When I was talking to Chris Rapley about that warmist piece, he said he had worked with the astronaut Bruce McCandless. Rapley was very moved by this picture from 1984. It shows McCandless in orbit wearing a Manned Manoeuvring Unit. It is extraordinarily beautiful, perhaps because its content and form are one. The awkward angle between man and horizon and the way his left foot just crosses the horizon line reflect the precariousness of the situation. Also McCandless is made anonymous by the mass of machinery and protection required to keep him there. He could be a machine and yet, poignantly, we know he isn't. Rapley pointed out that he was untethered. If one of the tiny rockets on the MMU had stuck open, he would have been pushed beyond rescue and would have died slowly. Then there are the millions of dollars and man hours required to keep him there. Heroic and humbling, it is, I think, the greatest of all space pictures.
Thursday, December 10, 2009
Man in Space
When I was talking to Chris Rapley about that warmist piece, he said he had worked with the astronaut Bruce McCandless. Rapley was very moved by this picture from 1984. It shows McCandless in orbit wearing a Manned Manoeuvring Unit. It is extraordinarily beautiful, perhaps because its content and form are one. The awkward angle between man and horizon and the way his left foot just crosses the horizon line reflect the precariousness of the situation. Also McCandless is made anonymous by the mass of machinery and protection required to keep him there. He could be a machine and yet, poignantly, we know he isn't. Rapley pointed out that he was untethered. If one of the tiny rockets on the MMU had stuck open, he would have been pushed beyond rescue and would have died slowly. Then there are the millions of dollars and man hours required to keep him there. Heroic and humbling, it is, I think, the greatest of all space pictures.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
A blog about, among other things, imaginary ideas - What ifs? and Imagine thats. What if photographs looked nothing like what we see with our eyes? Imagine that the Berlin Wall had never come down. What if we were the punchline of an interminable joke? All contributions welcome.
I don't know. Perhaps this has a better composition but I think the pictures from the Apollo missions are hard to beat. I love the extremes of contrast in those photos, the glimpses of the earth in the visors, the patches of gold thermal insulation...
ReplyDeleteI don't have a collection of space pictures at hand, but I recall most fondly pictures of the earth that led me to think, "Oh, wow, it looks just like it does on a map." Oh, yeah, that's right.
ReplyDeleteI'm glad he's almost upright. I always thought Star Trek was wrong to show orbiting sideways on.
ReplyDeleteHe looks more like a robot which, considering the danger, makes me think, why not use a robot?! Is the human element important to the task, to boldly go etc.? Is the human element cheaper? Possibly both, I suppose.
It's wonderful but you wouldn't get me up there. I'm not good with heights to begin with but the clincher would be having to drink someone else's waste. I've travelled on enough budget airlines, thank you.
It is a great picture. The sharpness of the astronaut combined with the blurriness of the horizon caused by the Earth's atmosphere adds to the beauty.
ReplyDeleteIt must be amazing to be floating out there with the Earth directly below. Not a place for people with vertigo.
Aha! Tom, I fully agree.
ReplyDeleteVertiginous is right, even though there's no Down. Even from here, the idea of letting go of the spacecraft causes wee butterflies.
Fantastic picture, but ive searched and searched for a pic of what Bruce McCandless is seeing from his camera on his suit.
ReplyDeleteI seem to remember that this way part of the Imax "dream is alive" doc?
Rubbish, Bryan, the only McCandless is John Wayne.
ReplyDelete