The Continuity Guide
Eagle Guide
by Martin Willey

The Eagle models were built in four scales, the largest being 43.25 inches/ 1.1m long. Inside the command module are two astronauts from Revell's 1:24 Gemini kit; they also fit the 5 inch Moonbuggy sometimes seen alongside the Eagle on the launch pad. The Eagle hangar furniture, including steps to the Eagle door, are also 1:24 scale. This would make the Eagle 26.4m long (about 90 feet).

At 1:24 scale, the Eagle side door is about 1.5m / 5ft tall, and the interior ceilings would be 1.65m / 5.5ft tall. Roberto Baldassari's more practical scale is 1:28, making the Eagle 102 feet/ 31m long (see below). As Martin Daoust's collage shows, this makes the hangar steps very steep- each step is about 40cm/ 16 inches high!

The floor of the passenger module is 2.4m / 8ft above the ground, but the studio version appears to be about 0.9m / 3ft above ground. On Seed Of Destruction Tony and Maya have a short single step down to the surface, as if the Eagle has sunk into the ground.

The Another Time, Another Place shot of an Eagle with crew reveals another problem: the cockpit seen through the windows is much higher than the passenger module. When the pilots are seated, their eyeline would be in the centre of the Eagle; to see them from outside we would have to look down. Looking closely at the background set behind the pilots shows how most of the height of the cabin has gone.

The Eagle studio set was 12m / 40ft long in Year 1. The passenger module is 4.2m / 14ft wide. Unlike the exterior design, the set is not symmetrical. The corridor in the front half of the passenger module is 2.4m / 8ft long, while the rear half with seats is 3m / 10ft long.

In Year 2, the Eagle set is 9.6m / 32 ft long, losing the 2.4m / 8ft forward corridor section. This creates a serious continuity problem with the exterior design, but the long corridor was rarely used. Its loss is not immediately obvious on screen, apart from there being only one set of doors between the pilot section and the passenger section.

A better solution, proposed by Martin Daoust, may have been to turn the passenger module round, putting the seats in the front half. To save studio space, the module corridor, now in the rear, could have been closed off with a door.

Roberto Baldassari worked out a number of sizes based on Nick Tate's height and the Eagle length.

• Alan Carter = 1.80 m (5.9 ft) tall
• Eagle door = 2 m (6.5 ft) tall
• Eagle = 31.36 m (102.88 ft) long
• Launch pad = 72.5 m (237.86 ft) (pad upper diameter)
• Moonbase Alpha = 1,500 m (4,921.2 ft) (max diameter)