We are five and a half minutes to the moon. Tension goes “through the roof”. Neil Armstrong takes control and the fuel starts to run out. In Mission Control, flight controllers count down to 60 seconds of fuel remaining – and then 30 seconds… With Kevin Fong. Starring: Steve Bales Charlie Duke Gerry Griffin Courtesy of the Johnson Space Center Oral History Project: Neil Armstrong Gene Kranz Jack Garman Bob Carlton Theme music by Hans Zimmer for Bleeding Fingers Music #13MinutestotheMoon www.bbcworldservice.com/13minutes
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We pick up just short of where we ended episode eight more than halfway through Apollo Eleven's final descent to the Luma surface.
Ok, 730 coming up.
730 coming up.
That's Neil Armstrong marking the time elapsed since they started firing the engine on the lunar module, committing them to a landing.
That thrust has slammed the brakes on their spacecraft with a dramatic loss of speed and altitude, taking them from 50,000ft to where they are now at 16,000ft, 5000 meters.
Remember, until now, Eagle has been flying on its side, feet first, with the astronauts lying on their backs, looking out into space.
But now the Lem's beginning to tilt, bringing Armstrong's head up a little.
And he catches a tantalizing glimpse of the moon at the bottom of his window.
And I have the window.
I have the two out the window.
They're in the thick of the fight, having already battled with patchy communications and an overloaded computer.
And they know they're going to overshoot their planned landing site by several miles, taking them into hazardous territory.
But the greatest challenge is yet to come.
Time and fuel are running out, and Armstrong will be forced to fly the lunar module like it's never been flown before.