The moon landing footage analysis I did last month made me realize I was trusting NASA's released data way too blindly for years.

I finally dug into the raw telemetry logs from Apollo 11's lunar module descent, and the numbers don't line up with the official story at all... has anyone else pulled those original files and seen the inconsistencies?

2 comments

2 Comments

flores.tessa1mo ago

The descent propulsion system throttle schedule is a big one that jumps out at me. My own dive into the telemetry showed the thrust levels were way too smooth and consistent for a real manual landing with all the unknowns of that terrain. I know there's debate about signal processing and data compression back then, but the delta between the expected vs logged burn times for those final 30 seconds is hard to just shrug off. Would love to hear if you dug into the lunar module's inertial measurement unit data specifically, because that's where I kept hitting dead ends trying to cross-reference with the flight plan.

beth_baker691mo ago

Yeah the "too smooth" thing gets me too. I mean those terrian unknowns alone should have made for way choppier data.