The Hammer and the Feather
On live television from the Moon, an astronaut dropped a hammer and a feather at the same moment. They hit the ground together.
What was reported
At the end of the last moonwalk of Apollo 15, the commander, David Scott, stood in front of the camera holding a geologist's hammer in one hand and a falcon feather in the other. He let them go together.
On Earth, the feather would have drifted down long after the hammer. On the airless Moon, the two fell side by side and landed at the same instant. 'How about that,' Scott said. 'Mr Galileo was correct.'
Explanations offered
Without air resistance, all objects fall at the same rate, whatever their weight, as Galileo argued in the 1600s. The feather came from the falcon mascot of the US Air Force Academy, a nod to the lunar module, named Falcon. It's still lying where it fell.
- When
- 2 August 1971
- Where
- Hadley Rille, the Moon (Apollo 15 landing site)
- Witnesses
- The crew of Apollo 15, and television viewers
- Status
- Confirmed
Famous cases are real, widely reported events. Each file sets out what witnesses said and the explanations that have been offered, without taking a side.