As others have said, rescue was impossible. And the thing is that staying on the Moon was also impossible because they didn't have enough supplies.
Now - they could have made it safer, for more expense, by using a "Mars Direct" type approach of landing supplies on the Moon first, so that when the astronauts land they land right next to a depot with a working spaceship with enough oxygen and supplies to last them, say, for a year. It's not impossible.
So then, as long as they can land on the Moon, then they are safe for a year - well pretty much, barring accidents on the surface of course - and can be continually resupplied from Earth by supply missions if you don't get rescued for some reason.
I don't think they considered a mission quite like that. But they did have "lunar rendezvous" as one of the early mission ideas - where they land on the Moon with a round trip spaceship which is refueled from a tanker landed there previously.
They also, very early on, had an idea to just send a single astronaut there, who would live on the Moon for some time, resupplied from Earth, very like the Mars one idea for Mars.
That had the advantage that you only needed the capability to send an astronaut to the Moon and didn't have to work out how to get them back until later. It is very like the "Mars One" approach for Mars.
Requires less technology to get to the point where you have your first human to the Moon - so - you might get them faster - at an earlier stage in the program.
For some of the early ideas see Chariots For Apollo, ch3-2
The lunar orbit rendezvous one which they eventually used was originally one of the lowest ranked of their mission plans
Lunar Orbit Rendezvous and the Apollo Program
So - they could have combined those ideas together. But that would surely have delayed the mission and they felt they had to get there as quickly as possible, within the requirements of a reasonably safe mission.
They had already soft landed the lunar Surveyor 1 so certainly had the capability to soft land a supply depot for the astronauts next to their proposed landing site.
The whole thing was a case of balancing risks. The astronauts could have died during a space walk also for example. Or failed to rendezvous with the command module on the way back. Were lots of potential failure points.
Now - they could have made it safer, for more expense, by using a "Mars Direct" type approach of landing supplies on the Moon first, so that when the astronauts land they land right next to a depot with a working spaceship with enough oxygen and supplies to last them, say, for a year. It's not impossible.
So then, as long as they can land on the Moon, then they are safe for a year - well pretty much, barring accidents on the surface of course - and can be continually resupplied from Earth by supply missions if you don't get rescued for some reason.
I don't think they considered a mission quite like that. But they did have "lunar rendezvous" as one of the early mission ideas - where they land on the Moon with a round trip spaceship which is refueled from a tanker landed there previously.
They also, very early on, had an idea to just send a single astronaut there, who would live on the Moon for some time, resupplied from Earth, very like the Mars one idea for Mars.
"Another approach was the proposal to send a spacecraft on a one-way trip to the moon. In this concept, the astronaut would be deliberately stranded on the lunar surface and resupplied by rockets shot at him for, conceivably, several years until the space agency developed the capability to bring him back!"
That had the advantage that you only needed the capability to send an astronaut to the Moon and didn't have to work out how to get them back until later. It is very like the "Mars One" approach for Mars.
Requires less technology to get to the point where you have your first human to the Moon - so - you might get them faster - at an earlier stage in the program.
For some of the early ideas see Chariots For Apollo, ch3-2
The lunar orbit rendezvous one which they eventually used was originally one of the lowest ranked of their mission plans
Lunar Orbit Rendezvous and the Apollo Program
So - they could have combined those ideas together. But that would surely have delayed the mission and they felt they had to get there as quickly as possible, within the requirements of a reasonably safe mission.
They had already soft landed the lunar Surveyor 1 so certainly had the capability to soft land a supply depot for the astronauts next to their proposed landing site.
The whole thing was a case of balancing risks. The astronauts could have died during a space walk also for example. Or failed to rendezvous with the command module on the way back. Were lots of potential failure points.
About the Author
Robert Walker
Writer of articles on Mars and Space issues - Software Developer of Tune Smithy, Bounce Metronome etc.Studied at Wolfson College, Oxford
Lives in Isle of Mull
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