Another Apollo 11 highlight is a star chart used and signed by Buzz Aldrin to help navigate Apollo 11 back to Earth from the Moon, estimated at $30,000 – 50,000. Buzz Aldrin, in the accompanying letter describes the use of this celestial navigation aid: "This sheet illustrates what was the expected view through our scanning telescope while we performed an IMU (Inertial Measurement Unit) alignment just after our TransEarth Injection (TEI) burn which brought us back from the Moon. That spacecraft burn had to work. If it did not, Neil Armstrong, Michael Collins, and myself would remain in lunar orbit, never to return to Earth."
Shortly before the star chart was used, Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin had returned to lunar orbit from their historic first lunar landing and Moonwalk, completed the rendezvous with the Command Module "Columbia," transferred the equipment and lunar samples from the LM to the CM, jettisoned the LM and had begun the journey home to Earth.
Aldrin continues in his letter: "The flight plan was probably the single most important document related to the success of our mission. It provided a time schedule of crew activities and spacecraft maneuvers to accomplish the first lunar landing. That spacecraft burn had to work. If it did not, Neil Armstrong, Michael Collins, and myself would remain in lunar orbit, never to return to Earth."
Also going under the hammer is a copy of First on the Moon (Boston: Little, Brown, 1970, original cloth with dust jacket), one of the most complete histories of Apollo 11, signed by crew members Armstrong, Aldrin, and Michael Collins, as well as Arthur C. Clarke, estimated at $6,000 – 8,000.
