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    We Recreated The Moon Landing To See If It Could've Been Faked

    Live from the moon, it’s… NASA?

    One of the classic conspiracy theories of our time is that man’s first steps on the moon were faked:

    View this video on YouTube

    BuzzFeedBlue / Via youtube.com

    We learned in history class that Neil Armstrong was the first man on the moon, famously saying, “That's one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind,” on July 20, 1969.

    Ever since Neil Armstrong hopped off that ladder, some people have questioned whether the moon landing really happened.

    There are some valid questions to explore about the moon landing, though...

    Why was the American flag waving in the wind? There's no wind in space!

    But how did NASA film on the moon?

    If Neil Armstrong was the first man on the moon, then how were his first steps filmed?

    How did NASA broadcast live?

    So the thing to keep in mind is, “live” doesn’t necessarily mean instantaneous, especially in 1969. Even today, in 2016, Facebook Live often has a slight delay.

    Broadcasting live from the moon was a process. First, Lebar had to create a whole new format for broadcast, because the part of the broadcast spectrum that TV usually used was instead being used to communicate with mission control. As footage was filmed, it was sent to tracking stations at observatories in Australia, Spain, and California. At the tracking stations, the footage was converted back to the correct spectrum for TV and sent to NASA's mission control in Houston, TX. From there, mission control sent the footage to the broadcast stations, who beamed it out to at least 500 million people who were watching.

    NASA has a ton of documentation of the moon landing, but the one thing they'll never have is independent verification.

    Typically, when scientists and researchers want to make a new scientific claim, they must get third-party, independent verification of their discovery before it is published in scientific journals. The most convincing point that conspiracy theories have brought forth is that 100% of the moon landing evidence comes from NASA itself.

    The way NASA tells it, the reason why they felt it was so important for them to film the moon landing was because this acted as their verification - they knew no one would believe them if there wasn't visual proof. But does this explanation actually feed the conspiracies?

    With all this in mind, we decided to try and find out if it was even possible for the moon landing to be faked.

    The final product:

    On the left, the original moon landing in 1969. On the right, BuzzFeed's recreation in 2016.

    On the left, the original moon landing in 1969. On the right, BuzzFeed's recreation in 2016.

    Left: NASA | Right: BuzzFeed

    On the left, the original moon landing in 1969. On the right, BuzzFeed's recreation in 2016.