Golf on the Moon: 50th Anniversary Images Show How Far Alan Shepard Hit the Ball
This image consists of six photos taken with the Lunar Module, enhanced and merged into a single panorama show the landing scene, along with the location from which Shepard hit the balls
Fifty years ago Alan Shepard hit two golf balls on the moon this week.
He hit the first in a crater. The second he claimed to have broken "miles and miles and miles".
Now, while all golfers are prone to exaggeration, Shepard, who was commander of NASA's Apollo 14 mission, would very well have hit his ball this far on February 6, 1971 – despite only using an improvised iron six that he had made from a folding tool designed to create moonstone samples, and sneaked on board in a sock.
The Shepard clubhead aboard Apollo 14 snuck into a sock and the implement he attached it to – this image is reproduced courtesy of the United States Golf Association who has the item in his museum part of the Moon shot collection
The only footage in existence is grainy video shot sideways with a single television camera. And there was no ball tracking technology.
But imaging specialist Andy Saunders digitally enhanced recent high-resolution scans of the original photographic film and applied a stacking technique to smaller 16mm film. & # 39; recordings made by the crew, and managed to locate the second ball and calculate how far it actually went.
The Moon's lack of gravity would certainly have helped, and Saunders says it's a big hit. US Open champion Bryson DeChambeau could, theoretically, shoot a ball 3.41 miles into thin air – about the length of an 18-hole golf course – with a hangtime of a minute and 22 seconds, if he continues his quest for more distance. would take to extreme lengths.
So, how far did Shepard hit his ball?
"It seemed like a slice, Al," Fred Haise joked in Mission Control after seeing Shepard & # 39; s first shot that he was in a nearby crater. Given the TV camera's known location, Shepard's shoe prints can be identified, showing his attitude for his first two tries – when he took "more dirt than a ball."
"We can now determine fairly accurately that number of balls one traveled 24 meters, and ball number two traveled 40 meters," says Saunders of Cheshire, who works with the United States Golf Association (USGA) on the occasion of the anniversary.
"Unfortunately even the impressive second shot could hardly be described as" miles and miles and miles ”, but this, of course, is only considered a light-hearted exaggeration. "
Using a known scale of images taken by the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter, a spacecraft launched in 2009 that took this photo in 2011, you can the point between divot and ball is measured.
Wh While those distances may seem disappointing, it is still an astonishing achievement by Shepard, who was the first American to travel into space in 1961, a decade before he became the fifth man to walk on the moon.
] "The moon is in fact a gigantic, uninhibited, rock-strewn bunker," Saunders continues.
"The pressurized suits severely restricted movement, and because of the visors of their helmets, they had difficulty even seeing their feet.
"I would challenge any club golfer to go to his local golf course and try to hit a one-quarter iron out of an uninhibited bunker.
"Then imagine that you are fully dressed, helmeted and wearing thick gloves. Also remember that there was little gravity to pull the clubhead towards the ball.
"The fact that Shepard even made contact and got the ball in the air is extremely impressive."
Movie images of the Lunar Module in 1971 were used to identify both balls. The & # 39; Javelin & # 39; was a pole of a solar wind experiment hurled by crew member Edgar Mitchell
Andy Saunders is an imaging specialist and author of the upcoming book Apollo Remastered. Previously, he had produced the clearest image ever of Neil Armstrong on the moon, and revealed life aboard the stricken Apollo 13 mission, regularly shares the remastered images on social media. Follow him on Twitter: @ AndySaunders_1 and Instagram: @andysaunde rs_1
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