Friday, July 17, 2009

NASA erased Apollo 11 Moonwalk Videotapes to save money on tapes

NASA

Video of Moonwalk From 1969 Restored

NASA on Thursday unveiled refurbished video of the first human landing on the moon, restored after it became clear that the original tapes of the July 20, 1969, moonwalk had been erased and reused.

NASA admitted in 2006 that no one could find the original video recordings of Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin's landing. Since then, Richard Nafzger, an engineer at the Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, found where the footage went: It was in a batch of 200,000 tapes that were degaussed -- magnetically erased -- and reused to save money.

So NASA took television video copies of what Apollo 11 beamed to Earth 40 years ago to a Hollywood film-restoration company, which made the pictures look sharper.

NASA emphasized that the video isn't 'new' -- just better-quality."

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