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0 pointsnickff8mo ago0 comments

On one of the Apollo documentaries (I can't remember which one), the astronauts joked that it was the least effective quarantine ever; they talked about how there was a stream of ants going in and out of the Airstream they were in.

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dmix8mo ago

They quarantined in an Airstream van? That's hilarious. Very 1960s

Found the wiki https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mobile_quarantine_facility

Gracana8mo ago

You can go look at one up close at the Udvar-Hazy Center in VA. I highly recommend a visit there if you are in the area and interested in aerospace stuff. They've got a ton of amazing exhibits.

philsnow8mo ago

The USS Hornet is the ship that picked them up, it's permanently docked in Alameda, CA and has been transformed into a museum. They have footprints painted on the floor to show the astronauts' path walking (across the deck) into the Airstream. You also get to walk on the (wooden) flight deck and see the jet elevator, etc.

https://www.wired.com/2009/07/hornet/

https://uss-hornet.org/

bawolff8mo ago

A stream of ants would not necessarily render a quarintine ineffective.

ben_w8mo ago

If you're protecting against the possibility of an unknown hypothetical pathogen that can survive on the moon, but which you have no specific reason to think favours or disfavours any randomly selected Earth life, you want something that can at the very least stop ants.

jeremyjh8mo ago

That’s right, it made it completely a joke.

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