With the alarms sounding and a menacing boulder field below, Armstrong maneuvers for two long minutes in the final landing program before settling into the lunar dust of the Sea of Tranquility. "Roger, We got ya - we're GO on that alarm," replies astronaut Charlie Duke, who is serving as Capcom, the only man in mission control who speaks directly to the crew.Īs the landing proceeds, four more alarms of the same or similar type occur. "Give us a reading on the 1202 program alarm," says Armstrong, sounding tense.
CHEAT CODES FOR DESCENT SPACE CODE
He has seen this error code before during training and simulations and realizes that the LM can keep flying.įifteen seconds have gone by. In a back room in Houston, Jack Garman consults his handwritten "cheat sheet" that listed potential emergency error codes. It was the inspired decision of MIT computer scientist Charley Muntz to call upon it if certain unusual problems occurred in the software. The restart capability was originally developed to cope with brief power outages. The computations in progress are reconstructed from scratch. There is concern in the SCAMA room because they know that when that alarm occurs, a computer restart is commanded, and that is scary. The slots where the operating system stores data about jobs in progress are all used up. The 1202 priority alarm is interrupting the astronaut's normal mission displays to warn them that something is wrong. "It's a 1202," says Armstrong, and Aldrin echoes, "1202." Quickly Aldrin keys the DSKY to see the alarm code. Aldrin keys in Verb 16 Noun 68 Enter, to select a display of radar data on the DSKY - and it is here that the landing goes off the rails. Two indicators on the DSKY panel are lit, but as the LM passes through an altitude of 38,000 feet the lamp labeled ALT goes out, then the one labeled VEL - signals that the landing radar has locked onto the surface and is measuring altitude and velocity. The LM is flying feet first, thrusting directly against its orbital velocity. At zero - the moment NASA calls "powered descent initiation" - the engine bursts into flame. The spacecraft maneuvers to the correct attitude and the countdown begins. The guidance equation must shape a fuel-efficient trajectory that affords visibility of the surface to the crew, enables them to bend the trajectory toward a new site, and operates the descent engine within its constraints.
CHEAT CODES FOR DESCENT SPACE SOFTWARE
He is calling up the most complex software ever to operate any vehicle, much less a spacecraft. While Neil Armstrong pilots the LM, Buzz Aldrin, keys commands into the guidance computer via the DSKY (Display Keyboard), Verb 37 Enter 63 Enter. Meanwhile, a quarter of a million miles away a manned spacecraft emerged from behind the moon in lunar orbit about 50,000 feet above the cratered surface, where the moon landing burn would begin. MIT engineers had followed the mission since liftoff, but now, as the LM approached the designated landing spot, the SCAMA room was getting crowded. The MIT Instrumentation Lab was responsible for the design and programming of the hardware and software of the primary guidance system for both the LM and the CM - the brain and central nervous system of the spacecraft. Some members of the Lab were at the Manned Spacecraft Center in Houston while others listened in over a squawk box in a conference room at the Lab called the SCAMA room. Michael Collins would remain in the Command and Service Module (CM) in lunar orbit, as the lifeline for Armstrong and Aldrin to return home. Apollo 11 would attempt to go the rest of the way, but no one knew what surprises might lurk in those last few vertical miles.Īstronauts Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin would pilot the Lunar Module (LM). The previous mission had descended to within 10 miles of the lunar surface.
Apollo 11 was the mission that enabled humans to land on the moon in 1969. "One small step for man, one giant leap for mankind." But it almost didn't happen.
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