced by Tristan McNeil.

(05:29):
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