I found out the moon landing footage was actually filmed in a studio

I was digging through some old NASA documents online last week, the ones they declassified in the 2000s, and I found a memo from 1969 that straight up says the Apollo 11 broadcast was shot in a soundstage at a facility in New Jersey. It specifically mentions a lighting setup that matched the 'lunar surface' and even gives the room number - Studio B. I checked it against three other sources, including a historian's blog that breaks down the shadows in the footage, and they all point to the same thing. The whole thing about the flag waving when there's no air? That's because they had a fan running in the studio. I'm not saying we didn't go to the moon, but the broadcast itself seems faked. Has anyone else stumbled on that memo or got any links to the original scans?

2 comments

2 Comments

beth_baker691mo ago

Honestly, "one memo and a random blog" is kind of the whole point, right? Like, that's how most of these things start, with one piece of paper that someone actually found. But I'm with you, I don't know why they'd fake the broadcast and then leave the lighting setup and room number in the memo for anyone to find. Seems like a lot of extra work for a secret.

linda_clark1mo ago

Oh, so you found one memo and a random blog and now the whole broadcast is a Hollywood production? Come on, if it was really filmed in a studio in New Jersey, don't you think the Russians would have called that out in 1969 instead of congratulating us? They had every reason to expose a lie, but they didn't. And that flag waving thing gets debunked every time someone actually looks at the footage frame by frame - it's the astronauts moving the pole, not wind. Why would NASA go through the trouble of faking a broadcast and then leave obvious clues like a fan and bad lighting for people to find 50 years later?