Interesting Facts

Neil Armstrong and Edwin "Buzz" Aldrin spent a total of 21 hours on the Moon, two-and-a-half of them outside the landing module.  They left a plaque, which read, "Here men from the planet Earth first set foot upon the Moon July 1969 AD. We came in peace for all mankind." " Neil Armstrong pose ".  via  Wikimedia Commons . (The astronauts, including Michael Collins, returned to Earth on 24th July, where they spent the next 21 days in quarantine at an American military base - a procedure dropped in subsequent missions since no alien organisms were found.)

According to curators at the Rijksmuseum in Amsterdam, a treasured piece on display - a supposed moon rock from the first manned lunar landing - is nothing more than a piece of petrified wood. (It was given to former Prime Minister Willem Drees during a goodwill tour by the three Apollo-11 astronauts shortly after their moon mission in 1969. Seemingly NASA gave 'moon rocks' to more than 100 countries following lunar missions in the 1970s. They might want to check them out. The Rijksmuseum, which is perhaps better known for paintings by artists such as Rembrandt, says it will keep the piece as a curiosity.) Source: BBC News

powered by ODEO Astronauts wear nappies during launch and re-entry because they can't stop what they're doing should they need to urinate. (Of course they don't call them nappies, they call them "Maximum Absorbency Garments". Still, I wonder if kids would still want to be astronauts if they were told this little snippet?)

The rings around Saturn are fluffy. (There's something about this idea that I like. Fluffy sounds nice. Makes you want to be an astronaut.)