Hoagland stages a double-header for Superbore weekend

        Since I blogged Richard Hoagland's failures on 22nd January, he's had more luck with the demons of internet radio. Both shows over the 27th/28th weekend completed just fine. The subjects were Antarctica with Robert Morningstar (who has no known expertise on the subject) and Wilbur Allen; and a Space Drive with Mike Gamble.

        Both nights of this last weekend, 3rd/4th February, were billed as featuring Ken Johnston and Steve Troy, discussing what Hoagland has already discussed to death over the years, namely Glass Structures on the Moon, and how NASA suppresses evidence of them. Think about that—that's SIX HOURS on a basically non-existent topic. Are these people mad? (don't answer that.) Ken Johnston almost immediately got off topic by telling his old familiar stories about how he saved a set of 10x8 glossy photoprints from the Apollo program. He even repeated yet again the story of how he saw evidence of an alien base in crater Tsiolkovsky, in 16mm film taken from Apollo 14 as it overflew that huge crater on the back side. He didn't explain how a spacecraft in an orbit inclined 14° can overfly a crater at 20.4°, and Hoagland didn't think to ask.

        Steve Troy may have been more compelling (and more original) but since his audio was incomprehensible it's hard for me to say. Hoagland himself, however, was easily audible and he came armed with a set of 13 images, some of which he says confirm the presence of glass structures. Well, I've seen lots of Hoagland's "evidence" since I've been creating this blog, and none of it is remotely convincing. A couple of the images he presented on Saturday night went beyond merely "unconvincing" into the realm of sheer hilarity. Here's one, in which Hoagland mistakes jpg compression artifacts for his precious alien glass houses:

        It's from Apollo 16, and to get that horrible effect he says he had to "enhance" it. What he actually did was FUBAR it, as we technical chaps say.

        Hoagland-style enhancement was also to blame for the worst case of scanner contamination I've ever seen. This one was an Apollo 11 earthrise shot:

        I wasn't sure whether he thinks the horizontal lines introduced by a cheap scanner are the glass structures, or is it the grubby thumb prints on the scanner glass?

        These horrible exhibits, and others like them, illustrate a Hoagland paradox. He loudly alleges that NASA suppresses evidence of glass thingies, yet his evidence is derived from... NASA.

Podcasting
        In addition to the show's presence (sometimes) on Blog Talk Radio, there is now a podcast stream available to members only. Which is just as well, since on Sunday night the BTR stream crapped out after a few minutes. Hoagland complained that his computer mysteriously switched itself off—cast-iron evidence that some sinister conspiracy is devoted to sabotaging his chat-show. Personally, I'm not too sure about that last part. Once again, FUBAR could just as easily be the problem.

        The podcastery only works while the show is actually "on the air," but for the time being the Saturday show can still be heard at this link.

Update 21 February:
        Here's Bret Sheppard's hand-drawn Apollo 14 ground track, referenced by James Oberg in a comment today. He has the maximum southerly track passing Tsiolkovsky X, at 15.25°S. In reality Apollo 14 could not have gone further South than 14°. The small crater Dobrovolsky R, right by the A of the label "Apollo 14 ground track" is at exactly 14°S.

        The Apollo 14 photographic index map shows that the nearest photo target was near crater Necho P, at 7°S. It's the one only party seen on Sheppard's map to the North.