40 Years Since The Moon Landing And The ISS Still Has Toilet Troubles

July 20 1969 was the famous day in history that man first landed on the moon. Some still don´t believe it even though there were about 6 missions and photos from a recent lunar probe show the footprints. In any case, 40 years later the crew of Eagle (Armstrong, Aldrin and Collins) reflect on that historic day and urge men to take the next step and go to Mars. There seems to be a fair bit of media coverage at the moment, which I hope might inspire a generation to take more interest in science. That day certainly inspired my parents to name me after one of the astronauts. I can´t believe that NASA erased and reused the original tapes, though newly restored footage can be found here.

In related but somewhat less inspiring news, the ISS toilet is on the blink. Again. We managed to put a man on the moon, but how in the heavens can we make the 2.5 year trip to Mars if the loo is broken? There isn´t going to be a space shuttle come after you and install some spare parts, not least because they are decommissioning it after next year, replacing it with the Constellation programme and the Orion crew module. Or did the Russians deliberately sabotage the bog because the US got to the moon first ;)