Over the weekend, the world celebrated the 50th anniversary of man landing on the moon.
But there are still a bunch of whackjobs out there who think it was all fake, including one guy who once confronted astronaut Buzz Aldrin, who promptly punched him in the face.
On July 20, 1969, American astronauts Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin were the first humans ever to step on the moon. In an amazing technological feat for the time, images from the historic moonwalk were beamed back to earth, where billions watched live in awe.
But Bart Sibrel, 55, says it never happened, and he claims to have “undeniable” proof to back up his outrageous claim.
Sibrel says the moon landing was a “Cold War CIA and Nixon administration deception,” Florida Today reports. And Sibrel says he has plenty of evidence, including “recordings, photographic analysis, and high profile interviews with those involved in the space program.”
“I met a man who worked on the ‘Apollo’ program for six years, who had top security clearances, who said that the missions were staged to avert international humiliation after the naive boast to do so with 1960’s technology,” Sibrel wrote in an email to FLORIDA TODAY.
In that same email, Sibrel asserted that he has a secret audio track of the CIA directing the illusion of a “fake” moon landing as well as supposed verification from an NBC news director — whose name was not disclosed — confirming Apollo 11 photos to be fake.
“Not a single critic has ever explained, in this federal government’s alleged picture from the moon, how two shadows in sunlight, from objects five feet apart from one another, can intersect at 90 degrees,” Sibrel wrote.
“Go outside yourself and see if this can take place in sunlight. It is completely impossible.”
For the record, the “MythBusters” TV show once made a meticulously detailed set of the moon landing site to test that very claim and “discovered the sun-like lamp shining on the uneven surface did indeed cast non-parallel shadows on the mini-astronaut and imitation moon rocks,” Florida Today reported.
What’s more, some 400,000 people worked on the moon-landing project. Is it conceivable that thousands of people — or tens of thousands or hundreds of thousands — are keeping such an incredible secret?
Sibrel, though, says the only proof was provided by the government. “The only evidence submitted to support it was entirely controlled and provided by those perpetrating the fraud,” he said.
“This conspiracy is the most symbolic of government arrogance,” Sibrel told The Sun, a British newspaper.
“It was totally 100 per cent contrived — none of it is true — yet they held ticker tape parade for these guys and gave them congressional medals of honour. It was a needless lie really just done for no reason other than arrogance and greed. And it makes a sucker out of every American who believes it is true,” he said.
Sibrel also told the paper that he has a source who “was there when they filmed the fake first moon landing.”
“I have the name of the air force base where it was filmed. I have the techniques they used to do it. I have the codename for the project. … I have the list of President Johnson’s personal visitors who were allowed in the place. My source was in charges with security for the event. That’s how he got the list and gave it to me. He even confessed that he was responsible for killing somebody to keep it a secret,” Sibrel said.
Sibrel and Aldrin have met before. Aldrin was confronted on the street in 2002 by Sibrel, who called him a “thief, liar and coward.” Sibrel was 37 and Aldrin 72, but Aldrin socked him right in the kisser (this is the best mashup video of the incident).
Last year, the feisty Aldrin also weighed in the movie “First Man,” a biopic about the first man to step on the moon. The movie stars actor Ryan Gosling — but not the American flag. The moment when the U.S. flag was planted on the moon was omitted from the movie because, as Gosling said, “I think this was widely regarded in the end as a human achievement [and] that’s how we chose to view it.”
Aldrin tweeted a picture of the flag planted on the moon during the landing in 1969.
He hashtagged the photo: “Proud to be an American.” Aldrin also re-tweeted a photo of him saluting next to the same picture, saluting.
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