Apollo 15 Flag movement

[bknight]

Since we are in the midst of spatial recognition and Apollo 15 landing area from lunar orbit I thought I'd post a video I ran onto a week or so ago.
It concerns flag movement during Apollo 15 as Dave Scott passes between the flag and camera on the rover around 2:35.  I have my explanation but was curious what the rest of the forum thinks
What caused the flag movement?

[JayUtah]

There have been several proposals, but the one I favor is that Scott is actually closer to the flag than it first seems and actually brushed it.

[bknight]

That is/was my guess the camera is using a wide angle lens setting and he is much closer to the flag than he appears, very likely brushing it with his left arm/hand.

[raven]

I really don't like Shane here's insulting language, but his presentation and analysis is sound to the best of my knowledge.
I am fond of the electrostatic theory induced by UV radiation, but both are possible with how close he was. One thing is for sure, it ain't air, as the flag would have stopped moving far sooner in air, and the dust kicked up would be moving quite differently.

[bknight]

I really don't like Shane here's insulting language, but his presentation and analysis is sound to the best of my knowledge.
I am fond of the electrostatic theory induced by UV radiation, but both are possible with how close he was. One thing is for sure, it ain't air, as the flag would have stopped moving far sooner in air, and the dust kicked up would be moving quite differently.

Nice video I was told that I had spatial issues when I  commented he was close enough to touch the flag. The 3d was a great idea. I hadn't considered the electrostatic theory.

[onebigmonkey]

I've always wondered if it was a simple matter of vibration from the footsteps..

[Gazpar]

I've always wondered if it was a simple matter of vibration from the footsteps..

But you can see the astronaut walking besides the flag when he salutes for the photos and the flag does not move.

[gwiz]

Another possibility is that he kicked some soil against the flagpole.

[Bryanpoprobson]

I have to do this from memory as I don't have the bandwidth to view the video until I'm home on Wednesday, but as I recall isn't the first movement of the flag towards the astronaut? This would seem to favour brushing against it or static!

[Count Zero]

Oh, if ONLY the astronauts had thought to hang some reference-object, such as a 3'X5' piece of nylon (ideally one that's subdivided by high-contrast parallel stripes) in the frame at the same distance as the flag.  Then we could have measured the difference in size of the near and far edges and calculated how far it was from the camera.

Of course, if I was going to wish for that, I might as well wish for the astronaut to carry some rectangular object of known dimensions (on his back, say) so that we could calculate his distance from the camera, too.

But that would just be silly.

Oh well...

[bknight]

I've always wondered if it was a simple matter of vibration from the footsteps..

But you can see the astronaut walking besides the flag when he salutes for the photos and the flag does not move.

That is a good point that I attempted to present, but that was quickly brushed aside by the rather poorly informed poster.  Another good point is that his body blocks from view what his left arm/hand are doing, so that one can not conclusively say that it didn't touch the flag or be effected by electrostatic charge.

[bknight]

I have to do this from memory as I don't have the bandwidth to view the video until I'm home on Wednesday, but as I recall isn't the first movement of the flag towards the astronaut? This would seem to favour brushing against it or static!

I had to watch again, when the body clears the flag it appears that the flag may be toward the end of its arc away from Dave, just as I would expect from a brush or the electrostatic effect.

[frenat]

This is one of Rocky/DavidC/Cosmored's favorite clips.  IIRC Jarrah White supposedly proved the astronaut was close enough to touch it.

[bknight]

This is one of Rocky/DavidC/Cosmored's favorite clips.  IIRC Jarrah White supposedly proved the astronaut was close enough to touch it.

Gwak, the blunder dis-proved a HB proposition?  I quit watching his videos after watching the Apollo 1 fire, so that may be the case.

[frenat]

This is one of Rocky/DavidC/Cosmored's favorite clips.  IIRC Jarrah White supposedly proved the astronaut was close enough to touch it.

Gwak, the blunder dis-proved a HB proposition?  I quit watching his videos after watching the Apollo 1 fire, so that may be the case.

I haven't watched it myself but that's the story supposedly.  I've heard that in the next breath after he says they could have been close enough he makes up some reason why they weren't.