For their latest video they ADs have turned their myopic eye to Chang'e-6, and what they believe shows proof that Apollo's landings shown in the 16mmm footage are false, main ly because you don't see a blast crater.
Here's the footage.
They claim that Apollo's engines continue to put out gas after shutdown and landing. This is also exactly what you see in the Chinese footage. The probe cut out it's rockets just before landing and then settled, and the footage clearly shows the action of rocket exhaust after it lands. I'm no rocket scientist, but Jarrah's claims that the exhaust should "instantly stop" surely ignores the fuel still in the system some pipe length from the engine bell.
They also claim that they can see the probe's exhaust "dig a crater in the ground". You see no such thing.
Here's the frame they're discussing:
The crater they claim is being excavated is at the bottom and centre. It is nothing of the sort. It's a dust devil whipped up by the engine bell. They have no image of a crater anywhere. I've been trying to get hold of the images from China's site but it's going through one of its uncooperative phases right now, but until we see one that shows one their claim rests entirely on "I'm sure there must be one".
This study
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/40328779/even shows that a shallow crater exists right under the engine bell before it lands (probably the one whose existence allows the creation of the 'dust devil'), as well as identifying where the landing camera sits on the probe, so even if they were able to identify a crater beneath the bell, they couldn't possibly claim it didn't exist already.
In fact, when you look at the full sequence of images, you can see that after landing there's quite the collection of small pebbles and other material very close to the engine bell and the RCS thrusters it used. How come that material is still there?
They also go on about the lack of dust in the footpads of Apollo. Why would dust being dispersed at high speed suddenly decide to settle in a footpad? If you look at the photos taken by China, they have no dust in their footpad other than that which has settled in it after the pad has dug itself into the ground.
If they thought about it for more than a second, they might realise that the flow of exhaust material is diverted away from the footpad by the lander legs, making it even less likely that entrained material is just going to conveniently drop into a footpad. Material is entrained, by gas, it continues away from its origin at speed until lunar gravity overcomes the force that lifted it, after which it is deposited. Simple physics boys.
It's also very obvious that despite the engine exhaust there's plenty of surface material around, as evidenced by the rover tracks as it leaves its housing:
Jarrah also turns his attention to the surface discolouration report for Apollo missions (particularly Apollo 15s), asking why it isn't visible in the Apollo surface imagery. YOu might equally ask why it isn't visible in any surface imagery of any unmanned probes, including Chang'e-6. You can see a change in the surface colour, but that is more likely to be from the depression in which the probe sits.
The LRO certainly identifies some discolouration, just as it does with Apollo landings:
But the effect is subtle and diffuse, only visible from distance. There is no contradiction in not being able to see something close up that is obvious from far away. Even if any colour change visible in the image there could be diorectly attributable to the engine exhaust, it's a much smaller engine, so of course it is going to impact a much smaller area.
By far the most ridiculous claim comes from Robert Williams, who claims to be able to see the shadow of someone holding some sort of blower creating jets. Apart from this being beyond ludicrous, a jet on Earth would not create the kind of effect you see on the Apollo landing videos, nor would it somehow magically create surface features that were unknown prior to the landings, but confirmed since.
In sort, the video from Chang'e-6 shows surface impingement of engine exhaust, dispersal plums of material disappearing at high speed, some residual dispersal from outgassing after engine shutdown, and lots of surface debris still left behind, because (as someone once pointed out in relation to Apollo footage), if dust is being picked up, there is obviously still dust there. Surface discolouration can be seen in orbital images, just as it can for Apollo, and no material can be seen in footpads other than that deposited from soil falling in after landing. There is no difference between in the broad substance China's of footage, or indeed anyone else's, and that from Apollo. All they have here is personal incredulity and either an unwillingness, or an incapability, of tracking down more than the single source they know of as their evidence. And stupidity. Much stupidity.
