Moon landing - 50 years

[Bealman]

50 years ago today they splashed down safely in full view of the recovery ship. An astonishing feat of trajectory calculation, considering the circumstances.

They'd all lost weight and Haise had a kidney infection. The frogmen who opened the hatch said it was like opening the door to a freezer. You could see your breath in there.

Kranz admitted some years later that while they were sending up commands to power this down, power that down, including all heating, he says that they were so focused on getting them home that they never really considered how close they came to the limits of what those men could endure, close to the point of non-survival.

[Steven B]

Lost Moon by Jim Lovell & Jeffrey Kluger is well worth a read as a first-hand telling of the Apollo 13 Mission. It's years since I last read it but it's remarkable how close the mission came to ending with deadly results.

Steven B.

[Bealman]

I have a copy of that, autographed by Lovell himself. 

Anyway, we're coming up on the 50th anniversary of the launch of Apollo 14 (Jan 31), the first mission after the Apollo 13 incident. The mission is interesting for several things:

The commander was Alan Shepard, America's first man in space. He'd been grounded all through the sixties because of inner ear balance problems. He took on the role of head of the astronaut office, and was known as the Ice Commander.

An operation cured his condition, and he was put back on flight status. He then used his position to leapfrog other astronauts to secure a moonflight. He could be quite a nasty piece of work at times, apparently.

He is the astronaut who played golf on the moon.

The mission almost ended before it began, as they had difficulty docking the command module with the lunar module in order to withdraw it from the spent S-IVB stage.

Landing was also problematic - the radar refused to lock on to the lunar surface during descent.

This mission had a trolley to carry picks and tools - a MET (Modular Equipment Transporter in NASA speak). Shepard and Mitchell often had trouble with it, sometimes carrying it rather than pulling it.

The main objective of the mission, walking to the rim of Cone Crater, was not achieved, the astronauts became lost and fatigued. NASA instructed them to turn back, although subsequent analysis showed they were in fact within 100 feet of the crater rim.

Nevertheless, the mission was successful overall, splashing down Feb 9 1971, and restored NASA's confidence in their spacecraft.

[Bealman]

50 years ago, Apollo 14 was on it's way to the moon for a Feb 5 landing. Interesting that this was considered the most scientifically unrewarding of all the missions - because the astronauts didn't pay attention to their geology lessons!

They basically were fliers, and Shepard had the sole ambition to walk on the moon. The scientists were furious when he returned a large rock weighing about 1.5 kg. Obviously, this would all be made of the same stuff! He could have brought a variety of different smaller samples adding up to the same weight.

[railsquid]

But they did wonders for the field of lunar golf research!

[Bealman]

Indeed! Yet another reason the scientists were crapped off 

[Bealman]

I'm a bit early with this one!

Fifty years ago next month, on 26th July 1971, Apollo 15 lifted off, carrying CMR Dave Scott, LMP Jim Irwin and CMP Al Worden on the most ambitious moon mission to that date.

Their destination was Hadley-Apennine, landing on a small flat area hemmed in by high mountains on three sides, and a deep canyon (or rille) on the other.

Apollo 15 was the first of three 'J' missions, designed to maximise scientific returns. On board was a rover (LRV), to transport the two astronauts and their equipment long distances over the surface.

Scientific exploration was not limited to surface activities either; the service module had a SIM bay containing a suite of mapping cameras, spectrometers and other scientific sensing instruments which Worden could operate from lunar orbit.
There was even a sub-satellite which was ejected from the SIM bay (it's still in orbit there today).

The LRV carried a colour TV camera which could be remotely controlled from mission control. This meant that geologists in the 'back room' could follow along as if they were actually there with Scott and Irwin, and make changes to the schedule in real time, if they saw something interesting.

This camera was also able to capture the lift off of the LEM from the moon.

An all-up spectacular and  successful mission, which I remember very well, as I was on vacation after my first year in college.

There was only one thing that marred the mission - Scott and Irwin stamped a set of stamps which they had carried to the moon in a deal they had made with a German business man. NASA took a very grim view of this, and two very accomplished and high- achieving astronauts were dismissed immediately.

[keithbythe sea]

Great stuff, thank you George. 

[Ossian]

A couple of days late and a month early, by the look of it  , but many thanks for the reminder.

I still remember the Apollo 11 landing, at primary school being plunked down in front of a big TV and told "watch this, you'll never see anything like it again".   With hindsight, and an unhealthy interest in all things space-y, I realise we were all watching the repeat!

[Graham]

thanks for the update George, makes me feel old, this was the first one after I finished school in the time which would now be called a gap as it was just before I started my apprenticeship.

[Bealman]

A couple of days late and a month early, by the look of it  , but many thanks for the reminder.

I still remember the Apollo 11 landing, at primary school being plunked down in front of a big TV and told "watch this, you'll never see anything like it again".   With hindsight, and an unhealthy interest in all things space-y, I realise we were all watching the repeat!

Quite correct, sir. For some reason I thought it was the end of July and not the end of June! I think this lockdown we are currently under here might be taking it's toll... 

Anyway, I've fixed it. 

[emjaybee]

I got to touch a slice of 'moon' rock at Houston some years ago.

They obviously still valued it highly as you had to 'snake' your hand through a thick acrylic 'baffle' to touch it. Presumably done to discourage people from trying to lever it off its plinth. The whole display was in room of its own which was a vault with one of the thickest doors I've ever seen.

The door was significantly thicker than the blast doors of the Titan II missile silo and command bunker we visited some years later.

[Bealman]

A personal anecdote to this mission: I've actually met Al Worden,the command module pilot of the Apollo 15 mission. He passed away not very long ago, unfortunately, but there are not many Apollo astronauts left alive these days.

Sometime back in the eighties, my local shopping centre (yes, the one beside the bus stop, for the fans of my banal thread) advertised a promotion "Meet the Astronauts". I don't know exactly who they had lined up, but I remember thinking that these guys must have landed on hard times if they were doing tours of Australian shopping centres! Kinda sad, I thought.

Anyway, I turned up on a cold Thursday night, just to see. In the middle of the centre they had a little stage and a mike set up, a space suit hanging on a hook, and about thirty chairs in front of the stage. Probably no more than a dozen people were sitting there.

The astronaut turned out to be Al Worden, which impressed me no end, but not the few people who were sitting there, who were obviously expecting Neil Armstrong and had no idea who the hell this guy was.

Worden explained a little bit about his mission in simple terms, and pointed out features of his space suit. He then fielded questions. The morons sitting there asked stuff like "what's it like to fly in space?" and of course the perennial uber-stupid "How do you go to the toilet in space?"

I was getting a bit frustrated, so put me hand up, and said:

"Colonel Worden, when Apollo 15 splashed down, it did so on only two main chutes instead of three. That must have been a pretty heavy landing! Would you care to share your experience of that?"

The guy seemed genuinely taken aback by that, and I could see he was pleased to have been asked a question about his mission. He went on to explain the probable reason why one of the chutes hadn't reefed, and said they hit the water "like a ton of bricks."

Anyway I hung back when the Thurday night shoppers went on to more important things like going into K-Mart, and had a good chat to the man. I felt honoured to be in the company of a fellow who had been on one of the most scientifically rewarding voyages ever.

Andy Warhol said that every one will have 15 minutes of fame. That was probably mine 

[Trainfish]

.......... the perennial uber-stupid "How do you go to the toilet in space?"

I must be a perennial uber-stupid person as I don't know the answer to that but would like to know 

[chrism]

.......... the perennial uber-stupid "How do you go to the toilet in space?"

I must be a perennial uber-stupid person as I don't know the answer to that but would like to know 

Fill yer boots - no, not literally 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space_toilet