ASTRONAUTS FIRST ENCOUNTER GALACTIC COSMIC RADIATION Shortly after the crew of Apollo 11 had fired their Saturn thrusters to begin their journey to the moon the strange flashes in their eyes were noted. They were out about 96,000 miles and Earth wasn’t much bigger than a good-sized marble held at arms length. There was no pattern, simply an occasionally and variable flash now and then when they closed their eyes for a moment or were in a dark area of the cabin. Neil noted them at first and after sitting on the observation for awhile decided to mention it to Mike and Buzz, “Hey, have you guys noticed any unusual flashes of light?” Both nodded their heads calmly in the affirmative while they took turns positioning themselves before a small window to better view the extraordinary sight of planet Earth slowly receding. “What do you guys think it is?” Neil asked calmly. They both shrugged. “I thought it was just me,” Mike reported. “So did I,” Buzz added. Neil thought for a while and then shrugged. “Since we all are seeing it,” Neil asked his companions, “do you think we ought to report it?” Mike and Buzz just shrugged. “You never know what those guys will do,” Buzz offered. Then he said with a grin, “What can they do now, bring us home?” All three astronauts chuckled at that. “But you’d better play it down since we seem to be okay, “ Buzz added.“ ”Hell of a note,” Mike added. “You guys might have to ride around with me instead of hogging all the glory. “Maybe I ought to at least mention it,” Neil replied, “but why don’t we hold off for a day or so. We don’t want to upset anybody down in Houston. They’ve got enough on their minds.” So when visual flashes finally were reported back to mission control it was during their return home leg, several days later. Still later, when they found the emulsion plates all streaked NASA types knew they had a problem. These little retinal flashes represented cosmic radiation. Likely they were nuclei of certain elements stripped of their electrons and whizzing through space at near light speed. And just because we saw them as flashes of light did not mean they were confined to just the eyes. The eyes were faithfully recording hits that were occurring in the brain and by inference the entire body. Consternation reigned throughout NASA headquarters. “What could be the consequences of this observation?” was a frequently asked question in Washington circles but there were few satisfying answers. The first question was one of danger to the astronauts and it was quickly established that mission durations of a week or so represented no threat to astronaut health but the implication for longer missions outside the protective electromagnetic shield of Earth were serious, indeed.
Posted on: Mon, 23 Sep 2013 22:12:47 +0000