“The flag on the moon is a great illustration of the fact that in space, nothing is simple,” said Annie Platoff, a librarian at the UC Santa Barbara Library and a leading expert on the Apollo program’s placement of flags on the lunar surface. “That was when I also discovered there is a name for it –– vexillology. Kennedy Space Center, where workers attached it to the LM Eagle's landing leg just three days before launch. Lunar Flag Assembly Kit is "Out of Print" from The Blasted Tree Store. After returning from space for a second time, the flag was When they backed away from the flag, it proved it could stand on its own. Astronaut Hall of Fame. A lunar flag, however, is anchored to the pole only at the bottom. It is held in place mainly by a horizontal crossbar at the top. “I’d also always been interested in the space program, so this was the perfect melding of my two interests,” she said. On the first day of the mission, Gene Cernan erected it in Taurus–Littrow lunar valley. Serving as the UC Santa Barbara Library’s subject liaison for Slavic studies, Platoff is a Ph.D. candidate in history at the University of Leicester in England. flag rigidity in the windless environment so that it appeared to wave. displays one of the U.S. flags that had been placed aboard the two Voyager Smithsonian Institution, the Library of Congress, the archivist of the United spacecraft. Credit: NASA / GSFC / Arizona State Univ. Photograph: Neil Armstrong nation to landing a man on the Moon and returning him safely to Earth before I guarantee it. As he deployed it, Cernan said, "This was one of the proudest moments of my life. A better view of the flag assembly is in Robert's original post. from inside the LM as the astronauts lifted off from the Moon begins after the took it. and installation on the LM. The first flag, left by The vertical and horizontal poles were gold-anodized aluminum tubes. William Drummond and Jack Kinzler fold the flag. Listen to the audio pronunciation of Lunar Flag Assembly on pronouncekiwi. He asked Jack Kinzler, head of technical services at MSC, also known as "Mr. How do you say Lunar Flag Assembly? The shroud was estimated to cost several hundred dollars. assisted by Deputy Division Chief David L. McCraw, designed the mechanism in The farthest of The flag itself Left: Apollo 12 landings, astronauts planted the flags farther from the LM. Later it made a return trip to the Moon, this time to stay. Kinzler also suggested, designed, and oversaw the creation of the commemorative plaques affixed to the Apollo Lunar Modules. ounces. committees. "Lunar Flag Assembly Sonnet" - Lunar Flag Assembly Kit by Kyle Flemmer, visual poetry, space poetry, erasure poetry, Apollo moon landings, The Blasted Tree Publishing Company, Canada, Canadian The most common suggestion received was to carry an American flag ✪ Who Is NASA’s ‘Forgotten Astronaut’? exhaust during liftoff. Right: The first American Neil A. Armstrong (left) and Edwin E. "Buzz" Aldrin, Jr. (right) with the flag on the Moon during the Apollo 11 extravehicular activity. "[3], Some Americans anticipated possible controversy over planting the United States flag on the Moon, since the Outer Space Treaty prohibited territorial claims to any extraterrestrial body. landing leg of the Lunar Module (LM), and that it would withstand the heating The deploying of the Lunar Flag Assembly, as it was known officially, was repeated by each Apollo mission. Lunar Flag Assembly Kit is out of print from The Blasted Tree Store. Detail from Apollo 12 photo AS12-47-6983 showing the deployed flag and its shadow. Fix It", to take on the task. Using visual poetry and erasure, mixed media and modularity, Flemmer seeks to explore our technical understanding and accomplishments, physical impermanence, and the politics of space exploration. This inspired an idea within NASA to have astronauts plant a United Nations flag on the first landing. [2], The flag, which had hung in the Mission Operations Control Room (MOCR) in the Mission Control Center through the prior Apollo landings, was flown to the Moon on the final mission, Apollo 17. The photograph above is superimposed in the video at the time that Armstrong That's it. Posts: 3161 From: San Diego Registered: Feb 2002: posted 06-04-2009 03:35 PM Kinzler then hand-carried the flag assembly to NASA’s The horizontal and vertical poles were each made of one-inch aluminum tubes in two telescoping parts, anodized with a gold color. lunar soil. They also recommended installing a plaque onto the lunar module (LM) descent stage (which would be left on the Moon) bearing the inscription: "Here men from the planet Earth first set foot upon the Moon July 1969, A.D. We came in peace for all mankind. The most common proposal among those solicited was to plant a flag. The success of this flight, which placed in recent years by the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) show that the flags left [2] Top brass at NASA were surveyed, and the overwhelming consensus was to plant an American flag. “It was basically the space where they kept their cameras, hammers, sampling scoops and other equipment. Movement when installing the flag also caused it to ripple.[7]. The nylon flags were hung on telescoping staffs and horizontal bars constructed of one-inch anodized aluminum tubes. As we explore the reaches of space, let us go to the new worlds together – not as new worlds to be conquered, but as a new adventure to be shared. background. To insulate the flag from these extreme conditions, it had to be packed inside a dual-walled protective shroud consisting of a stainless steel outer case separated from an aluminum layer by Thermoflex insulation, with several layers of Kapton thermal insulation foil between the inner case and the flag. Robert Gilruth, Director of the Manned Spacecraft Center (MSC) (footnote 8) and a member of the Committee on Symbolic Activities, asked Jack Kinzler, Chief of Technical Services … John Young saluting the flag while jumping! Gilruth, director of the Manned Spacecraft Center in Houston, now Johnson Space Moon. NASA Administrator Thomas O. Paine created the Committee on Symbolic Activities for the School, located near Cape Canaveral, Florida, and was rolled up and stowed in a Robert L. The most common suggestion received was to carry an American flag Images taken by the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) have shown that the American flags left on the Moon by Apollo astronauts are still standing– except for the Apollo 11 mission, which Buzz Aldrin reported as being knocked over by engine exhaust as Apollo 11 lifted off. Over the next States, the NASA Historical Advisory Committee, the Space Council and congressional The Lunar Flag Assembly was designed to survive a Moon landing and to appear to "wave" as it would in a breeze on Earth. three years, five more flags joined the one left by Apollo 11. Lunar flag assembly kit. [2] Since it was made clear the United States had no intention of making a territorial claim to the Moon, no serious controversy materialized. “He is the person I really consider to have been my mentor,” Platoff said. The astronauts struggled to get the flag into the lunar surface crust and also struggled getting the telescoping arm to extend fully, giving it a wicked looking curled appearance. the Moon by astronauts, the Stars and Stripes have travelled to all eight as its chair on Feb. 25, 1969. The source code for the WIKI 2 extension is being checked by specialists of the Mozilla Foundation, Google, and Apple. the first docking of a U.S. space shuttle to Russia's Mir space station. and plant it on the Moon, and that is what the committee recommended to Paine. The flag was stored externally in the MESA, and was destroyed with the Lunar Module Aquarius when it reentered the Earth's atmosphere. Committee on Symbolic Activities for the Moreover, the viewing angle isn’t necessarily straight down: on occasion the LROC team has angled the spacecraft’s view toward the illuminated sides of flags. was a standard 3- by 5-foot nylon flag, with the only modification being a hem It also represented a major feat of engineering. Without adequate thermal protection, the flag would have been gone.”. Right:  Orbital view of the Apollo 12 in the lead-up to the mission. flag on Mars in the Viking 1 Lander in 1976. Elements of the lunar flag assembly for Apollo 11 included the flag pole, an insulating blanket, and a thermal protective shroud. [7], The complete package needed to be as light as possible so as not to cut into the lunar payload and weighed 9 pounds 7 ounces (4.3 kg). and William E. Drummond of the Parachute Support Section carefully folded the as its chair on Feb. 25, 1969. Mercury-Redstone 3 flight in May 1961. Animation shows no flag movement between two different photos. Watch a video of Apollo 11 astronauts Neil left), indicating that our flag is still there. NASA officials never intended for the 5-by-3-foot nylon flags to last indefinitely. Image Credit: NASA. So Robinson has assembled all of the LROC images for each Apollo landing site and created a series of digital “flip books” that show each scene with various lighting angles.