英语听力文摘 English Digest 380、登月照片是造假吗？

Waving a Flag on the Moon
月球上飘扬的国旗

Don: Yaël, I’m not a conspiracytheorist or anything, but I must admit that those photographs of the moon landing make me suspicious. I mean，the flag in those pictures of Buzz Aldrin and Neil Armstrong is rippling¹ in the wind; and everyone knows that there is no atmosphere on the moon. And no atmosphere means no breeze.

 

Yaël: Well, as you can imagine, the folks who came up with the idea of taking an American flag to the moon were aware that unless they rigged something up, the flag would just hang there. So they built a special flagpole expressly for the purpose of making the flag appear to fly.

D: So our taxer' dollars went to work reinventing the flagpole?

 

Y: Actually, it’s not a trivial problem.The astronauts would be wearing bulky space suits, so they needed a flagpole that was easy to assemble and to plant in the ground. Plus, the pole had to be portable, and not use up a lot of precious cargo² space. So scientists rigged a telescoping pole with a telescopinghorizontal crossbar that was supposed to make the flag look as if it were blowing in the wind.

 

The flag itself was standard issue, although the top was hemmed³ so that the astronauts would be able to slide it over the crossbar. Plus the entire assembly weighed less than ten pounds. Even so, the astronauts reported having some trouble setting the flag up. They weren’t able to stick the pole far enough into the ground, and they weren’t able to fully⁴ extend the horizontal crossbar.

D: That explains the rippling effect.

 

Y: And takes the air out of your conspiracy theory.

 

D:我并非一个阴谋理论家，可是，不得不承认，我开始怀疑这些月球登陆照片的真实性。宇航员尼尔•阿姆斯特朗和巴斯•奥尔德林和国旗的合影中，美国国旗迎风而舞。可是，谁都知道，月球上没有任何空气，没有空气又何来的微风呢？

Y:当然，你应该考虑到，那些提出将美国国旗带到月球的人们，肯定会预料到即便带去了，国旗也只是耷拉着脑袋。所以，他们专门制造了一种特殊旗杆，让国旗飘扬。

D:那就是说，我们纳税人的钱又用来制造特殊旗杆了？

Y:没错，但是，这可并非易事。宇航员的太空服笨重，所以旗杆需要易于组装，也便于插在地上。此外，旗杆还必须轻便，省得占去宝贵的太空舱空间。所以，科学家设计了内置可伸缩旗杆。（一个可折叠的7字状的旗杆，不用的时候是1形状，插在月球时候，旗杆打开了，因为由一个横杆支着，所以可以飘起来。）
国旗也是关键，国旗的顶端镶边了，以便宇航员将国旗滑动至横杆。虽然旗杆的总重量不到10磅，但是，据报道，宇航员还是遇到些困难撑起国旗。比如，无法将旗杆深入地表；无法将横杆调至最长。

       D:这就解释了涟漪作用。

        Y:现在，你不怀疑了吧？

1 rippling   

起涟漪的，潺潺流水般声音的

参考例句：

• I could see the dawn breeze rippling the shining water. 我能看见黎明的微风在波光粼粼的水面上吹出道道涟漪。
• The pool rippling was caused by the waving of the reeds. 池塘里的潺潺声是芦苇摇动时引起的。

2 cargo   

n.(一只船或一架飞机运载的)货物

参考例句：

• The ship has a cargo of about 200 ton.这条船大约有200吨的货物。
• A lot of people discharged the cargo from a ship.许多人从船上卸下货物。

3 hemmed   

缝…的褶边( hem的过去式和过去分词 )； 包围

参考例句：

• He hemmed and hawed but wouldn't say anything definite. 他总是哼儿哈儿的，就是不说句痛快话。
• The soldiers were hemmed in on all sides. 士兵们被四面包围了。

4 fully   

adv.完全地，全部地，彻底地；充分地

参考例句：

• The doctor asked me to breathe in,then to breathe out fully.医生让我先吸气，然后全部呼出。
• They soon became fully integrated into the local community.他们很快就完全融入了当地人的圈子。