&imwidth=800&imheight=600&format=webp&quality=medium "Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin almost died on the Moon. The plastic pen that saved them just sold for $857,600")
In July 1969, as NASA astronauts Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin famously took the "one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind," they almost got stuck on the lunar surface. What saved the Apollo landing from ending in a tragedy was a simple plastic pen, which has now been sold at an auction for over $850,000 (£630,000).
How did the pen save astronauts from certain death in space?
The dented silver plastic Duro Rocket pen was used by Buzz Aldrin, the second man on the moon, to save Neil Armstrong and himself from being "struck on the moon for ever".
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Armstrong and Aldrin landed on the surface of the moon back in July 1969 as part of the historic Apollo 11 mission. After the historic landing, the two astronauts were preparing to catch up on some ZZ's when they noticed that small black switch on the floor of the cabin, which turned out to be a vital piece of the circuit breaker that sends electrical power to the ascent engine.
In his 2009 autobiography 'Magnificent Desolation', Buzz Aldrin detailed the nerve-wrecking moment, “My heart jolted a bit … The broken switch had snapped off from the engine-arm circuit breaker, the one vital breaker needed to send electrical power to the ascent engine that would lift Neil and me off the moon.”
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The Broken Circuit Breaker Switch that Nearly Ended Apollo 11, and the Pen that Saved the Crew and the Mission Photograph: (Screenshot Sothebys website)
Eventually, the astronaut came up with the ingenious plan of inserting the pen into the circuit thereby rerouting the power. The pen which was part of Aldrin's personal preference kit "did the trick;the circuit breaker held. We could return to Earth after all!," said Aldrin.
Auction and more
The felt tip pen was sold along with a letter of provenance in which Aldrin jokes: "I think Neil broke the switch off and Neil thinks that I broke the switch off."
"In the end, what mattered most was that we had to figure out how to solve the problem of the broken switch so that we could leave the lunar surface and get home to Earth."
Sotheby estimated the auction price for the pen to be between $800,000 and $1.2m. After being pursued by five bidders, the pen was eventually sold for $857,600.
