Aliens
Bernie Newnham
I know that you’ll be absolutely gutted to discover that you just missed the International Flat Earth Conference in Raleigh, North CarolinaNovember 2017 – or maybe you were there.
Alan Machin
You wouldn’t think that someone who believes that we are controlled by reptilians from the rings of Saturn and the moon would also be a Flat Earther, but it would seem he is. Anybody remember David Icke? His ramblings and conspiracy theories are on YouTube.
Funny what too much “Breakfast Time” and “Grandstand” can do to you!
Roger Bunce
David Icke believed that the ruling classes of the world are not human beings. They are cold-blooded, soulless, alien reptiles. Many people do not believe this. However, I think you can prove him to be correct with just two words. Those words are ‘John’ and ‘Birt’.
David Lawson
I can confirm that David Icke is right, it all comes from his time as a reporter on “Midlands Today”. A very odd bunch?
Moon Landings
Robert Miles
This wonderful website brings the Apollo 11 moon landing to life. I’m sure some of you worked on the studio coverage. I was woken by my dad in the middle of the night to watch the historic moment.
http://www.firstmenonthemoon.com/
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David Denness
I was at Jodrell Bank observatory with Sir Bernard Lovell being interviewed by most of the World’s broadcasters in turn. The truck was Intertel OB2. It was a very long day especially as when we were supposed to get our break, along with the astronauts having just landed, the director, the late Gordon Hesketh, managed to knock over a fairly full bottle of red wine straight into the vision mixer. As all the buttons were of the mechanical type all of the truck techs Video, Sound and VTR set to cleaning all the affected buttons so it could be re-assembled just before going back on air with NBC news main unit at Houston. Nobody knew except this bunch of very tired techs. Longest continuous day I ever worked – around 50 hours. No shortage of adrenaline that night though.
Dave Mundy
‘elf’n’safety wouldn’t allow it these days!
Bernie Newnham
I was working on the Roy Castle Show at GGH (Golder’s Green Hippodrome). I was on that camera that was remote-controlled from the vision area left of the stage. It has to be said that we weren’t as concentrated on Roy Castle as we should have been. When recording was finished we put the moon show on the audience monitors, as the landing had been during the show. They wouldn’t leave so we had to take it off again. I got in my car and headed for TC and watched for the rest of the night in TC7 engineering.
Roger Bunce
My cardboard badge – on which the BBC spared every expense – just to prove I was there. I’d love to claim that I was there for the ‘Eagle has landed’ moment, or the ‘One Giant Leap’ moment – but I can’t remember anything about it, and my diaries don’t go back that far.
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Hugh Sheppard
As one with the claim to ‘being there’ – in the Gallery of TC4 (I’m pretty sure) at the time, as the Pres. Co-ordinator or some such, I’m envious of Roger’s badge! Somewhere I’ve a 35mm slide or two of the Control Room and monitors at the moment of ‘One small step for man… ‘ Or was it delayed in the aether or by NASA? Will we ever really know?
Peter Cook
I have a recollection of driving from my flat in Northolt to Heathrow at silly o’clock in the morning where we had an OB on round-the-clock duty, covering experts and Vox Pop, working in shifts. I am pretty sure that I had watched the moon landing live at the flat. I also remember cursing as the moon walk started whilst I was on the commute so I heard it on the car radio but missed watching it on live TV. Irritatingly 1969 is one of the few diaries which has escaped, so I can’t verify!!
John Howell
My rather sketchy diary reveals that I was on duty for the Apollo 11 coverage in TC7 on July 19th 1969.
I remember feeding 8 inch reels of triple play tape running at 1 and 7/8ths inches per second to 2 Ferrograph Logic 7 recorders recording Nasa ‘talkback’ on one track and the Speaking Clock on the other, an early form of Timecode!
Sound Supervisors were John Holmes, Robin Luxford and Dave Hughes.
Dave Plowman
I remember being given some of those tapes after the run finished – BASF?
They were OK for the single motor Akai I have which has a very gentle (and slow) transport, but the A77 turned them into quadruple play.
Just about anything was better than ‘BBC’ tape – except for tying up the roses.
John Howell
I had a couple of reels of said tape, (yes, they were BASF) it meant my Fi-cord would record for 24 minutes. This led to the next problem: finding batteries that would last for 24 minutes !
The comment about BBC tape (well Z***l actually) reminds me of a session in the Riverside Music Studio. I was running the recording machines and ‘before my very eyes’ the tape slowly became transparent as it passed through the machine then the coating returned at a very crude splice. This was new, sealed stock!
Roger Bunce
But I remember where I was for Apollo 12. I was keen to see the first images from the Moon IN COLOUR. (I know the Moon is grey, but that’s not the point!) We didn’t have a colour tele at home, so I went into work early, and was sitting in the Engineering area of the "Space Studio" waiting expectantly. I saw the glittering gold of the foil in which the camera was wrapped. It looked magnificent. A figure in a space suit was seen unwrapping it. O.K. the space suit was entirely black-and-white, but even black-and-white looks better in colour! Then the camera panned toward the sun . . .
All the so-called "Experts" on the studio floor were padding wildly, "I’m not sure why we’re not seeing any pictures yet." And all the techies were screaming, "He’s pointed the camera at the Sun!" Engineers ran into the gallery to tell the Production Team, but still the message didn’t reach the ‘Experts’. "We’ll probably see some pictures in a moment." "No you won’t. He’s burnt out the tube!" etc. In fairness, some movement was still visible in the corners of the frame, but the whole central area was burnt incurably black.
Geoff Fletcher
In other words, it was toast…
Re Apollo flights and Moon Landings, here is an entry from my diary for 18 May 1969 concerning Apollo 10.
| SUNDAY 18th MAY | ||
WeatherN/A
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Fuel (Petrol) etc.
2 Gallons Chevron: 13/- (£0.65) |
Mileage
62 Miles |
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Work / Notes
TC7: Apollo 10 Launch (1000 – 0015) Camera 4 |
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Still / Movie
N/A |
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| First day on Crew 2 and 14 hours of it! I only discovered the programme and consequently the times had been changed once I got to TC. At least I was half an hour early as a result! Should have been doing Troubleshooters but on Apollo 10 launch programme instead. Judging by all the mirth and leg pulling with Frank and Mike Harrison at lunchtime I should be in for an amusing spell of duty. There was a lot of trouble with Tam Fry in the evening over some music duration and a timed track by Frank. Mum was the FM. Felt very tired once I got back home and my legs were extremely stiff from standing up on camera all day. | ||
And a diary entry mentioning Apollo 11 and the moon landing for 20 July 1969.
| SUNDAY 20th JULY | ||
WeatherN/A
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Fuel (Petrol) etc.
N/A |
Mileage
104 Miles |
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Work / Notes
TC8: Six Wives of Henry VIII (1100 – 2045 2015) Cameras 4 and 2 |
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Still / Movie
N/A |
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| …Six Wives was quite good to work on. After the programme, I stayed on to watch the Apollo 11 moon landing and then set off for Whitstable…. (extract) | ||
Not terribly interesting I know. I had forgotten I worked on “Six Wives…” with Geoff as Senior. We probably watched the landing in the production gallery after the recording?
Cassini
Bernie Newnham
Cassini dived into Saturn 15th September 2017, after 13 years in orbit and six years on the way. I’ve been endlessly fascinated by what it has done, but also by the fact that people have spent their whole careers working on it.
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Graeme Wall
It was a bit sad but Cassini was working till the end.
Dave Mundy
(joke) Shocking really, after 20 years the bloody thing broke up, can’t they build things to last? It was obviously a Lada factory device! (joke)
Yes, I know, it was a miracle it got there anyway. Think back 20 years and wonder that people were so clever to program it to do what it has done! 20 years ago I didn’t have a PC!
My apologies to Lada lovers (I had one myself and apart from crumbling into rust particles it was an amazing version of the Fiat 125, (or was it 124, no, that was the Polski)!)) Perhaps I should have said Skoda but on the other hand Skoda have been transformed into something quite acceptable! So who can we slag off now? I saw a Rover 75 the other day!
Peter Cook
I don’t know anyone who admits to owning a Trabant!
