Adam Sees One of National Air and Space's Favorite Artifacts!
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- Опубліковано 8 лют 2025
- The wonderful Smithsonian curators had a lot of surprises for Adam during his visit to the National Air and Space Museum, and one of them was this camera from the Surveyor III spacecraft! Curator Matt Shindell takes Adam on a tour of this artifact and explains what makes it so extraordinary.
Shot and edited by Joey Fameli
Produced by Kristen Lomasney
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Thanks for watching!
#AdamSavage #Smithsonian #SurveyorCamera
As a life long space nerd I’m totally aghast that I had no idea about this. After so many years it’s fun to discover something major that I did not know. Thanks for the video Adam.
SAME! Huge space nerd and I have never even seen this mentioned once in any book or museum. I don't even remember seeing this at the A&S. That's crazy.
Thank you for the comment! We're happy this video meant something to you!
Same! Totally off my radar
Same
The original news reports said that there was still bacteria alive in the optics from a sneeze. Recent reports deny this.
Omg that’s sooooo cool. As a space nerd that’s the coolest thing I’ve seen all day. Keep it up Adam
Thank you, Adam, for showing us these artifacts. I doubt I will ever make it to the Smithsonian to be able to view it for myself. I remember being glued to the TV watching the launches of the Mercury, Gemini, & Apollo missions. And I vaguely remember about this camera being retrieved. What a wonderful item to see.
So cool to see this camera, thank you Adam for sharing this. And thank you Matt, I hope I can see it on display someday. Awesome. Made my day.
Ooooh, aaaaah. I didn't realize they brought back such a big piece!
So much bigger than I thought. I had read about the camera retrieval, but I assumed something much smaller. How the heck did Al and Pete carry that thing and bunch of moon rocks all the way back to the LM? They didn't have a lunar rover or anything.
@@andrewfarrow4699 They landed really, really close.
@@CuriousMarc pretty close, but they took a long walk arround that crater to get back the LM. EVA 2. Nearly 4 hours outside the spacecraft.
@@andrewfarrow4699 Wow! That is long for the second time on the Moon!
that's really neat to see, that was a fun episode of From the Earth to the Moon. from what i remember NASA also did it to prove they could land in a precise spot, after apollo 11's kinda frantic landing.
You are correct
this is a such a great and underated series. It was so hard to get for the longest time as lacked digital copies and got ridof dvd player somany years ago, but now available on amazon..
A great series - i can still hear the Tom Hank intros and emphasis on the delivery of "...from the Earth to the MOON"!
The picture of Pete Cerran standing next to Surveyor 3 with the LEM in the background is my favorite picture of the Apollo era and hangs proudly on my wall. I'm a nerd what can I say.
I recognized it from the thumbnail and I'm sort of surprised that Adam didn't know what it was. It's a wonderful piece of space history
I just love your immense curiosity, good nature and youthful excitement. Dont EVER change!
I knew what this was as soon as I saw it. I was twelve years old when Apollo 12 landed on the Ocean of Storms. The astronauts (Pete Conrad and Al Bean) saw Surveyor III as soon as they touched down. There are some great pictures of the astronauts standing beside Surveyor with the LM in the background. The camera we see here is clearly visible in the photos. (That was before it was removed, of course.) Thanks, Adam!
The photos you mention are some of my favorite space exploration photos ever!
That's cool, I knew they brought stuff back, but didn't know it was on display. Also that would make an awesome build series of you trying to replicate it.
Seeing the “only sample that exists”, no matter what it is, must be pretty thrilling. 🚀🌑
Idk, I'm the only one of me that exists and I'm never that thrilled to see myself in the mirror.
We were all truly honored.
@@tested How long ago were you in DC?
"only sample that exists" ... on Earth :-)
I was pretty disappointed when the doctor just threw mine in a "biohazardous waste disposal" bin.
I have a comment about the dust damage. My uncle Dr. James L Carter was the gemochemist that unlocked the make up of lunar dust and made several tons of it for NASA to study and test. When he passed in 2019, I made his burial urn, and mixed some of it with epoxy to make a feature on the urn. It was very fine, but in the epoxy it removed the edge from my tools. I had to spend 10 minutes re-profiling my tools after that. I had to use carbide to clean up the epoxy, and the edge on those was ruined by the end of the project. I am sure the landing bast force would cause major damage to anything if it had the lunar soil mixed into it.
So. Shark dust.
Lunar dust is one of the most abrasive materials we know of. It's like tiny particles of broken glass because there's nothing to erode and soften the edges. It's also very dangerous to inhale for that reason. That's why NASA is experimenting with "suit ports" and other methods of keeping the dust outside.
Thank you for sharing all this information!
@@evensgrey thank you as well! I love learning!
There have been only 840 lbs of lunar soil and dust brought back, so how did your uncle produce "tons" of lunar dust and samples?
*I knew it was a Camera when he revealed it, but didn't know the Significance, and like Adam I too was Gobsmacked! I had tears in my eyes watching that, I watched every Launch and Landing of the Apollo Missions that were shown on TV, and pestered the heck out of the Astronauts who visited our school in the 70s. I've been a Space Junkie all my life and That was Awesome, Thank You!*
I had no idea this happened either! THANKS FOR THIS!!
Absolutely Incredible ! .. I remember looking out at the moons surface through Surveyor III's camera , and then as Apollo 12 used it for the first test of a precision landing and getting to see it from the other side so to speak .. the photos of the marks in the regolith from of it's landing pads, showing the bounce and tilt as it landed ...
I saw a moon rock a few days ago and literally could not look at it long enough to full appreciate what I was looking at. It's so hard to internalize that I'm looking at a physical piece of the moon.
Adam has the coolest job in the world.. love this type of stuff.
ok, that pretty cool....Smithsonian visit is on my bucket list
Wow. Please keep things like this coming!
Woww, a legendary artefact from Apollo 12. Loved the account of the crew revisiting the Surveyor and taking samples but had no idea the camera was this big. Must have taken up some room in the Sample Return Container!
Woo hoo! My favorite mission, Surveyor 3/Apollo 12. Too bad that Pete and Al's self-portrait with Surveyor 3 didn't work out.
IMHO Apollo 12 was probably the most fun of all the missions: the pinpoint landing required to get within moonwalking range of Surveyor 3, the retrieval of the camera, the attempted self portrait, and don't forget the Playboy pinups that were sneaked into their spacesuits' EVA checklist!
I never expected that a lot of my time was going to be taken up by watching Adam Savage enjoy being shown things
I remember the Apollo mission that did this. I think there are some really cool pictures they took while cutting this off.
Imagine late 1960's navigation technology and a lunar landing module that's essentially hand flown - to land within walking (or driving?) distance to recover this camera. That footprint is probably no more than 3 square meters and is probably the ultimate needle in the haystack recovery. Special recognition to the astronaut/pilot, flight controllers, and everyone crunching the numbers to make the recovery a success.
Definitely walking distance. They didn't have the rovers until Apollo 15.
Adam (and team), I just wanted to say thank you for sharing this. As another "man of a certain age" I think we were lucky to be around during the beginning of space travel during it's infancy and to have been able to experience the childhood wonder and magic of remembering those days. I can see it in just the way you talk about it and in the way you have built things to keep the magic alive over the years. I was lucky enough to have a half brother in law at the time I was young who was involved in the space program and he showed me things about the space shuttle quite a bit before it became publicly known and that was just the bees knees to a young boy interested in anything that flew. I made a paper model of it that I wish I still had today. Cheers and I hope one of these billionaires gives you a ride on one of their big bottle rockets.
Thank you for the comment; it's appreciated.
I find it hard to believe an Apollo fan like Adam didn’t know about this.
And convenient
Yeah I agree, the retrieval of the Surveyor camera was a huge part of the Apollo program
It's always nice to see Adam this happy 👍
That Apollo 12 photo on the moon with Surveyor is still epic to this day. Favourite Apollo photo ever.
That's sooooo cool !!
It must be so awesome being able to see these artifacts in person
We could spend days in the Restoration Hangar alone.
@@tested Having worked in the History and Technology section of The Queensland Museum, days would not be enough for me :)
I never knew until today!
Fascinating! 💛🙏🏼
Pete Conrad and Al Bean brought this back, but I've never seen a picture of the Surveyor 3 part as it stands since its return. Wild!
wow!! just, wow!! im speechless!
I'm amazed something like this isn't spoken of more. Like you, this is the first I've heard of us bringing something back that's sat on the moon for any length of time. With this having noticeable scarring from micrometeorites, I'm surprised the retroreflectors on the moon still work.
Nice to see Adam The “myth Buster” again. Remember their moon myth busting on one of their episodes.
Realy interesting stuff they did on that mythbuster show.
That is a wonderful thing to see!
Seeing this and the first spy cameras at the Smithsonian Air and Space Museum was a blast. Everyone should wander through it at least once. And it's Free!
Can't even leave your stuff the moon anymore, damn scrappers.
“Uutini!!”
They need to have one of the 35mm film cameras that were attached to the Saturn-V that took those great great close-ups of staging and fuel sloshing inside the tanks. They had around 20 per launch and they were ejected then parachute recovered floating in the ocean afterwards. Most people have no idea that they existed. I have several Laser-Discs that the Smithsonian published back in the late 80s and one of them contains dozens of really neat short films from Mercury through Apollo. :) (Also has film from the service module orbiting the moon and some of the in flight PR movies. Anyone know if those discs were released on DVD or BR?
Watch the Apollo 11 movie it's made completely with archival fotage that they have rescanned in 4k resolution.
I don't know if those LDs were re-released, but here's something somewhat similar: ua-cam.com/video/vFwqZ4qAUkE/v-deo.html
@@danhunters8226 Seconded. The newly scanned old footage is jaw-droppingly crisp (where the original resolution permits) and it is a damn fine documentary as well.
@@RobertHarrisonBlake Thank you for this link, those shots are absolutely beautiful!
Only Apollo 4 and 6 used staging cameras.
Been to the DC area several times for work but never had time to be a tourist and our national museums are on my bucket list. Soon as I retire I guess.
I knew Cpt Bean…such a gentleman. It was one of the main objective to do a pinpoint landing. At the beginning of the EVA, they discovered that they had indeed landed beside surveyor. They were very very excited about that !!
“right down the middle on the road”
This is amazing! I love space artifacts like this!
It also makes me wonder if you've ever thought about doing a tour of Steve Jurvetson's place? He's got everything from a flown Mercury capsule door, to Apollo launch control stations, to SpaceX parts
Awesomeness of freaking. Thanks. Be well and stay safe.
I was 8 years old at the time watching every minute of the Apollo missions on TV and recall Walter Cronkite reporting on the visit to Surveyor 3 and the recovery of that camera. At the time Mattel's Major Matt Mason was the must have toy for boys my age,.
My middle school had National Geographic magazines dating back to the late 40’s. Was able to find all of the magazines dating from the Apollo missions. I read about this artifact there. Very interesting.
September 1948 Nat Geo a very interesting issue and relevant to today.
We had the same situation, except someone pilfered all of the landing coverage 11,12,14-17. So sad.
Remember Apollo 12. was unable to watch as they had damaged the tv camera when they were deploying it. Also it is remarkable as Apollo 11 was mile off on landing and the next one they were able to land withing feet of the target.
They didn't "miss" with 11. They were on target. Only, quite famously, perhaps you've heard, Armstrong had a boulder field to avoid at the designated landing zone.
@@UnitSe7en They were in the target zone but missed the planed target by 4 miles.
@@UnitSe7en Their “sweet spot” for landing was an ellipse 3 miles wide
and 11 miles long. They landed about 4 miles down range beyond the center of the target ellipse.
The last minute manual control to avoid some rocks was minimal and had no impact on the 4 mile down range “error” they experienced.
More please!
It belongs in a museum!
As a space nerd since the days of the Mercury 7, this is to me so fascinating and so cool.
Absolutely incredible
Good to see Adam!
For saying I wasn't even there, I enjoyed this an awful lot. Thank-you.
The Apollo 12 lander landed so close to the Surveyor 3 that the astronauts could easily see the LEM from the Surveyor site.
I for one am torn between two worlds. The space fan in me loves that they have taken the time and effort to preserve this artifact for future generations to see. The tech geek in me just wants to take it apart to see what's inside with my own eyes and count the types and number of components.
You mean I knew something that Adam didn't know, mind blown. This was a big part of the Apollo 12 mission.
Apollo 12 was my favorite Apollo mission. Three friends taking a road trip to the moon "dancing" in zero gravity to "Sugar, Sugar!". That pinpoint landing was a big deal after Apollo 11 was 3-4 miles from their intended landing site.
Im actually amazed I didn't know of this specific recovery from Apollo 12's mission. Amazing!
Thanks that’s awesome!
For these kinds of video, there really should be a collab between Tested and Objectivity. Can't wait to see Adam and Brady nerd out over space stuff!
It would be amazing to be that close to such a interesting piece of history. NASA did it’s first precision targeted landing on the moon in order to retrieve that. 👍 🇺🇸
That was just awesome. I had no idea we retrieved something.
Wow, what did the Apollo 12 Lunar hacksaw look like!!! Learned something new here! Thanks for sharing!
Thanks Adam! I didn't know this existed either and it is amazing to see. Have to plan a trip to the Smithsonian when it goes back on display.
I saw that at the air and space museum sometime in the 90's
ZOMG. You learn something new everyday. I did not know that NASA had recovered one of the Surveyor cameras and I am a big space nut! Thanks for sharing this Adam.
I continue to experience all of my nerd fantasies through Adam.
That’s absolutely amazing
As I understand it when they brought it back and dissected it they found that somebody had sneezed when they put it together and this bacteria survived two years on the moon and was alive when they brought it back to Earth
I thought he was James May from "The Grand Tour." I love these videos.
So cool!
Very cool. That brought the little kid in me out.
That’s so awesome!!
1:26 Subtle detail but, notice that those Phillips screws are "tighten only", designed to cam out if you try to loosen it.
Very Nice! Thank you
I remember seeing this artifact back in 2006 when visiting NASM.
Amazing!
I had followed all of the Apollo landings and remember 12 visiting and examining Surveyor 3, but I had totally forgotten about the astronauts removing pieces of the Surveyor.
Wow! I totally understand Adam's fascination. It makes me wonder what we will find when (not IF) we visit the various Apollo landing sites.
A Lunar Hacksaw! 🤣 How long till Adam finds one for his shop?
He probably all ready has one.
A lunar hacksaw is just a hacksaw
One Day Build: Apollo 12 Lunar Hacksaw Replica
I remember as a kid them landing near this "lander"...I didn't know they were going until this video they had brought a piece of it back.
That is probably one of the most extraordinary objects in human history.
So cool thank you!
This is incredible
I never knew this.Thank you.
this is awesome I knew Pete n Alan took a comera from the craft but i thought it maybe the size of a shoe box.
This is incredible!
I was just reading Chris Hadfield's new novel which makes reference to Apollo and the retrieval of equipment from Surveyor(s) :D
So COOOOL!!!!
I had the pleasure of meeting the man who brought that back from the moon…
Mr. Pete Conrad
Adam, you should read the book "How Apollo Flew to the Moon" by W. David Woods if you haven't - the story on taking samples from Surveyor is featured there, along gazillion other details of the program which are at least as mindblowing.
Apollo 12 was hellbent on proving "We can hit our target, god damn it!" so they picked one of the surveyors and missed the mark by
"Whoopie!"
Not quite. They figured the navigation would not be very accurate and so they targeted Apollo 12 to land right on the surveyor lander. The commander had to take manual control of the landing at the last moment because the guidance software was more accurate than they thought and he was afraid they would actually hit the surveyor spacecraft
@@ouvuu Not mutually exclusive though, right? Main thing was that 11 was off by so much that they wanted to show even higher precision... What actually transpired to make it happen is another story, no? I do agree though... The audio of them discussing it first in view and stuff is intense
They did not want to land too close or the Surveyor might be damaged by the LEM exhaust/dust. Just within walking distance. So it was perfect.
I can't wait to visit the Smithsonian someday, the last time I was there was when I was 14.
It's amazing! You'll enjoy your revisit!
Adam!!! 🔥🔥🔥
I nerded out watching this and I happen to be wearing my NASA shirt today. Cool!
Okay, Adam... you get to do and see a lot of cool shit... but... HOLY FUCKING CHRIST ON A CRUTCH... this is the most amazing thing ever.
The irony about the Apollo 12 mission is while they picked up the Surveyor camera, the Apollo color TV camera they were supposed to use to transmit the mission home live was destroyed when one of the astronauts accidently pointed it at the sun. I remember watching the mission as a kid. The "coverage from the moon" was just an actor in a fake space suit on a moon set walking around, because the astronauts had no way way to send a live TV signal.
Interesting to see it - I've wondered where it ended up.
‘Lunar Hacksaw’ is a great band name 🤣
I drop my DSLR from waist high and it's toast. Someone at Nikon needs to check this thing out.