Explorers on the Moon
Encyclopedia
Explorers on the Moon, published in 1954, is the seventeenth of The Adventures of Tintin
, a series of classic comic-strip albums, written and illustrated by Belgian writer and illustrator Hergé
, featuring young reporter Tintin
as a hero. Its original French title is On a marché sur la Lune ("We walked on the Moon"). It is the second of a two-part adventure begun in Destination Moon
.
. Professor Calculus
is taking Tintin, Tintin's dog Snowy
, Captain Haddock
and Calculus' assistant Frank Wolff to the Moon
in his rocket
. However, the detectives Thomson and Thompson
come up from the hold, having mistaken the time of the launch (1:34 a.m.
instead of 1:34 p.m.
) and been left on board while carrying out a final security check, putting the expedition at risk due to the new strain on the oxygen supply, designed for four people and Snowy and now forced to accommodate six.
The rest of the Moon journey remains not uneventful. The Thompsons accidentally turn off the nuclear power motor, which stops the artificial gravity and sends everyone floating until Tintin restarts the motor. Haddock has smuggled some whisky
aboard in hollowed-out books, becomes drunk, and engages in an unscheduled spacewalk
that results in him briefly becoming a satellite
of the asteroid
Adonis
. Tintin also dons a space suit to fetch him, and, in a very rare display of temper, berates the Captain for his recklessness. When the rocket engine must temporarily be shut down in order to execute the turnaround maneuver that will enable it to land on the Moon right side up, the momentary lack of artificial gravity
also poses problems for Haddock, who has neglected to put on his magnetic boots
in time. Additionally, Thomson and Thompson suffer a relapse of the condition caused by their ingestion of the energy-multiplying substance Formula Fourteen (see Land of Black Gold
); as a result, they once more sprout thick hair that grows at lightning speed and frequently changes color.
The spacecraft eventually lands safely in the Hipparchus Crater
, and by agreement among the crew, Tintin is the first to set foot on the Moon (the first human to do so). Everyone then gets a chance to walk about; even the Captain enjoys it, but upon seeing the Earth
, expresses unease over whether they will survive to see it again.
The crew soon starts unpacking the scientific payload - telescopes, cameras, and a battery-powered expedition tank. Calculus decides to reduce the total stay on the lunar surface from fourteen Earth days to six in order to conserve oxygen. Three days later, the Captain, Wolff and Tintin take the battery-powered tank to explore some stalactite
caves in the direction of the Ptolemaeus Crater
; inside a cave Snowy slips into an ice-covered fissure, damaging his two-way radio, and there is a minor drama in rescuing him, but they all return to the rocket safely.
Tintin decides to rest up and have lunch with Wolff while the Captain, Calculus, Thomson and Thompson immediately go out in the tank again on a 48-hour trip to explore the lunar caves in detail, as Calculus suspects they might find uranium
or radium
deposits there. A sudden turn of events occurs when the spy
plot broached in Destination Moon is revealed: Wolff has been working with a secret agent from a foreign power, the brutish and autocratic Colonel Jorgen, whom Tintin had previously encountered and defeated in King Ottokar's Sceptre
, has been hiding in the rocket since it was launched eight days previously (having been smuggled aboard along with technical equipment). When Tintin goes below to fetch some supplies for lunch, Jorgen knocks him out and binds him, then tries to seize control
of the rocket, which he plans to fly back to his own country, leaving the others marooned on the Moon.
Outside, from the Moon tank, the Captain, Calculus, Thomson and Thompson watch, horrified, as the rocket blasts off, but comes crashing back down and coming to rest. Jorgen wrongly accuses Wolff of sabotaging the launching gear and nearly shoots him, but Tintin stops him. Tintin has freed himself and succeeded in foiling the plot, but in order to do so had been forced to sabotage the rocket to prevent Jorgen's attempted liftoff. Wolff reveals to the stunned group his history of gambling debts, which Jorgen's employers have used to blackmail him into aiding them involuntarily. After the group interrogates Jorgen and Wolff, Tintin eventually locks them in the hold. Calculus determines that the crew needs at least four days to repair the damaged rocket, while the remaining oxygen supply will last at most four days.
Due to the strain on the oxygen supplies, the crew decides to abandon most of the equipment and to cut short the lunar stay. The repair work is completed slightly ahead of schedule after three days, and the rocket cleared for lift-off. Even so, shortly before lift-off, the Captain becomes the first among them to experience a bout of dizziness due to build-up of carbon dioxide
. The lift-off is successful, but the rocket is put off course, and by the time the crew awake from the liftoff-induced blackout and correct it, they have lost additional time and thus consumed more oxygen.
Halfway back to Earth, Jorgen escapes after overpowering the detectives, who have attempted to secure the prisoners more thoroughly. When Jorgen declares his intention to kill Tintin and the others, Wolff intervenes and a fight ensues; the gun goes off, killing Jorgen. However, even without Jorgen there isn't enough oxygen to make it home. Therefore, and also overcome with guilt, Wolff sacrifices himself by opening the airlock and going out into space while the others are unconscious, leaving behind a moving farewell note that asks for forgiveness.
The rest of the group continues towards Earth as their oxygen runs low. Everyone soon falls unconscious, but Tintin barely manages to set the rocket up to land on auto-pilot. After the ship lands, firemen break the door open. On the tarmac, everyone is revived, except for the Captain. A doctor is giving a prostrate Haddock oxygen, but fears that his heart is worn out because "It seems he was a great whisky drinker." Suddenly roused by the sound of the word "whisky", Captain Haddock wakes up with a start.
Everyone rejoices and a ground crew member returns with a bottle of whisky. In the bliss of the moment, Calculus joyfully announces that "we will return" to the Moon (referring to mankind in general), whereupon Haddock furiously declares that he will never be seen inside a rocket again. He then promptly walks away, only to trip and a fall over a stretcher in the midst of declaring that "Man's proper place ... is on dear old Earth!"
and several years before manned space flight. Hergé was keen to ensure that the books were scientifically accurate, based on ideas about space flight then available.
s, the only rockets to have struck popular imagination by the early 1950s. The similarity even goes as far as including the checkerboard pattern on the hull, which the V-2 designers used to measure the roll rate of a rocket during test flights.
No separate lunar lander is shown: The whole ship turns about on its axis, lands tail-down, and returns intact. This is in stark contrast to the real-life Saturn V
moon rockets, which, like virtually all modern rockets, were disposable, multistage rocket
s, and as such would separate into progressively smaller segments during ascent in order to save weight. The approach taken by Tintin's rocket is what NASA called a "direct ascent
". Such a mission profile was studied, and discarded by NASA engineers. In Tintin's case, it is made possible by the rocket's extremely efficient propulsion which, more than half a century later, remains much more capable than any real-life rocket propulsion system.
. The depicted rationale for this solution is to avoid contaminating takeoff and landing sites with radioactive exhaust products. Today, nuclear power is not widespread in space propulsion because of another safety risk, namely that of the reactor core or other radioactive materials falling back to Earth upon accidental or programmed destruction of the spacecraft. Hergé's rocket most closely resembles a nuclear thermal rocket, such as the design tested in the United States NERVA
project. One of the reasons for the cancellation of the NERVA project was the risk of radioactive particles being released in the rocket exhaust, so Hergé's chemical/nuclear combination makes sense.
Currently, nuclear power is only being used for space probe
propulsion. These, however, are nuclear electric rocket
s (nuclear-powered ion drives), which do not generate enough thrust to lift a heavy spacecraft off a planet. They give the probe a very small acceleration over a very long period of time, ideal for long-distance travel by an unmanned craft. This is, however, a completely different system to the one proposed by Hergé.
The book shows gravity being generated through the constant acceleration of the moon rocket. This is impossible with the chemical rockets in use today, which can only maintain their thrust for a few minutes before running out of fuel, but it could conceivably be achieved using high-powered nuclear pulse propulsion
.
shape by surface tension
.
There is a glaring flaw in the configuration of the rocket's acceleration couches, in which the explorers lie face-down. In reality, all launches have passengers lie on their backs, and the only worse position for a human being to endure acceleration than face-down would be heads-down. Hergé took the cue from the diagram of the Wernher von Braun
moonship, without realizing that the crew members who need to monitor the controls are prone, but everybody else in their acceleration stations are properly on their backs. The liftoff acceleration also seems to be significantly higher than that of existing real-life manned spacecraft: The crew passes out due to the tremendous G-force
s.
The reader is given the impression that the journey to and from the Moon is undertaken in just a few hours, whereas the Apollo Moon journey took about three days to reach the Moon from Earth. However, if the rocket accelerated constantly at one gravity for the first half of the trip and decelerated at the same rate for the second half, as the author implies, the flight from Earth to the Moon could have taken as little as three and a half hours.
Finally, the mission is allowed to continue unabated even when it is discovered that extra passengers are aboard, resulting in increased oxygen consumption. In reality, space missions are terminated as soon as possible if it is believed that oxygen supplies may be inadequate. This occurred during the Apollo 13
mission when a faulty wire in one of the spacecraft's oxygen tanks caused it to explode. Although the explosion occurred too late for the mission to turn back, the actual Moon landing did not occur and the astronauts returned to Earth as soon as was feasible.
's illustrations for Willy Ley
's book The Conquest of Space
and Collier's
"Man Will Conquer Space Soon!
" series.
The spacesuits are rigid and have fishbowl-like helmets made of glass-like "multiplex," with bulky integrated backpacks that permit radio communications with the ship and other astronauts. The main differences from the suits worn by the Apollo astronauts
are that they are apparently rigid, rather than soft, are orange rather than white, and the helmets lack sun-shielding
visors.
Hergé accurately represented the methods of movement on the Moon: the reduced gravity makes Tintin and friends hop in huge jumps.
In order to explore the surface of the Moon away from their landing site, Tintin and his crew bring a rover vehicle. This is similar to the last three Apollo missions, which also brought along a Lunar Roving Vehicle
(LRV). However, whereas the Apollo vehicle was extremely light, open, and seated two, Tintin's rover is actually more akin to a tank, is pressurized, which means the occupants can remove their spacesuits once inside, and seats four.
Tintin admits to have had no training in driving such a vehicle, a rather odd neglect, and it is only when they first try it out on the Moon that they decide that crash helmets should be worn while travelling in it.
The asteroid Adonis
is a real object, but despite being classed as a near-Earth asteroid, it never comes between the Earth and the Moon. However, its exact orbit was not known in the early 1950s.
Tintin stated that the stars appear, "frozen ... they don't twinkle like how they do on Earth." This is quite accurate because there is no atmosphere
on the Moon, so stars cannot twinkle. However, unless one landed on the dark side of the Moon, one could not see stars from the Moon due to the large amount of sunlight being reflected off the lunar surface.
Hergé was delighted to have predicted the lunar mission fairly accurately, given the limited knowledge at the time, and later he produced a four-page comic of Tintin, Haddock, Calculus and Snowy greeting Neil Armstrong
on the Moon.Shown for instance as an illustration in this.
set was also released. The Moon rocket has been used on various merchandise.
The Adventures of Tintin
The Adventures of Tintin is a series of classic comic books created by Belgian artist , who wrote under the pen name of Hergé...
, a series of classic comic-strip albums, written and illustrated by Belgian writer and illustrator Hergé
Hergé
Georges Prosper Remi , better known by the pen name Hergé, was a Belgian comics writer and artist. His best known and most substantial work is the 23 completed comic books in The Adventures of Tintin series, which he wrote and illustrated from 1929 until his death in 1983, although he was also...
, featuring young reporter Tintin
Tintin (character)
Tintin is a fictional character in The Adventures of Tintin, the series of classic Belgian comic books written and illustrated by Hergé. Tintin is the protagonist of the series, a reporter and adventurer who travels around the world with his dog Snowy....
as a hero. Its original French title is On a marché sur la Lune ("We walked on the Moon"). It is the second of a two-part adventure begun in Destination Moon
Destination Moon (Tintin)
Destination Moon is the sixteenth of The Adventures of Tintin, a series of classic comic-strip albums, written and illustrated by Belgian writer and illustrator Hergé, featuring young reporter Tintin as a hero...
.
Plot
The story continues from Destination MoonDestination Moon (Tintin)
Destination Moon is the sixteenth of The Adventures of Tintin, a series of classic comic-strip albums, written and illustrated by Belgian writer and illustrator Hergé, featuring young reporter Tintin as a hero...
. Professor Calculus
Professor Calculus
Professor Cuthbert Calculus is a fictional character in The Adventures of Tintin, the series of classic Belgian comic books written and illustrated by Hergé...
is taking Tintin, Tintin's dog Snowy
Snowy (character)
Snowy is a fictional character in The Adventures of Tintin, the series of classic Belgian comic books written and illustrated by Hergé. He is a white Wire Fox Terrier and Tintin's four-legged companion who travels everywhere with him...
, Captain Haddock
Captain Haddock
Captain Archibald Haddock is a fictional character in The Adventures of Tintin, the series of classic Belgian comic books written and illustrated by Hergé...
and Calculus' assistant Frank Wolff to the Moon
Moon
The Moon is Earth's only known natural satellite,There are a number of near-Earth asteroids including 3753 Cruithne that are co-orbital with Earth: their orbits bring them close to Earth for periods of time but then alter in the long term . These are quasi-satellites and not true moons. For more...
in his rocket
Rocket
A rocket is a missile, spacecraft, aircraft or other vehicle which obtains thrust from a rocket engine. In all rockets, the exhaust is formed entirely from propellants carried within the rocket before use. Rocket engines work by action and reaction...
. However, the detectives Thomson and Thompson
Thomson and Thompson
Thomson and Thompson are fictional characters in The Adventures of Tintin, the series of classic Belgian comic books written and illustrated by Hergé. Thomson and Thompson are detectives of Scotland Yard, and are as incompetent as they are necessary comic relief...
come up from the hold, having mistaken the time of the launch (1:34 a.m.
12-hour clock
The 12-hour clock is a time conversion convention in which the 24 hours of the day are divided into two periods called ante meridiem and post meridiem...
instead of 1:34 p.m.
12-hour clock
The 12-hour clock is a time conversion convention in which the 24 hours of the day are divided into two periods called ante meridiem and post meridiem...
) and been left on board while carrying out a final security check, putting the expedition at risk due to the new strain on the oxygen supply, designed for four people and Snowy and now forced to accommodate six.
The rest of the Moon journey remains not uneventful. The Thompsons accidentally turn off the nuclear power motor, which stops the artificial gravity and sends everyone floating until Tintin restarts the motor. Haddock has smuggled some whisky
Whisky
Whisky or whiskey is a type of distilled alcoholic beverage made from fermented grain mash. Different grains are used for different varieties, including barley, malted barley, rye, malted rye, wheat, and corn...
aboard in hollowed-out books, becomes drunk, and engages in an unscheduled spacewalk
Extra-vehicular activity
Extra-vehicular activity is work done by an astronaut away from the Earth, and outside of a spacecraft. The term most commonly applies to an EVA made outside a craft orbiting Earth , but also applies to an EVA made on the surface of the Moon...
that results in him briefly becoming a satellite
Satellite
In the context of spaceflight, a satellite is an object which has been placed into orbit by human endeavour. Such objects are sometimes called artificial satellites to distinguish them from natural satellites such as the Moon....
of the asteroid
Asteroid
Asteroids are a class of small Solar System bodies in orbit around the Sun. They have also been called planetoids, especially the larger ones...
Adonis
2101 Adonis
2101 Adonis was one of the first near-Earth asteroids to be discovered. It was discovered by Eugene Delporte in 1936 and named after Adonis, the beautiful youth with whom the goddess Venus fell in love...
. Tintin also dons a space suit to fetch him, and, in a very rare display of temper, berates the Captain for his recklessness. When the rocket engine must temporarily be shut down in order to execute the turnaround maneuver that will enable it to land on the Moon right side up, the momentary lack of artificial gravity
Artificial gravity
Artificial gravity is the varying of apparent gravity via artificial means, particularly in space, but also on the Earth...
also poses problems for Haddock, who has neglected to put on his magnetic boots
Magnetic boots
Magnetic boots are boots that are magnetic, which allows them to attach to the ferrous floor or hulls of a spacecraft during weightlessness, and presumably would allow someone to walk around the cabin of a spacecraft, but they would still feel weightless....
in time. Additionally, Thomson and Thompson suffer a relapse of the condition caused by their ingestion of the energy-multiplying substance Formula Fourteen (see Land of Black Gold
Land of Black Gold
Land of Black Gold is the fifteenth of The Adventures of Tintin, a series of classic comic-strip albums, written and illustrated by Belgian writer and illustrator Hergé, featuring young reporter Tintin as a hero....
); as a result, they once more sprout thick hair that grows at lightning speed and frequently changes color.
The spacecraft eventually lands safely in the Hipparchus Crater
Hipparchus (lunar crater)
Hipparchus is the degraded remnant of a lunar crater. It is located to the southeast of Sinus Medii, near the center of the visible Moon. To the south is the prominent crater Albategnius, and to the southwest lies Ptolemaeus, a feature of comparable dimensions to Hipparchus. Horrocks lies entirely...
, and by agreement among the crew, Tintin is the first to set foot on the Moon (the first human to do so). Everyone then gets a chance to walk about; even the Captain enjoys it, but upon seeing the Earth
Earth
Earth is the third planet from the Sun, and the densest and fifth-largest of the eight planets in the Solar System. It is also the largest of the Solar System's four terrestrial planets...
, expresses unease over whether they will survive to see it again.
The crew soon starts unpacking the scientific payload - telescopes, cameras, and a battery-powered expedition tank. Calculus decides to reduce the total stay on the lunar surface from fourteen Earth days to six in order to conserve oxygen. Three days later, the Captain, Wolff and Tintin take the battery-powered tank to explore some stalactite
Stalactite
A stalactite , "to drip", and meaning "that which drips") is a type of speleothem that hangs from the ceiling of limestone caves. It is a type of dripstone...
caves in the direction of the Ptolemaeus Crater
Ptolemaeus (lunar crater)
Ptolemaeus is an ancient lunar impact crater close to the center of the near side. To the south-southeast Ptolemaeus is joined to the rim of the crater Alphonsus by a section of rugged, irregular terrain, and these form a prominent chain with Arzachel to the south...
; inside a cave Snowy slips into an ice-covered fissure, damaging his two-way radio, and there is a minor drama in rescuing him, but they all return to the rocket safely.
Tintin decides to rest up and have lunch with Wolff while the Captain, Calculus, Thomson and Thompson immediately go out in the tank again on a 48-hour trip to explore the lunar caves in detail, as Calculus suspects they might find uranium
Uranium
Uranium is a silvery-white metallic chemical element in the actinide series of the periodic table, with atomic number 92. It is assigned the chemical symbol U. A uranium atom has 92 protons and 92 electrons, of which 6 are valence electrons...
or radium
Radium
Radium is a chemical element with atomic number 88, represented by the symbol Ra. Radium is an almost pure-white alkaline earth metal, but it readily oxidizes on exposure to air, becoming black in color. All isotopes of radium are highly radioactive, with the most stable isotope being radium-226,...
deposits there. A sudden turn of events occurs when the spy
Espionage
Espionage or spying involves an individual obtaining information that is considered secret or confidential without the permission of the holder of the information. Espionage is inherently clandestine, lest the legitimate holder of the information change plans or take other countermeasures once it...
plot broached in Destination Moon is revealed: Wolff has been working with a secret agent from a foreign power, the brutish and autocratic Colonel Jorgen, whom Tintin had previously encountered and defeated in King Ottokar's Sceptre
King Ottokar's Sceptre
King Ottokar's Sceptre is the eighth of The Adventures of Tintin, a series of classic comic-strip albums, written and illustrated by Belgian writer and illustrator Hergé, featuring the young reporter Tintin. It was first serialized as a black-and-white comic strip in Le Petit Vingtième on 4 August...
, has been hiding in the rocket since it was launched eight days previously (having been smuggled aboard along with technical equipment). When Tintin goes below to fetch some supplies for lunch, Jorgen knocks him out and binds him, then tries to seize control
Aircraft hijacking
Aircraft hijacking is the unlawful seizure of an aircraft by an individual or a group. In most cases, the pilot is forced to fly according to the orders of the hijackers. Occasionally, however, the hijackers have flown the aircraft themselves, such as the September 11 attacks of 2001...
of the rocket, which he plans to fly back to his own country, leaving the others marooned on the Moon.
Outside, from the Moon tank, the Captain, Calculus, Thomson and Thompson watch, horrified, as the rocket blasts off, but comes crashing back down and coming to rest. Jorgen wrongly accuses Wolff of sabotaging the launching gear and nearly shoots him, but Tintin stops him. Tintin has freed himself and succeeded in foiling the plot, but in order to do so had been forced to sabotage the rocket to prevent Jorgen's attempted liftoff. Wolff reveals to the stunned group his history of gambling debts, which Jorgen's employers have used to blackmail him into aiding them involuntarily. After the group interrogates Jorgen and Wolff, Tintin eventually locks them in the hold. Calculus determines that the crew needs at least four days to repair the damaged rocket, while the remaining oxygen supply will last at most four days.
Due to the strain on the oxygen supplies, the crew decides to abandon most of the equipment and to cut short the lunar stay. The repair work is completed slightly ahead of schedule after three days, and the rocket cleared for lift-off. Even so, shortly before lift-off, the Captain becomes the first among them to experience a bout of dizziness due to build-up of carbon dioxide
Carbon dioxide
Carbon dioxide is a naturally occurring chemical compound composed of two oxygen atoms covalently bonded to a single carbon atom...
. The lift-off is successful, but the rocket is put off course, and by the time the crew awake from the liftoff-induced blackout and correct it, they have lost additional time and thus consumed more oxygen.
Halfway back to Earth, Jorgen escapes after overpowering the detectives, who have attempted to secure the prisoners more thoroughly. When Jorgen declares his intention to kill Tintin and the others, Wolff intervenes and a fight ensues; the gun goes off, killing Jorgen. However, even without Jorgen there isn't enough oxygen to make it home. Therefore, and also overcome with guilt, Wolff sacrifices himself by opening the airlock and going out into space while the others are unconscious, leaving behind a moving farewell note that asks for forgiveness.
The rest of the group continues towards Earth as their oxygen runs low. Everyone soon falls unconscious, but Tintin barely manages to set the rocket up to land on auto-pilot. After the ship lands, firemen break the door open. On the tarmac, everyone is revived, except for the Captain. A doctor is giving a prostrate Haddock oxygen, but fears that his heart is worn out because "It seems he was a great whisky drinker." Suddenly roused by the sound of the word "whisky", Captain Haddock wakes up with a start.
Everyone rejoices and a ground crew member returns with a bottle of whisky. In the bliss of the moment, Calculus joyfully announces that "we will return" to the Moon (referring to mankind in general), whereupon Haddock furiously declares that he will never be seen inside a rocket again. He then promptly walks away, only to trip and a fall over a stretcher in the midst of declaring that "Man's proper place ... is on dear old Earth!"
Scientific accuracy/inaccuracy
Destination Moon and Explorers on the Moon were written well over a decade before the 1969 Apollo 11 Moon landingApollo 11
In early 1969, Bill Anders accepted a job with the National Space Council effective in August 1969 and announced his retirement as an astronaut. At that point Ken Mattingly was moved from the support crew into parallel training with Anders as backup Command Module Pilot in case Apollo 11 was...
and several years before manned space flight. Hergé was keen to ensure that the books were scientifically accurate, based on ideas about space flight then available.
Rocket
The rockets bear a striking physical resemblance to V-2 rocketV-2 rocket
The V-2 rocket , technical name Aggregat-4 , was a ballistic missile that was developed at the beginning of the Second World War in Germany, specifically targeted at London and later Antwerp. The liquid-propellant rocket was the world's first long-range combat-ballistic missile and first known...
s, the only rockets to have struck popular imagination by the early 1950s. The similarity even goes as far as including the checkerboard pattern on the hull, which the V-2 designers used to measure the roll rate of a rocket during test flights.
No separate lunar lander is shown: The whole ship turns about on its axis, lands tail-down, and returns intact. This is in stark contrast to the real-life Saturn V
Saturn V
The Saturn V was an American human-rated expendable rocket used by NASA's Apollo and Skylab programs from 1967 until 1973. A multistage liquid-fueled launch vehicle, NASA launched 13 Saturn Vs from the Kennedy Space Center, Florida with no loss of crew or payload...
moon rockets, which, like virtually all modern rockets, were disposable, multistage rocket
Multistage rocket
A multistage rocket is a rocket that usestwo or more stages, each of which contains its own engines and propellant. A tandem or serial stage is mounted on top of another stage; a parallel stage is attached alongside another stage. The result is effectively two or more rockets stacked on top of or...
s, and as such would separate into progressively smaller segments during ascent in order to save weight. The approach taken by Tintin's rocket is what NASA called a "direct ascent
Direct ascent
Direct ascent was a proposed method for a mission to the Moon. In the United States, direct ascent proposed using the enormous Nova rocket to launch a spacecraft directly to the Moon, where it would land tail-first and then launch off the Moon back to Earth...
". Such a mission profile was studied, and discarded by NASA engineers. In Tintin's case, it is made possible by the rocket's extremely efficient propulsion which, more than half a century later, remains much more capable than any real-life rocket propulsion system.
Rocket engine
Hergé's rocket has two propulsion systems — a conventional liquid-fueled chemical rocket engine for launching (and also for deceleration upon landing), and an engine for the spacebound part (>800 km altitude) of the journey, described as being nuclear-poweredNuclear thermal rocket
In a nuclear thermal rocket a working fluid, usually liquid hydrogen, is heated to a high temperature in a nuclear reactor, and then expands through a rocket nozzle to create thrust. In this kind of thermal rocket, the nuclear reactor's energy replaces the chemical energy of the propellant's...
. The depicted rationale for this solution is to avoid contaminating takeoff and landing sites with radioactive exhaust products. Today, nuclear power is not widespread in space propulsion because of another safety risk, namely that of the reactor core or other radioactive materials falling back to Earth upon accidental or programmed destruction of the spacecraft. Hergé's rocket most closely resembles a nuclear thermal rocket, such as the design tested in the United States NERVA
NERVA
NERVA is an acronym for Nuclear Engine for Rocket Vehicle Application, a joint program of the U.S. Atomic Energy Commission and NASA managed by the Space Nuclear Propulsion Office until both the program and the office ended at the end of 1972....
project. One of the reasons for the cancellation of the NERVA project was the risk of radioactive particles being released in the rocket exhaust, so Hergé's chemical/nuclear combination makes sense.
Currently, nuclear power is only being used for space probe
Space probe
A robotic spacecraft is a spacecraft with no humans on board, that is usually under telerobotic control. A robotic spacecraft designed to make scientific research measurements is often called a space probe. Many space missions are more suited to telerobotic rather than crewed operation, due to...
propulsion. These, however, are nuclear electric rocket
Nuclear electric rocket
In a nuclear electric rocket, nuclear thermal energy is changed into electrical energy that is used to power one of the electrical propulsion technologies. Technically the powerplant is nuclear, not the propulsion system, but the terminology is standard. A number of heat-to-electricity schemes...
s (nuclear-powered ion drives), which do not generate enough thrust to lift a heavy spacecraft off a planet. They give the probe a very small acceleration over a very long period of time, ideal for long-distance travel by an unmanned craft. This is, however, a completely different system to the one proposed by Hergé.
The book shows gravity being generated through the constant acceleration of the moon rocket. This is impossible with the chemical rockets in use today, which can only maintain their thrust for a few minutes before running out of fuel, but it could conceivably be achieved using high-powered nuclear pulse propulsion
Nuclear pulse propulsion
Nuclear pulse propulsion is a proposed method of spacecraft propulsion that uses nuclear explosions for thrust. It was first developed as Project Orion by DARPA, after a suggestion by Stanislaw Ulam in 1947...
.
Space travel
When the rocket is turned around halfway through the journey (to decelerate), the crew experiences weightlessness for a short time, and the effects of this weightlessness are correctly portrayed, including floating liquid held into a sphericalSphere
A sphere is a perfectly round geometrical object in three-dimensional space, such as the shape of a round ball. Like a circle in two dimensions, a perfect sphere is completely symmetrical around its center, with all points on the surface lying the same distance r from the center point...
shape by surface tension
Surface tension
Surface tension is a property of the surface of a liquid that allows it to resist an external force. It is revealed, for example, in floating of some objects on the surface of water, even though they are denser than water, and in the ability of some insects to run on the water surface...
.
There is a glaring flaw in the configuration of the rocket's acceleration couches, in which the explorers lie face-down. In reality, all launches have passengers lie on their backs, and the only worse position for a human being to endure acceleration than face-down would be heads-down. Hergé took the cue from the diagram of the Wernher von Braun
Wernher von Braun
Wernher Magnus Maximilian, Freiherr von Braun was a German rocket scientist, aerospace engineer, space architect, and one of the leading figures in the development of rocket technology in Nazi Germany during World War II and in the United States after that.A former member of the Nazi party,...
moonship, without realizing that the crew members who need to monitor the controls are prone, but everybody else in their acceleration stations are properly on their backs. The liftoff acceleration also seems to be significantly higher than that of existing real-life manned spacecraft: The crew passes out due to the tremendous G-force
G-force
The g-force associated with an object is its acceleration relative to free-fall. This acceleration experienced by an object is due to the vector sum of non-gravitational forces acting on an object free to move. The accelerations that are not produced by gravity are termed proper accelerations, and...
s.
The reader is given the impression that the journey to and from the Moon is undertaken in just a few hours, whereas the Apollo Moon journey took about three days to reach the Moon from Earth. However, if the rocket accelerated constantly at one gravity for the first half of the trip and decelerated at the same rate for the second half, as the author implies, the flight from Earth to the Moon could have taken as little as three and a half hours.
Finally, the mission is allowed to continue unabated even when it is discovered that extra passengers are aboard, resulting in increased oxygen consumption. In reality, space missions are terminated as soon as possible if it is believed that oxygen supplies may be inadequate. This occurred during the Apollo 13
Apollo 13
Apollo 13 was the seventh manned mission in the American Apollo space program and the third intended to land on the Moon. The craft was launched on April 11, 1970, at 13:13 CST. The landing was aborted after an oxygen tank exploded two days later, crippling the service module upon which the Command...
mission when a faulty wire in one of the spacecraft's oxygen tanks caused it to explode. Although the explosion occurred too late for the mission to turn back, the actual Moon landing did not occur and the astronauts returned to Earth as soon as was feasible.
Lunar exploration
When the comic was created, nobody had actually visited the lunar surface, so the drawings were based on Chesley BonestellChesley Bonestell
Chesley Bonestell was an American painter, designer and illustrator. His paintings were a major influence on science fiction art and illustration, and he helped inspire the American space program...
's illustrations for Willy Ley
Willy Ley
Willy Ley was a German-American science writer and space advocate who helped popularize rocketry and spaceflight in both Germany and the United States. The crater Ley on the far side of the Moon is named in his honor.-Life:...
's book The Conquest of Space
The Conquest of Space
The Conquest of Space is a 1949 speculative science book illustrated by Chesley Bonestell and written by Willy Ley. The book contains a portfolio of paintings by Bonestell depicting the possible future exploration of the solar system with explanatory text by Ley.Some of Bonestell's designs inspired...
and Collier's
Collier's Weekly
Collier's Weekly was an American magazine founded by Peter Fenelon Collier and published from 1888 to 1957. With the passage of decades, the title was shortened to Collier's....
"Man Will Conquer Space Soon!
Man Will Conquer Space Soon!
Man Will Conquer Space Soon! was the title of a famous series of 1950s magazine articles in Collier's detailing Wernher von Braun's plans for manned spaceflight. Edited by Cornelius Ryan, the individual articles were authored by such space notables of the time as Willy Ley, Fred Lawrence Whipple,...
" series.
The spacesuits are rigid and have fishbowl-like helmets made of glass-like "multiplex," with bulky integrated backpacks that permit radio communications with the ship and other astronauts. The main differences from the suits worn by the Apollo astronauts
Apollo/Skylab A7L
The A7L Apollo & Skylab spacesuit is the primary pressure suit worn by NASA astronauts for Project Apollo, the three manned Skylab flights, and the Apollo-Soyuz Test Project between 1968 and the termination of the Apollo program in 1975. The "A7L" designation is used by NASA as the seventh Apollo...
are that they are apparently rigid, rather than soft, are orange rather than white, and the helmets lack sun-shielding
Sunglasses
Sunglasses or sun glasses are a form of protective eyewear designed primarily to prevent bright sunlight and high-energy visible light from damaging or discomforting the eyes. They can sometimes also function as a visual aid, as variously termed spectacles or glasses exist, featuring lenses that...
visors.
Hergé accurately represented the methods of movement on the Moon: the reduced gravity makes Tintin and friends hop in huge jumps.
In order to explore the surface of the Moon away from their landing site, Tintin and his crew bring a rover vehicle. This is similar to the last three Apollo missions, which also brought along a Lunar Roving Vehicle
Lunar rover
The Lunar Roving Vehicle or lunar rover was a battery-powered four-wheeled rover used on the Moon in the last three missions of the American Apollo program during 1971 and 1972...
(LRV). However, whereas the Apollo vehicle was extremely light, open, and seated two, Tintin's rover is actually more akin to a tank, is pressurized, which means the occupants can remove their spacesuits once inside, and seats four.
Tintin admits to have had no training in driving such a vehicle, a rather odd neglect, and it is only when they first try it out on the Moon that they decide that crash helmets should be worn while travelling in it.
Water
In one part of the story, Tintin and Snowy accidentally discover frozen water beneath the surface of the Moon. When the Moon landings were completed, many experts felt the Moon was bone dry, so this would have been an inaccuracy. In 2009, however, evidence has shown a strong probability that water ice does exist in certain lunar regions.Astronomy
Notable failings in Hergé's story include the representation of the Earth as seen from space (there are no clouds), and the lunar landscape, which is represented as craggy, unlike the smooth, undulating hills of reality.The asteroid Adonis
2101 Adonis
2101 Adonis was one of the first near-Earth asteroids to be discovered. It was discovered by Eugene Delporte in 1936 and named after Adonis, the beautiful youth with whom the goddess Venus fell in love...
is a real object, but despite being classed as a near-Earth asteroid, it never comes between the Earth and the Moon. However, its exact orbit was not known in the early 1950s.
Tintin stated that the stars appear, "frozen ... they don't twinkle like how they do on Earth." This is quite accurate because there is no atmosphere
Atmosphere
An atmosphere is a layer of gases that may surround a material body of sufficient mass, and that is held in place by the gravity of the body. An atmosphere may be retained for a longer duration, if the gravity is high and the atmosphere's temperature is low...
on the Moon, so stars cannot twinkle. However, unless one landed on the dark side of the Moon, one could not see stars from the Moon due to the large amount of sunlight being reflected off the lunar surface.
Hergé was delighted to have predicted the lunar mission fairly accurately, given the limited knowledge at the time, and later he produced a four-page comic of Tintin, Haddock, Calculus and Snowy greeting Neil Armstrong
Neil Armstrong
Neil Alden Armstrong is an American former astronaut, test pilot, aerospace engineer, university professor, United States Naval Aviator, and the first person to set foot upon the Moon....
on the Moon.Shown for instance as an illustration in this.
Merchandise
Various merchandise has been released about this book. In the United States, a pop-up-version was made. A View-MasterView-Master
View-Master is a device for viewing seven 3-D images on a paper disk. Although the View-Master is now considered a children's toy, it was originally marketed as a way for viewers to enjoy stereograms of colorful and picturesque tourist attractions.-1939–66: stereoscopic sightseeing:In 1911,...
set was also released. The Moon rocket has been used on various merchandise.
External links
- Explorers on the Moon at Tintinologist.org