What becomes of old 'friends'..

[slang]

And Cosmoquest bans another Patrick Tekeli sock puppet ("theloniusmonkey").

Took a while to get consensus this time. And already it seems another is in the works, but I doubt this one will see daylight.

[sts60]

Predictably as night follows day, Patrick Tekeli gets booted again off one forum, and sets up yet another laughably transparent sock-puppet ("DaylightSavingsTime") on another (JREF again).  He'll probably try again here after getting kicked off there. 

Patrick, for someone who gets so much practice lying, you're a terrible liar.  You're as bad at lying as you are at engineering and writing.  That's pitiful.  Do you just need attention so badly that getting people to point and laugh at you is good enough?

[Abaddon]

Meh. It's amusing to see, in a way, for a while. Then it gets boring.

[onebigmonkey]

He's hardly even trying to hide it any more.

He does raise an interesting question (and I know he's only raising it because he thinks no-one has looked at it and it's some sort of chink in the armour). How much water is likely to have been deposited on the lunar surface as a direct result of LM exhaust gas?

I know the chemical reaction, but I'm not enough of a chemist to work out quantities. I would imagine most of any water deposited in this way would immediately sublimate? I've asked him the same question - I don't expect an answer. Unless there's poop involved.

[ka9q]

I can work out the quantities of each of the exhaust products, if that's what you want. How much would go into the lunar surface and stay there, I don't know.

Several ALSEPs had instruments that could detect the various particles. Some easily detected the water vapor from the PLSS sublimators. I suppose they would also give a clue as to how quickly the temporary atmosphere from the LM ascent stages dissipated.

[onebigmonkey]

That would be interesting! He is claiming that "tons" of water would be deposited in each mission by the exhaust. I'm sure tons would be produced, but I would doubt that much of that would reach the surface, or that much of it would remain in situ long enough for it to be on rocks during collection.

You can see the effect of the exhaust gas in the landing videos. If it is carrying the dust away, then the exhaust gas and its attendant water load is surely long gone too?

[ka9q]

I would certainly think so, especially since the exhaust gas (and probably its entrained particles) are going at greater than lunar escape velocity (2.38 km/s).

[cjameshuff]

Also, any deposits it left would be in the form of a sparse collection of molecules adhering to the surface, and would likely be dismissed as terrestrial contamination anyway.

[onebigmonkey]

Also, any deposits it left would be in the form of a sparse collection of molecules adhering to the surface, and would likely be dismissed as terrestrial contamination anyway.

Indeed - it would surely have been impossible to tell the difference between terrestrial contamination acquired on the moon and that acquired in transit to, or handling by, the lunar materials receiving lab. Water was found in a number of samples, and dismissed as exactly that. Even my National Geographic issue covering Apollo 17 mentions it.

[ka9q]

I thought the sample boxes were sealed under vacuum and opened under dry nitrogen. If water was present in the samples, I wonder where it came from:

1. Actually present in the lunar regolith, maybe formed by a reaction with the solar wind
2. Deposited there by the LM descent engine
3. Deposited by the PLSSes
4. Contamination after collection aboard the LM/CSM
5. Contamination after return to earth

[onebigmonkey]

While I was squinting around this morning on this subject I did see a couple of references pointing to incomplete seals of some of the sample boxes - according to this new scientist article, all of them had some level of breach:

http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn18629-apollo-rocks-dusted-off-to-find-new-evidence-of-water.html

Water already present in the lunar rocks is identifiable by its isotopic composition, and its that water that later examination with much better equipment has been able to identify.

[gillianren]

Okay, it took me a minute to figure out what his point is.  It's actually kind of interesting, which has got to be a first for this guy.

[Count Zero]

Nomuse already made the point I was going to, namely that the samples were not devoid of water; the minerals in them did not form in the presence of water.  Minerals like marble, opal, jarosite, goethite and most hematites, to name a few, could not form in an anhydrous environment such as the Moon.

The Apollo samples were never scientifically discussed as being entirely anhydrous. They are extremely dry. That was known then, that is known now. The mineral formation took place without the presence of water, and the history of the samples is without significant water. That was known then, that is known now.

You are inserting an absolute were none exists.

(You are also ascribing a level of stupidity to the actual geologists -- one on the Moon, many more on the ground -- that is hard to believe in. They wouldn't notice the potential for contamination?)

[AtomicDog]

Fatfreddy88 has shown up on The Straight Dope forum, in his Cosmored guise.

He's in the Pit, where he belongs.

[Stout Cortez]

And....DaylightSavingsTime is out of there at jref.