theCHIVE goes to NASA (34 HQ Photos)

Neil Armstrong was born on Aug. 5, 1930 on his grandfather’s farm in Wapakoneta, Ohio. He earned his flight certificate before he got his driver’s license. Years later, Armstrong would push the envelope of flight in the Mohave Desert, logging over 1,000 hours in some of the most dangerous test planes in the world.

Neil would later be named the commander of Apollo 11. The Mission: The first manned spaceship to land on the moon. In July 1969 the Saturn V, a rocket the size of a football field, was carefully rolled onto a landing pad at the Kennedy Space Center. On July 16th 1969, Apollo 11 blasted off. 235,000 miles later on July 20, 1969 Armstrong’s ‘Giant leap for mankind’ would galvanize the United States and the world. The astronauts left a plaque behind on the lunar surface, “Here men from planet earth first set foot on the moon. We come in peace for all mankind.”

This is the famous Chamber A, Nasa’s thermal-vacuum test facility. You’ve seen it in every movie from Armageddon to Transformers. Chamber A is able to simulate the conditions found in deep space (save for the anti-gravity, that’s a myth). Chamber A contains mass spectrometers, infrared cameras, and television cameras to monitor the equipment being tested within.

We were allowed into Chamber A. It was dark and completely surreal.

This is a rare look inside the Chamber, it looks like an empty stage. In some ways it is, and it’s about to play host to something big. More on that later.

We took an elevator to the catwalks high above Chamber A.

Looking down 90 feet…

The sense of history in the old Mission Control is almost palpable, there was a lot of smoking in that room and the ceiling and walls are tinged yellow. Mission Control is perfectly preserved. This famous room launched a man into orbit, put a man on the moon, safely returned the astronauts of Apollo 13 to terra firma and they did it will barley enough collective RAM to power a gameboy. This room helped win the cold war and inspired generations of young people to reach for the stars. Ask any kid born in the 80′s and 90′s what they wanted to be and their response was often, “I want to be an astronaut.”

This is the X-38 which was to be used as a crew return vehicle for astronauts at the International Space Station in case of medical or catastrophic emergencies.

Due to NASA budget cuts, the X-38 project was abandoned near its completion. This is all that remains of the X-38 today. NASA engineers strip it for parts.

Welcome to Chamber B, Chamber A’s kid brother. Chamber B is a smaller sphere and it’s human-rated. This is where the astronauts and their space suits are rigorously tested.

At the top of the photo is the conveyor that glides the astronauts into the pressurized chamber.

Monitoring the oxygen levels in Chamber B.

There is a watch for every mission. The time stands still for the last lost crew member from Columbia

Texan Chivette Tiffany Studstill met us at NASA. To preempt the ‘MOAR HER’ comments, Tiffany will be the Chivette of the Week this Thursday.

The old space suits weighed around 80 lbs. compared to the current suits which weigh close to 330 lbs.

Here is a glimpse at NASA’s new Space Suit being tested. It has a Buzz Lightyear quality to it.

We returned to Chamber A to witness something very few people ever see…

I got to see the door to Chamber A being opened. And then I was allowed to close it. You should see the videos below.