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Neil Armstrong's customs form for moon rocks (2016)
- guesswho_ 1y ago[flagged]
- whatever1 1y agoThe equipment that is left on the moon and you can literally see by yourself with a good enough telescope is also an illusion plotted by the government
- AnimalMuppet 1y agoNo, see, that equipment didn't go to the moon. But the government installed a large video screen there, so that if you look, you see what they want you to see, not what's actually there, which is not the equipment that you see. /s, if it wasn't blatantly obvious...
- whatever1 1y agoOn a serious note though, we probably don’t remember how to go to the moon. I mean the gritty details not the first principles. Organizations are really just people, who when are gone, if they have not trained a successor, their expertise just goes with them.
- em-bee 1y agowhile that's a pity, i am not terribly worried. we managed it once without previous experience, so we can manage it again. in fact the less we rely on past experience the more we develop the capacity to do difficult things without prior experience. (that sounds like a contradiction in terms, but i hope it makes sense. it's kind of like linux from scratch. or the learning benefits from reinventing the wheel. instead of improving how to travel to the moon we improve the process of how to develop moon travel)
- grues-dinner 1y agoOn the other hand, if you wanted to go to the moon today, you wouldn't do it the same way they did for Apollo, so not every gritty detail is useful any more. Hand-weaving guidance computer core rope memory, for example, is probably a forgotten skill, but you wouldn't use core rope memory today, and even if you did, it would probably not be woven by hand. And even if you did use it and you did weave it by hand, materials and technology is better and smaller now so you still would not build it in the same way. Or perhaps intricate multi-step machining processes using experts on machines not made for 50 years that these days would be a fairly ordinary 5-axis milling job.
- perihelions 1y agoThere's no earth-based telescope in existence that can resolve anthropogenic features on the moon. Only telescopes in lunar orbit can do that, today. (Technically, you can confirm the presence of the optical retroflector from earth, with a very sophisticated laser setup that's, I'd WAG, $100k+ of physics equipment. Far beyond "anyone can just look!" territory).
- npteljes 1y agoYou can not "see by yourself", as the equipment left behind is pretty small. But multiple lunar satellites photographed it since.
- temptemptemp111 1y ago[dead]
- edm0nd 1y ago[flagged]
- jleyank 1y agoI think at least one astronaut needed to file a request for tax deadline extension due to being “out of the country” at filing time. Didn’t have an entry in the system for “off the planet” I guess…
- elijaht 1y agoHa, that was actually Apollo 13: https://www.visitthecapitol.gov/john-swigert-jr https://www.visitthecapitol.gov/john-swigert-jr
- whycome 1y agoIf they said they were away on the moon that would be a lie.
- voidUpdate 1y agoI believe he was simply "abroad", which is true, since he wasn't in the US at the time (I think... How high do countries reach?)
- whycome 1y agoAs in apollo13 didn’t make it to the moon.
- Bluestein 1y agoI mean, technically ...
- ceejayoz 1y ago> Who would have guessed the regulations would have been enforced so rigorously in 1969 when three men returned to the U.S. from a rather long business trip – to the moon and back. I mean, I'd imagine it was mostly done for the joke aspect. edit: https://www.space.com/7044-moon-apollo-astronauts-customs.html https://www.space.com/7044-moon-apollo-astronauts-customs.ht... > "Yes, it's authentic," NASA spokesperson John Yembrick told Space.com. "It was a little joke at the time."
- more_corn 1y agoNo. This is one example of many. NASA astronauts have to fill out government business travel paperwork for travel to the ISS. The rules must be followed even if the rules don’t make sense.
- ceejayoz 1y agoThe article covers that. > Space station crews launching on Russian Soyuz spacecraft have to make their way to the Central Asian spaceport of the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan. No matter what the mission, even astronauts have to go through customs, NASA officials said. As part of their routine airline flights to other countries and back, they of course encounter airport customs. It's not to/from the ISS that's the issue there. A US-only crew on a US-launched spacecraft that lands in US territory won't need to do it. (ISS may add a few complexities, but if you stay on, say, the Shuttle, you're not leaving US-controlled territory.)
- sidewndr46 1y agoFor travel to Kazakhstan it makes sense to show a passport of some kind as they want to know why someone is entering the country. Traveling to Baikonur of course being a legitimate reason to enter the country. There's one aspect of this I don't understand entirely. What if the astronaut travels to the ISS from Baikonur, then used some of form return vehicle that lands in US territory? How would we handle that?
- 1y ago
- perihelions 1y agoThese things were mainly publicity stunts. The supposed biohazard quarantine for returning Apollo astronauts was a theater performance, too. https://www.livescience.com/space/the-moon/the-apollo-moon-landing-was-real-but-nasas-quarantine-procedure-was-not https://www.livescience.com/space/the-moon/the-apollo-moon-l... ("The Apollo moon landing was real, but NASA's quarantine procedure was not") https://www.nytimes.com/2023/06/09/science/nasa-moon-quarantine.html https://www.nytimes.com/2023/06/09/science/nasa-moon-quarant... ("A review of archives suggests that efforts to protect Earth from contamination by any organism brought back from the lunar surface were mostly for show")
- skeezyboy 1y agoallowing the "to be determined" answer sat at odds with the implied dilligency of the customs agency
- refulgentis 1y agoUnlikely, it was a stunt.
- montjoy 1y agoThis. Also, maybe setting legal precedent?
- refulgentis 1y agoNo. They're saying it was a stunt. Not setting legal precedent. There was no practical value.
- Lammy 1y agoThe practical value is reinforcing among the general public the idea that humans should not be able to move freely around their own planet. In the future only money will have that right. The modern passport didn't even exist until World War Ⅰ: https://www.amazon.com/dp/0521634938 https://www.amazon.com/dp/0521634938 / https://archive.org/details/pdfy-S0NQwPjPkMlzZ2eS/mode/2up https://archive.org/details/pdfy-S0NQwPjPkMlzZ2eS/mode/2up
- DataDaemon 1y agoI wonder if they checked their social profiles?
- ahmeneeroe-v2 1y agoYes 100% these astronauts were extensively vetted to ensure compatibility with the ruling power of their day.
- smnrchrds 1y agoSemi-related: "Passports please! British paratroopers met by French customs after D-Day airdrop British paratroopers recreating an airdrop behind German defences to mark the 80th anniversary of D-Day were met by French customs officials at a makeshift border checkpost. Moments after the paratroopers had hit the ground and gathered up their chutes, they formed an orderly queue and handed over their passports for inspection by waiting French customs officials in a Normandy field." https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/passports-please-british-paratroopers-met-by-french-customs-after-d-day-airdrop-2024-06-06/ https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/passports-please-britis... Video here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f7ZY4rlAQus https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f7ZY4rlAQus
- ceejayoz 1y agoReminds me a bit of when the UK accidentally invaded Spain on a training exercise. https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/uk-invade-spain-2002-accidentally-royal-marine-lord-west-gibraltar-first-sea-lord-beach-a7665716.html https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/uk-invade-spa... > Lord West said: "It wasn't one of the best days in my time. I had a phone call from the military commander saying, 'Sir, I'm afraid something awful's happened.' I thought, 'Goodness me, what?' And he said, 'I'm afraid we've invaded Spain, but we don't think they've noticed.' > "They charged up the beach in the normal way, being Royal Marines—they're frightfully good soldiers of course, and jolly good at this sort of thing—and confronted a Spanish fisherman who sort of pointed out, 'I think you're on the wrong beach.'
- magicalhippo 1y agoReminded me of when I got to see one of the customs declaration for an off-shore oil platform built here in Norway. It was a single-item declaration: one oil plaform. However, the elecronic customs message format didn't have enough digits to fit the item value, over a billion NOK IIRC. After some calls with customs, they had to send it with a fictitious item value and add the true value in a free-text field. This worked fine since there were no duties or taxes on exporting oil platforms, so no cross-checks that would fail.
- 9dev 1y agoLOL. I’m on the receiving end of these customs declarations, and stories like this are the reason the copies are so notoriously hard to parse programmatically… lovely, thanks for sharing.
- Scoundreller 1y agoWhat’s the “escape value” that triggers people to read the free text field? Or is it just zero? And if zero, how often do they just get mistakenly processed as zero value?
- bdamm 1y agoWhatever it is is likely to be part of the endless arms race between customs agencies and smugglers, so I doubt you'll get the privilege of finding out.
- 9dev 1y agoZero; or an arbitrary number; or a number that was destined for another field, but the commanding officer misread and filled the form wrong; or null; or as many digits as fit in the field. Any of these.
- magicalhippo 1y agoIn a case like this, they usually call ahead to let customs know, and follow up with the declaration ID once it has been sent. Apart from that, customs is very tight lipped about what triggers manual processing of a declararion. Though for example a large discrepancy between weight and value typically would lead to it getting flagged for manual processing, as I understand it.
- yardie 1y agoI did a 1100m passage from Puerto Rico to Miami. Anchored in the Bahamas bank but didn't step on land. And when we arrived in the US we weren't required to clear in since our last port of departure was PR. Pretty sure they were tracking us by drone, blimp, AIS, and radar the entire way because they weren't suspicious enough compared to my previous experiences. Curious why Apollo 11 would have to clear customs since the moon isn't a foreign country and they just did a there and back.
- tempodox 1y agoThey could have smuggled moonshine.
- burnt-resistor 1y agoFreshly bottled from the edge of the dark side where it's sweetest.
- jedberg 1y agoDue to international treaty the moon is considered international land, like Antarctica.
- lucianbr 1y agoYou think some other country would have objected to the US not requesting cusoms declarations from their own citizens, reasoning it breaks the treaty obligations?
- jedberg 1y agoI think it was more about the US insisting the rules get followed no matter what. Sort of like how astronauts today going to ISS have to fill out international travel forms, even when they leave from the USA.
- ethan_smith 1y agoUnder the 1967 Outer Space Treaty, the moon is considered international territory ("province of all mankind"), so technically they were returning from outside US jurisdiction, triggering customs requirements.
- ortusdux 1y agoMakes me think of the Apollo insurance covers: "The Apollo insurance covers are autographed postal covers signed by the astronaut crews prior to their mission. The primary motivation behind this action was the refusal of life insurance companies to provide coverage for the astronauts. Consequently, the astronauts devised a strategy involving the signing of hundreds of postal covers. These were to be left behind for their families, who could then sell them in the event of the astronauts' deaths.[1] The insurance covers began with Apollo 11 and ended with Apollo 16." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apollo_insurance_covers https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apollo_insurance_covers
- I-M-S 1y agoA country that sends men to the Moon but isn't able to guarantee the wellbeing of their families shouldn't be able to send men to the Moon.
- thescriptkiddie 1y agoan interesting implication of this is that the government probably didn't want to issue them life insurance because then they would have to explain why they don't do that for all military personnel
- jki275 1y agoThe US government does issue life insurance for all military personnel. It's a nominal cost (20 bucks a month IIRC) for something like 400k of coverage. It's been around since 1914[1]. As far as I know all of the astronauts were military at that time, so they probably would have been covered by this program. There could be any number of nuances I'm not aware of though. [1]https://benefits.va.gov/benefits/infographics/pdfs/timeline_100.pdf https://benefits.va.gov/benefits/infographics/pdfs/timeline_...
- dotancohen 1y agoI don't know about any of the other Apollo astronauts, and I wasn't around at the time, but I do remember once reading that a big deal was made about Neil Armstrong being a civilian when he landed on the moon.
- mathgradthrow 1y agoOf course they didn't. It's just funny.
- nullbyte 1y ago“Are you bringing with you: plants, food, animals, soil, disease agents, cell cultures or snails? Declare all articles that you have acquired and are bringing into the United States.” It's interesting that they specifically mention snails
- whycome 1y agoPlants, animals, fungi, archae….
- the__alchemist 1y agoAt least as of a few years ago, the Qataris required foreign aircrew (e.g. fighter pilots) operating out of bases in their country to do this after every mission! What a pain.
- woodpanel 1y agoWell, you can’t say this is a problem you’ll encounter with Trump
- hiccuphippo 1y agoThere's a funny story about how any new territory falls under the jurisdiction of the dioceses from which the expedition departed, so the bishop of Orlando is the bishop of the moon.
- Ylpertnodi 1y agoMy god's bigger than your god.
- burnt-resistor 1y agoMine does genocide better. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Short_Account_of_the_Destruction_of_the_Indies https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Short_Account_of_the_Destruc...
- rob74 1y agoYes, the form really does ask if a person is bringing in snails. Even more curiously, it asks for animals in general, and then specifically for snails. I wonder what it is about snails specifically that US Customs are/were so interested in?
- caseyohara 1y agoBiosecurity/agrosecurity. Some snails are highly invasive and destructive to crops so they are banned or tightly regulated by the USDA.
- jlarocco 1y agoI'm not sure what they were looking for, specifically, but snails can be bad news: https://bouldercolorado.gov/services/new-zealand-mudsnails https://bouldercolorado.gov/services/new-zealand-mudsnails
- aspir 1y agoThe story in the editor's note is charming enough that it's worth calling out: >Thanks to UC alumnus Luama Mays, JD ’66, for sharing a copy of the declaration with UC Magazine. Mays was a pilot who befriended Armstrong while the former astronaut was teaching at UC and Mays was running an aviation company. Initially Armstrong called him, without even identifying himself, asking for a ride on Mays old "bubble-style" helicopter left over from the Korean War. It was exactly what Armstrong had trained on in preparation for operating the lunar module.
- TZubiri 1y agoThe US gets a lot of flak for still using forms instead of modernizing, but imagine the nightmare this would be with an inflexible system with dropdowns. It seems so relaxing to just be able to write whatever you want or draw doodles on a form and expect the operator on the other side ot either grok it, coalesce it into whatever other system, or handle it in whatever way they see fit. Never change America
- nevster 1y agoDirect link to the actual image : https://magazine.uc.edu/content/dam/magazine/docs/Moon_rocks.pdf https://magazine.uc.edu/content/dam/magazine/docs/Moon_rocks...
- MathMonkeyMan 1y ago> Any other condition on board which may lead to the spread of disease: > TO BE DETERMINED
- computerthings 1y ago[dead]
- naganotonicbuy 1y agoSometimes I thought, even today's generation and technology are unable to land on the moon properly. And back to earth? wow. My school life was ruined.