Chaikin: Voices from the Moon
From Scienticity
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Andrew Chaikin with Victoria Kohl, Voices from the Moon : Apollo Astronauts Describe their Lunar Experiences. New York : Viking Studio, 2009. xix + 201 pages; illustrated.
Voices From the Moon is a pictorial guide to the Apollo moon missions with quotations from all of the Apollo astronauts. Andrew Chaikin interviewed all of the astronauts between June 1985 and August 1992. He and his wife Victoria Kohl worked together to combine the quotations and the photographs together. All of the photos were taken from the Apollo missions themselves.
I loved this book. It was a nice trip down memory lane for me because I was an avid follower of all of the missions. In fact, I wanted to be an astronaut and looked forward to the year when science was added to my grammar school curriculum. I thought that I would be beginning my career path to space. However, I am not too bright at the sciences so that killed my space career.
What did I learn from Voices? I learned that all of the astronauts hate to be asked "what does it feel like to be on the moon." The astronauts are all engineers and not in touch with their feelings so this was the most difficult question for them to answer. I also learned that there was no suicide pill for them to take if they could not make it back to earth. I remember reporters talking about this pill and everyone I knew expected the astronauts to swallow one if necessary. Jim Lovell stated that a suicide pill was unnecessary because he could have just opened the vent valve and that would be it. He also said that none of the astronauts on the ill-fated Apollo 13 even thought about it because they never felt that it was impossible for them to get back to Earth. There were so many things that could have been done to get them back and not all of them were even attempted because they were able to return from space.
Voices From the Moon is a beautifully laid out book and would make a great coffee table book. It is a must read for everyone who grew up watching the missions on TV. It will bring back the feelings of awe, worry and fear that we all had as the missions were taking place.
-- Notes by VS
