
Lunar mystery solved by recovery of lost Apollo mission tapes - curtis
https://www.cnn.com/2018/07/09/us/apollo-moon-landings-study/index.html
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lucb1e
Summary: "raw data on the temperature of the moon's surface, as well as a few
meters below it, was transmitted from the probes and recorded on magnetic
tapes". Some of the tapes were not correctly archived and were only recently
found. The previously available tapes showed that "the moon unexpectedly rose
in temperature by 1.8°F to 3.6°F near the probes. The possible reasons for
this change were debated by planetary scientists for decades." Now with the
new data, and because "researchers were also able to look at recently acquired
images from the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter Camera over the two landing
sites, [t]he only scenario that fits this type of warming is that the
astronauts caused it. While they were driving[/walking] over the surface,
[they] disturbed the moon's surface, which is covered in regolith, a layer of
dust and debris. Images from the camera show that those paths were darker,
which lowered their albedo, or ability to reflect the sun's light into space",
thereby absorbing more heat.

~~~
some_account
Right. Lost mission tapes. We are lucky they happened to appear. Super
convenient, how those astronauts happened to double the surface temperature of
the moon (oh, near the probes) by just standing there.

~~~
FreeFull
A change from 1.8 degrees Fahrenheit to 3.6 degrees Fahrenheit is not a
doubling by any measure, because Fahrenheit is a relative temperature scale.
3.6F is 0.0039 times bigger than 1.8F

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_rpd
Here's the paper ...

Examination of the Long‐Term Subsurface Warming Observed at the Apollo 15 and
17 Sites Utilizing the Newly Restored Heat Flow Experiment Data From 1975 to
1977

> The Apollo heat flow experiment (HFE) was conducted at landing sites 15 and
> 17. On Apollo 15, surface and subsurface temperatures were monitored from
> July 1971 to January 1977. On Apollo 17, monitoring took place from December
> 1972 to September 1977. The investigators involved in the HFE examined and
> archived only data from the time of deployment to December 1974. The present
> authors recovered and restored major portions of the previously unarchived
> HFE data from January 1975 through September 1977. The HFE investigators
> noted that temperature of the regolith well below the reach of insolation
> cycles (~1 m) rose gradually through December 1974 at both sites. The
> restored data showed that the subsurface warming continued until the end of
> observations in 1977. Simultaneously, the thermal gradient decreased,
> because the warming was more pronounced at shallower depths. The present
> study has examined potential causes for the warming. Recently acquired
> images of the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter Camera over the two landing sites
> show that the regolith on the paths of the astronauts turned darker,
> lowering the albedo. We suggest that, as a result of the astronauts'
> activities, solar heat intake by the regolith increased slightly on average,
> and that resulted in the observed warming. Simple analytical heat conduction
> models with constant regolith thermal properties can show that an abrupt
> increase in surface temperature of 1.6 to 3.5 K at the time of probe
> deployment best duplicates the magnitude and the timing of the observed
> subsurface warmings at both Apollo sites.

[https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1029/2018...](https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1029/2018JE005579)

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bigiain
Anthropogenic Lunar Warming!

(Humans are the worst...)

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supermdguy
I thought it was talking about these missing tapes:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apollo_11_missing_tapes](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apollo_11_missing_tapes).
That would have been amazing.

~~~
8bitsrule
Me too. Some people spent -a lot- of time look for them.

But, ya never know. Remember that warehouse they put Indiana's 'Lost Ark' in?
Bet there are -a bunch- of those.

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viridian
This is the experiment in question, for those curious:
[https://www.lpi.usra.edu/lunar/missions/apollo/apollo_17/exp...](https://www.lpi.usra.edu/lunar/missions/apollo/apollo_17/experiments/hf/)

The article outlines some of the details as well, but it was lacking in depth,
which can be found in the experiment results and details links in the page
above.

~~~
acqq
More background on the device:

[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apollo_Lunar_Surface_Experim...](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apollo_Lunar_Surface_Experiments_Package)

Apparently just the plutonium in the power supply of only one of these units
would cost today some 20 million USD.

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17492902](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17492902)

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msl09
Does anyone know how effectively block that annoying video?

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SECProto
I have javascript disabled - I don't see a video. Rest of the article loads
fine.

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NVRM
No. No need to loop around for 80 years. NO. Seriously. No way. STFU

~~~
dang
If you can't or won't stop posting unsubstantive comments, as we've already
asked, we're going to have to ban you.

[https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html](https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html)

~~~
NVRM
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russell%27s_teapot](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russell%27s_teapot)

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teh_infallible
How do tapes like this get lost in the first place? I mean, if you were a
startup funding this mission, and your CTO said, “Oops! I totally lost all
that data from our multibillion dollar mission!” wouldn’t you fire them
immediately?

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outworlder
Yes.

Except the CTO is dead and his grandson is in charge. And oh, the original
building is no longer there. Also, there's no more funding for storage. By the
way, the computer systems are no longer compatible and the paper records have
faded.

~~~
saalweachter
And your department is only concerned with future capabilities, historical
records are someone else's job. And your company just pivoted from lunar
exploration to lunar colonization, no, Mars exploration, no, space stations,
no, space defense, no, Mars exploration again.

