nasas decade of triumphs and tragedies
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T-Minus 10 Seconds To
Mankinds Greatest Achievement.
NASAs Decade of
Tragedies and Triumphs.
SS310
Unit 9- Final Essay
Bob McKay
Kaplan University
Dr. Nita Evans, Professor
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Lunar Module Pilot Edwin Buzz Aldrin :40 f eet [altitude] , down 2 [descent rate]
Aldrin : 30 feet down, 2 kicking up some dust .
Aldrin : 30 feet, 2 down, faint shadow 4 forward , 4 forward, drifting to the right little...
down a half
Houston Space Center : 30 seconds [referring to the amount of fuel remaining in the descentStage]
Mission Commander Neil Armstrong : Forward drift?
Aldrin : Yes.
Aldrin : OK Contact light ! OK. Engine stop. ACA out of Detent.
Armstrong : Out of Detent
Aldrin : Mode Control- both Auto. Descent and Engine Command Override -off. Engine Arm
off. 413 is in.
Houston : We copy you down, Eagle. Armstrong : Houston, uh, Tranquility Base here The Eagle has landed.
Houston : Roger, Twan Tranquility. We copy you on the gro und. You got a bunch of guys here
about to turn blue. Were breathing again. Thanks a lot. (nasa.gov, 1969)
Mankinds greatest hour followed some of Americas darkest moments. The decade of the 60s
was one of social change, moral change, protests, a ssassinations, the Cold War, and even redemption.
Despite the incredible transformations our society witnessed, NASAs heavenly ambitions managed to
side-step the American societal issues of war, poverty, assassinations, drugs, civil rights and more. This is
because on the Moon, there are no political boundaries, but rather, one undivided , war-free world.
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Abstract
In this article, I will briefly outline the history of rocket science, beginning with Robert
Goddards groundbreaking research and flights, followed by the results of WW IIs Nazi V -2
rocket program and the subsequent post-war recruitment of German rocket scientists. The main
body of this article details the NACA (and its replacement, NASA) programs which contained an
ambitious plan which eventually landed twelve men on the Moon. Concurrently, there will a lso
be some comparisons to relevant social issues that were in place during that time period.
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Yes, but can it fly? The evolution of rocketry
Nearly eight years from the day when Pres. John F. Ken nedy verbally challenged NASA
scientists to land a man on the moon and return him safely to the earth, Apollo 11 astronauts were giventhe go-ahead to leave the lunar orbit, to begin braking thrusts with their engines, and to land on the
surface of the moon. Prior to their descent, the access tunnel which connected the orbiter's cabin to the
Lunar Excursion Module (or "LEM) was not completely de -pressurized. Thus, the undocking caused a
noticeable "pop", much like a champagne cork popping. This seemingly small glitch caused the LEM,
nicknamed the "Eagle", to be on a trajectory which placed it nearly four miles from their planned lunar
landing site. Nonetheless, the successful Apollo 11 mission changed the world (and mankind) forever.
Ever since man has been able to look towards the heavens, he has had an unquenchable hunger to
explore. From the time Galileo and Copernicus gazed through their telescopes, a series of small steps led
to the eventual footprints on the moon. It began with Robert Goddard's successful 4-second flight of a
liquid-fueled rocket in a snow-covered cabbage field in Auburn, Massachusetts on a wintery March day in
1926. This was the first of a series of significant tests which led to the standardization of modern rocket
propulsion using a combination of liquid propellants and control nozzles, which entailed a seven-year-
long series of experiments immediately following the Smithsonian Institution's publishing of his
groundbreaking work, entitled " A Method of Reaching Extreme Altitude ." At the time, newspapers
laughed-off his new theories as mere fantasy, but on that cold March day, Goddard proved them, and
some skeptical scientists, wrong. In fact, Goddard was chosen as one of Time Magazines top 100
scientists of all time. (Time)
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In this photograph, Goddard is standing next to
his pr imitive rocket moments before the first-ever flight
of a liquid-fueled rocket. His wife took moving pictures,
which have been fabricated into still photos such as this
one. The engine is actually at the top of the rocket and the
fuel tank is the cone-shaped container about 4 feet below
the rockets nozzle to provide stability. This design was
eventually scrapped, in favor of the current rocket design
which places fuel tanks above the engines after
Goddards subsequent tests proved there was no
difference in stability when it came to the placement of the fuel tanks, as long as stabilizing fins were
added to the base of the rocket.
Years later, in the waning days of World War II, Nazi Germany successfully launched explosive-
laden V-2 rockets which eventually struck targets on British soil. It turned out that Goddards ideaswere stolen by the Nazis and used, to his dismay, as a weapon of mass destruction instead his
dream of using rockets for the peaceful exploration of space. (Popular Science) The German V-2
program followed almost 5 1/2 years of launch tests and launch failures at a top-secret facility
located in the German Baltic Sea coastal town of Peenemnde. When the Allies destroyed
Peenemnde after two days of bombing, there were some valuable rocket scientists of which
both the Russians and the United States were very interested in capturing. The problem was that
a personnel movement by the Nazis had transpired a mere two months before the war ended. The
Germans had already relocated these valuable minds to a different location in Austria.
Courtesy NASA
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One of those scientists was named Warner Von Braun. During the war, Dr. Von Braun
was the technical director of the Peenemnde rocket research site. After the war in Europe
ended, Pres ident Truman put together an operation known as "Operation Paperclip." During this
operation, top German scientists were recruited by United States. The Russians were running a
parallel operation to recruit as many scientists as they could, as well. Pres. Truman ordered that
those who scientists had a Nazi criminal past were, supposedly, exempt from this recruitment
operation. However, some of the best minds, including Dr. V on Braun, were given "bleached
backgrounds with papers attached to their file folders, thus, the nickname "Paperclip". This
turned out to be a good thing, because Dr. Von Braun is the man who eventually designed themost powerful rocket ever built by man, the Saturn V-- the rocket that carried the astronauts to
the moon and back.
Von Braun was considered the foremost authority when it came to designing rockets. Thus, the
US Government flew him, along with over one hundred of his researchers and builders, to Fort Bliss, TX,
near El Paso. White Sands, NM is located just over the hill, so these two areas became the de facto rocket
research facility in the US for the ensuing fifteen years.
Operation Paperclip Scientists at Fort Bliss, TX
Courtesy NASA
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A New Direction for Avation and Aeronautics: Straight up
Since its creation in 1915, the Nat ional Advisory Committee for Aeronautics (NACA) was
deemed the center of the universe for USs flight research. After WW II ended, they continued to oversee
funding for missile programs, aircraft technology, and intensifying jet engine and rocket engine research.
Among the legacies of World War II was a glittering array of new technologies spawned by the
massive military effort. Atomic energy, radar, antibiotics, radio telemetry, the computer, the large
rocket, and the jet engine seemed destined to shape the world's destiny in the next three decades
and heavily influence the rest of the century . (Bilstein )
Bilsteins words were amazingly accurate because between 1945 and 1975, those are exactly the
areas of technology which grew the fastest. By the 1950 s, the Cold War has forced President s Truman
and Eisenhower to give a high priority to the development of rocket-powered vehicles and also to
development of thermonuclear warheads to put onboard those missiles. This was so important to our
political leaders that in fiscal 1953, $1 Million was budgeted by the Defense Department for missile
research for the first time. By fiscal 1957, this amount had grown to $1 Billion. (Bilste in) Rockets and
miss iles were big business, and NACA needed a new direction.
During that year, Russia shocked the world by announcing that they
had successfully put a 183-pound, basketball-sized satellite into Earth orbit
the first man-made object ever to circle the globe. Although it only stayed
aloft, beeping non-stop, for 23 days, it was a stunning blow and a
psychological gut - punch to the morale of the people of America. After all,
we are innovators. We are the leaders in technology. We are the promoters of NASA History Office
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freedom. We are, well, Americans ! At that point i n time, NACAs main focus was perfecting the
Vanguard missile, without success. Another distressing factor was that the Sputnik satellite weighed a lot
more than the Vanguards proposed payload of only 3 pounds. One month later, Sputnik 2 achieved orbit
at a weight of 1,100 pounds, and contained the first living creature to enter space a dog named Laika,
who died from heat exposure and stress after only a few hours. The Russians had planned on euthanizing
her with poisoned food before re-entry, so her death was inevitable, albeit 7 days ahead of their planned
euthanasia.
America did not obtain official status as a space visitor until January 31, 1958, when a device
designed by Professor James Van Allen to measure radiation was successfully launched. When the device
reached 594 miles, the radiation detectors went crazy, signaling the existence of a dense area of radiation
around the Earth. (Bilstein) Today, that area is known as the Van Allen Belt, and was a major concern
during the missions to the Moon.
This victory, however, started a divisive rift throughout NACA, and by March, NACA was on its
proverbial deathbed. On July 29, 1958 President Eisenhower signed the National Aeronautics and Space
Act of 1958 into law , and NACA was no more. NACAs last official chairman was James Jimmy
Doolittle, the famed WW II General who raised Americas morale and showed Japan a huge military
vulnerability when his Doolittles Raiders bombed the Japanese mainland mere months after the attack
on Pearl Harbor. NASA s first administrator was T. Keith Glennan, the President of Case Institute of
Technology in Cleveland, OH. (NASA)
Setting goals- Anyone care for some green cheese?
By now, Werner von Braun had established himself as the premier rocket scientist in the
free world, and the newly-created NASA wanted to use his wisdom to set some goals beyond the
bounds of the Earth- the Moon and beyond. But Von Braun had painstakingly reminded the
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fledgling NASA that it must be done in baby steps. In other words, we may be falling behind the
Russians, but the race to the Moon had only just begun. In addition, the Russians had an
unbelievably-high failure rate for their launches. From the time of their first attempt to go to the
Moon, until the time Apollo 11 safely touched down in July of 1969, the Russians had 26
failures and only 12 successful missions, compiling a cumulative failure rate of nearly 54%,
including one failed un-manned Moon mission which was launched only 3 days before Apollo
11. (Zak, 2009)
Some c lear goals to achieve progress were needed. NASA already had dozens of test
pilots for their subsonic and supersonic aircraft, and it only seemed logical that these test pilots
would be best qualified to fly rockets. But without a plan to make orbital flight a reality, these
pilots were limited to fixed-wing atmospheric flight- NACAs former forte.
NASA was going to be markedly different from NACA in two important ways. First, it
was going to be operational as well as do research. So, it would not only design and build launch
vehicles and satellites but it would launch them, operate them, track them, acquire data from
them, and interpret the data. Secondly, it would do the greater part of its work by contract rather
than in-house as NACA had done. (Bilstein) Work had already begun on the X-1 and X-15
supersonic aircraft. These were, basically, rockets with wings, capable o f obtaining altitudes in
excess of 300,000 feet.
The next step- space- was broken down into three ambitious projects: Mercury, Gemini,and Apollo. Project Mercurys goal was simply to determine if one man could survive in space.
If that was possible, then Project Gemini would be a series of two-man learning flights to assist
with designs of docking mechanisms, to interpret the medical data gathered from the astronauts
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during the multi-day space flights, to practice maneuvers, and to also study other unforeseen
problems with living in zero gravity. Apollo was a series of final tests using 3 men with the
actual moon-bound equipment- some tests performed while in Earth orbit, and others while in
lunar orbit- culminating with actual manned landings on the Moons surface.
In March of 1960, NASA had succeeded in the launch of the worlds first inter-planetary
probe, named Pioneer 5, which flew by Venus and took the first close-up photos of a celestial
body other than our Moon. It also set a communication record with a 22 Million mile distance.
By the election of 1960, most of NASAs re -organization and planning was completed, and
contracts with developers were becoming a way of life. The use of existing large missiles simply
adapted to hold the space capsules was their des ign plan.
On April 12, 1961, that all changed when Soviet Cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin orbited the
Earth once and safely landed. We missed being first in space by a mere 3 weeks. American had
been dealt another proverbial punch to the gut another psychological b low to the America
first mindset.
Less than a month later, on May 6, Astronaut Alan Sheppard became the first American
to achieve a sub-orbital flight, but this was no consolation at NASA for four reasons. First, he
only flew for 15 minutes and was simply recovered downrange in the Atlantic Ocean. Second,
his spacecraft, Mercury 1, only weighed 2100 pounds.
Gagarins vehicle weighed more than 10,000. Thirdly,Sheppard flew for 300 miles, yet Gagarin flew more than
24,000. Finally, Gagarin had 90 minutes of
weightlessness and Sheppard only had about 5. A senseCourtesy NASA
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of urgency ensued in the White House.
Americans became worried that the Soviets would be p lac ing weapons in space, or
developing missiles that could reach sub-orbital altitude and possibly rain down on the
continental United States. This aspect worried the nations new p resident, John F. Kennedy, who
was sworn-in less than three months earlier. Thus, Kennedy sent his Vice President, Lyndon B.
Johnson, to gather information about NASAs capabilities for multiple circumlunar flights.
Johnson had served during the previous administration as Senate Majority leader, but he also had
extensive dealings with NACA and the fledgling NASA chief, Jimmy Webb. Three weeks later,
Johnson reported back to Kennedy with the positive results, and Kennedy immediately addressed
a joint session of Congress and stated, in no uncertain terms,
I believe that this nation should commit itself to achieving the goal, before this decade is
out, of landing a man on the Moon and returning him safely to the Earth . (Kennedy )
This solidified our commitment to put the U.S. first in space technology. Kennedy didnt
want a one -shot deal, either. He wanted a series of landings to prove we were superior to the
Russians. But, skeptics asked, how would we do it? In late 1962, NASAs overall plan to land on
the Moon was released to the public. It entailed having a massive launch vehicle carry a
command module to act as the tow truck to bring a specialized Lunar Excursion Module, or
LEM, to a Lunar orbit. The LEM consisted of two components- a Lunar Lander, and an ascent
vehicle. The LEM would depart the orbiting command module and descend to the Moons
surface with the astronauts onboard. Later, an ascent vehicle would propel the astronauts back
into lunar orbit to dock with the orbiting command module, and they would leave lunar orbit and
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return to the Earth. This was an ambitious plan, but NASA felt it was well within their realm of
possibility. Successful tests with V on Brauns powerful rockets had proved it was feasible.
Kennedy s commitment was re iterated in a speech to Rice University students and staff on
September 12, 1962, when he told them,
We choose to go to the moon [interrupted by applause]We choose to go to the moon...
[interrupted by applause] We choose to go to the moon in this decade and do the other
things, not because they are easy, but because they are hard And, this will be done in the
decade of the Sixties. (Kennedy, 1962)
On November 22, 1963, Pres ident Kennedy was scheduled to make a speech in Dallas, TX
which further supported the space program, but he was assassinated before he could reiterate his
continued commitment to have the US excel in space. After the moral butt-kicking the Russians
had given us earlier in the decade, now, the nation lost a visionary president who supported
NASA and all of its endeavors. The nation took a proverbial punch to the jaw. Psychologically,
our nation was numb. We needed something to bring us back up from the depths of shock, grief,
and anger. We needed a man on the Moon. We had the green light from Congress and the White
house, and now all we needed was some symbolic green cheese from the Moon to go with it.
Come on, baby, light my fire- Putting a man into space
The Mercury program had three distinct goals: to orbit a
man around the Earth, to investigate mans ability to function in
space, and to recover both man and spacecraft safely. (NASA)
John Glenn entering Mercury 7 CapsuleCourtesy NASA
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The Mercury program enjoyed 6 consecutive successful launches by the summer of 1963, so the
remaining 3 launc hes were cancelled in lieu of commencing the Gemini Programs aggressive
schedule of 10 flights within a 2- year period. Astronauts were beginning to become celebrities.
Prior to, and during the Mercury program, un-manned Moon probes would have allowed
geologists to select several potential Apollo landing sites which could yield the best scientific
data and samples for Apollo to bring back from the Moon. The major problem, however, was
that there had been 12 consecutive failures. By the time the Mercury program had triumphantly
concluded with Gordon Coopers 30-hour flight on May 5, 1963, the Russians had three
successful Moon missions, but they were merely fly-bys to detect gravity and photograph the
backside of the Moon.
The Soviet Premier, Nikita Khrushchev, gloated about the failures of the first NASA Ranger
moon probe missions, notably Ranger 4, which crashed on the far side of the Moon instead of softly
landing on the near side. As a response to Khrushchev s chiding , Jet Propulsion Labs Director, William
Pickering, retorted, " Ranger 4 was tracked by the Goldstone receiver as it passed the leading edge of the
moon. At 4:49.53 AM it crashed on the moon If the Russians wished to confirm that fact, they could
dispatch one of their own astronauts to the spot and investigate it first-hand . (Bilstein) Hence, the Space
Race had become a de facto entity.
Less than eight months after Kennedys death, NASA finally succeeded in photographing the
surface of the moon with a n impact probe designed to transmit images until the moment of impact.
Ranger 7, 8 and 9 gave NASA, and the entire US, something to finally be proud of not only because they
were successful, but they also transmitted pictures of proposed Apollo landing s ites, specifically, Ranger
8s photos of the Sea of Tranquility.
ASA
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Let Me Introduce Our Twins- America s Gemini Program
The Gemini mission had three objectives.
(NASA) First, measuring medical changes to a humans
body while in space for multiple days would tell NASA
whether the Moon mission would ever occur. Until the
Gemini program began, only one of the original seven
astronauts had endured 34 consecutive hours in one
miss ion, a lbeit with no side effects. Could man handle a
week or more in space with the same results?
Secondly, in order to make a trip to the Moon, vehicles need to be able to rendezvous with other
orbiting spacecraft, maneuvered in space, and hook together, or be docked. This had never been
attempted due to the constraints of Earths gravity. Small jets affixed to the outside of the spacecraft were
designed to handle this important function. Would they work? Could man ever maneuver a spacecraft in
zero gravity? Would the larger rocket be enough, or would we need a bigger one to carry two men and a
larger payload? What other unforeseen problems might appear? These questions needed to be answered.
Thirdly, NASA needed to perfect methods to re-enter the atmosphere and land at a predetermined point.
The manned portion of the Gemini program began on March 23, 1965 following two successful
un-manned tests of the Gemini programs proposed rocket, a modified Titan II missile. Gus Grissom and
John Young lifted off together and orbited the Earth 3 times in 5 hours.
The year was 1965. Young Americans were heading off to war in Vietnam while, domestically,
people protested against the very same thing. In November of that year, the first large-scale draft card
burning was held. (Gosse) An ideological rift was beginning to develop in the political spectrum. Space
Cutaway
Courtesy NASA
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was their escape. Nonetheless, there were even protests against the space program. Left-leaning political
activists wanted to know why money was being spent on the space program, while domestic hunger
flourished. They wanted to know why more money wasnt being spent o n equal rights or helping the rest
of the worlds poverty. The reality is that when the Gemini program concluded in November of 1966,
NASAs budget peaked at $5.9 Billion, or a mere 6% of the total Federal budget. By contrast, the NASA
budget in 1969, when Apollo finally landed on the Moon, was $4.25 Billion, only 2.1%. (Wikipedia), or
slightly more than the annual state budget for California. (Braastad)
Even though the Gemini miss ions were concurrent with a war that was intensifying in Vietnam,
there was a bright spot for some of the contractors who gave NASA their rocket technology because
missiles and solid fuel rockets were also becoming an effective weapon against the enemy in Vietnam.
Concurrently, the Soviets were increasing their research, development, and deployment of larger miss iles
which could actually carry nuclear warheads to the continental United States. Europe was becoming a
proverbial huge chess game, and nuclear missiles were becoming the chess pieces for both sides. These
large missiles could actually obtain sub-orbital flight and descend within a matter of twenty minutes.
Robert Goddard was probably rolling over in his grave at the thought of his invention being used for that
purpose. The United States was simultaneously developing missiles for the same purpose, but the Soviet
technology was more advanced.
Although the Russians enjoyed great success with intercontinental miss ile development , the
Soviets were frustrated with a failure rate of nearly 64% with their un-manned Moon probes. (Zak) A lot
of the failures were due to guidance problems and, as a result, several probes simply went past the Moon
without taking a single photo. Other Soviet probes that were designed to make a soft landing on the Moon
either crashed into the surface, or missed the Moon altogether. America was slowly taking the lead in the
new Space Race. An emerging symbol of American pride was emerging, and it had the name NASA.
Children yearned to become an astronaut. Space had become the final frontier, and by 1966, a short-lived
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television series, named Star Trek kept youngsters glued to their new color te levisions every week.
Space was becoming a part of the new American psyche.
During the Gemini program, one pair of astronauts, Jim Lovell and Frank Borman, set a duration
record with 206 orbits accumulating over 330 hours (2 weeks) in space With the conclusion of the Gemini
program following J im Lovell and Edwin Buzz Aldrin s flight of Gemini XII, NASA was looking
forward to answering President Kennedy s challenge within the next two years. That two-year goal was
about to tragically change during the Apollo program.
Shes Got A Ticket To Ride - The Moon Awaits
During this period of the 60s, Life magazine was a hallmark of the weekly periodical market.
With a gutsy and expensive move, they landed an exclusive contract with NASA to document and
photograph the emerging heroes of the Apollo program. To this date, the photos printed on the pages of
their magazine during that period remain some of the most iconic photographic images of our nation.
With this added publicity, astronauts were rapidly becoming big celebrities everywhere they went.
Autograph hounds, and shrieking ladies greeted some of the younger, single ones if they dared to venture
outside the Kenned y Space Center. Their crowds were not as big as some of the current rock bands
crowds, but people, nonetheless, were awestruck in their presence. People simply wanted to know what it
took to be an astronaut, and kids wanted to eat Space Food.
Meanwhile, NASA put forth the Apollo programs four objectives. NASA needed to: establish
the technology to meet other national interests in space, to achieve preeminence in space for the United
States, to carry out a program of scientific exploration of the Moon, and to develop mans capability to
work in the Lunar environment . (NASA) This was a daunting task, but one which NASA dreamed of
since its creation. Footprints on the Moon were only two years away.
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Dr. Von Braun supervised the development and testing of a massive rocket, consisting of three
stages which would allow the payload to enter Earth orbit, leave
Earth orbit and transit to the Moon and back. To date, it is the
most powerful rocket ever built by man, and it went by the name
of Sat urn V. But engineers and scientists decided that testing
the individual stages, as opposed to testing the entire three-stage
rocket, would lead to faster problem-solving and would allow a
mission to the Moon by early 1968. Thus, testing began in 1961
for different combinations and engine designs. Ultimately, the
Apollo Program used 3 variations of the Saturn Rocket: the Saturn
I, the Saturn I-B, and the Saturn V. Each model had specific payload capacities, and the early Apollo
miss ions had rather light pay loads.
In fact Apollo 1s missions goals were to simply rendezvous with their cargo and test the
Command Modules systems, and then come back to Earth. Three weeks before their scheduled February
17, 1967 launch, Virgil Gus Grissom, Roger Chaffee, and Ed White we re undergoing a test to
determine whether the spacecraft would operate nominally on internal power without any land-based
umbilical cords attached. As with the prior Mercury and Gemini projects, pure oxygen was used to
pressurize the cabin during this routine test. The doors on what Grissom dubbed the lemon only open ed
inwards. Thus, while under pressure, it was impossible to open them. The builder, North American
Aviation, wanted NASA to allow the doors to open outwards, but NASA refused, citing Mercury 4s
premature blowing of the hatch and subsequent sinking during the post-flight recovery. During the test,
and without warning, a fire erupted inside the cabin, and all 3 astronauts were killed. An entire nation,
who had fallen in love with the astronaut program from the pages of Life Magazine, was shocked.
America had its first space tragedy, and it did not even occur during a flight.
Courtesy NASA
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Days later, a shocked nation solemnly watched as two flag-draped coffins containing Gus
Grissom and Roger Chaffee were laid to rest in Arlington Cemetery. Ed White was given the same honors
at West Point Cemetery in West Point, NY. NASA suddenly had some investigat ing and explaining to do.
Congress would certainly see to that. Eventually, the cause of the fire was not determined, but the deaths
were attributed to several factors. Velcro, a combustible material, was used extensively inside the cabin to
secure astron auts personal items. In addition, some of the wiring did not have fireproof insulation.
Finally, the inward-opening hatch prevented the technicians from blowing the bolts to facilitate a launch
pad rescue. These three major design flaws caused a two-year delay before the next launch with a re-
designed Command Module.
December 21, 1968 marked the first launch of a manned Apollo mission. This ambitious mission
was the first visit to another world with humans as
passengers. Life magazine published one of the most
iconic images of Earth ever photographed after
Lunar Module P ilot, Bill Anders photographed a
Christmas Eve Earthrise above the Moons surface
after the three-day trip to the Moon. Frank Borman actually took the first photo of an Earthrise one
minute earlier , but it was in black and white. A short time later, the crew read the first 10 verses of
Genesis to a live television audience to commemorate Christmas Eve on Earth.
Courtesy NASA Courtesy NASA
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Between the period when Apollo 8 was launche d and before Apollo 11s historic launch in July
of 1969, there were two other missions to test the equipment and docking procedures. By Novembers
successful completion of Apollo 12, the deca de of the 60 s was coming to a close. During that timeframe,
our nation had experienced 3 assassinations, civil rights reform, protests against our government in
unparalleled participatory levels, and an unpopular war in which we won nearly every major battle on the
ground, but lost the war in the press at home. We were a nation changed forever by music, drug usage,
youth movements, long hair, and diametrically-opposed political beliefs. One thing, however, brought us
as a nation, and the world as a people, together. It was only for a fleeting moment, and that moment was
hearing Neil Armstrong say, Thats one small step for a man, one giant leap for mankind from a
celestial body that man has gazed upon for several million years.
Courtesy NASA
Astronaut Buzz Aldrin Salutes theAmerican Flag on the surface of
the Moon July 20, 1969
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Grade:
Numeric grade: 230/230 Letter grade:
Grade Details | INBOX Date & Time
Reviewed by: VeraBenita PhillipEvans 6 Sep 09 4:30 PM MST
Attachments: None
Comments:
Bob, wow! The word requirement was 1800-2400. You have 5126. I like the pics! Adds a lot tothe paper, which is the most detailed assessment a student has ever done of NASA. Without a doubt you
met all of the requirements for this assignment. Your use of concepts and integration of theory is
outstanding. It has been a pleasure reading your work. I value and applaud your work ethic. I wish more
students had it. It was a pleasure having you in the class. All the best! See you on fb.