Buzz Aldrin walked on the moon – then claimed $33.31 in travel expenses

Extract from The Guardian

The Apollo 11 astronaut who made the first lunar landing in 1969 has tweeted his official travel voucher and customs forms for the moon rock he brought back

A portrait of Buzz Aldrin aboard the Lunar Module on the lunar surface just after the first moon walk on 20 July 1969. Photograph: Neil Armstrong/Corbis

Mahita Gajanan in New York

@mahitagajanan

email

Tuesday 4 August 2015 03.58 AEST 

Buzz Aldrin’s 1969 trip to the moon was just like any other business trip, expenses forms and all.

The former astronaut posted his “travel voucher” for his trip to space on Twitter which shows that Aldrin claimed $33.31 for a journey from Houston, Texas, to the moon and back.

— Buzz Aldrin (@TheRealBuzz) July 30, 2015

#TBT My mission director @Buzzs_xtina's favorite piece of my memorabilia. My travel voucher to the moon. #Apollo11 pic.twitter.com/c89UyOfvgY

The voucher itemizes each detail of Aldrin’s travel arrangements, with a “government spacecraft” noted among government aircraft and automobiles used on the trip. “Government meals and quarters furnished for all above dates,” the voucher states.
Another tweet from Aldrin showed that all the astronauts on Apollo 11 had to sign a customs form upon their return to Earth from the moon.
Arriving in Honolulu, Hawaii, on 24 July 1969, Aldrin, Neil Armstrong and Michael Collins declared they had brought back “moon rock and moon dust samples”.

— Buzz Aldrin (@TheRealBuzz) August 2, 2015

Yes the #Apollo11 crew also signed customs forms. We brought back moon rocks & moon dust samples. Moon disease TBD. pic.twitter.com/r9Sn57DeoW

According to the form, none of the astronauts suffered from illnesses other than air sickness or the effects of accidents. It was “to be determined” whether they contracted any diseases while on the moon.
Aldrin also tweeted a photo of the Apollo 11 astronauts in biological isolation garments, which they wore so that lunar dust wouldn’t infect people on Earth. According to Aldrin, the rags used to wipe the moon dust were dropped in the ocean “so the poor underwater creatures got our moon germs instead”.
“Maybe this is fodder for a Godzilla movie,” he tweeted. “I claim the movie rights! (A fan said call it Buzzilla!).”
The 46th anniversary of the Apollo 11 moon landing fell on 20 July. Aldrin posted several photographs from the journey to his Facebook and Twitter pages throughout the past week.