What if NASA had asked Google to fake the Apollo 11 Moon landing?

This animation using Google Earth's view of the Moon follows the lunar landing module in its powered descent from 50,000 feet, when it was travelling at 5,365 feet per second, through to the landing in the Sea of Tranquillity.

The astronauts, Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin, began the descent head down and feet first so they could monitor their approach by looking out for landmarks along the flight path.

At a suitable point, the lunar module was yawed so the astronauts were facing away from the Moon. Then they pitched up so they could see the landing area.

I used my TourMaker software to prepare this animation. The programme generates KML (Keyhole Markup Language) statements that move and orient the model of the lunar module. Both the model and the following camera move along cubic spline curves that pass through successive points of a KML Linestring element.

The model was downloaded from the Sketchup 3D Warehouse: [ Ссылка ]

The audio of ground control, the control and service module, and the lunar module, was extracted from Internet Archive files: [ Ссылка ]

My main disappointment with the finished product is the low resolution of the lunar surface in Google Earth's model of the Moon.

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