Soyuz 7/Buran (Blizzard)
October 12, 1969 6:44am
Crew: Anatoly Filipchenko, Vladislav Volkov, Viktor Gorbatko
Orbits: 80
Duration: 4 days, 22 hours, 40 minutes, 23 seconds

Soyuz 8/Granit (Granite)
October 13, 1969 6:19am
Crew: Vladimir Shatalov, Aleksei Yeliseyev
Orbits: 80
Duration: 4 days, 22 hours, 50 minutes, 49 seconds

Having lost the race for the Moon, the Soviets were hoping for another dazzling display by having three spacecraft carrying seven cosmonauts rendezvous at once.

Over the course of three days beginning on October 11^th, the three Soyuz spacecraft were launched and reached orbit successfully. The plan called for Soyuz 7 and 8 to dock and transfer crew members as had been done with Soyuz 4/Soyuz 5 at the beginning of the year. The crew of Soyuz 6 would film the process.

But it never happened. The rendezvous equipment failed on all three spacecraft. The result, especially after the catastrophic failure of the N1, eventually led the Soviets to give up any pretense of going to the Moon and focus on their space station project.

All three spacecraft landed safely.

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The astronauts themselves were finally given the chance to choose the soundtrack of their flights on the flight of Apollo 9 in March of 1969. NASA had begun supplying astronauts with early prototypes of the Sony Walkman to record voice notes. Unfortunately, there doesn't seem to be any definitive list of all the songs brought along by the astronauts, but here are at least some notes on their choices.

For Apollo 9, Lunar Module Pilot Rusty Schwieckart brought along a tape of classical music, which wasn't able to find until the ninth day of the ten day mission.

Apollo 10 had flown to the Moon accompanied by Frank Sinatra and his hit "Fly Me to the Moon" on a tape put together by Lunar Module Pilot Gene Cernan and his friend Al Bishop.

For Apollo 11, Neil Armstrong asked for bandleader Les Baxter's Theremin-infused  1947 album "Music Out of the Moon." Buzz Aldrin suggested "People" by Barbra Streisand and “Spinning Wheel” by Blood, Sweat & Tears. Michael Collins requested "Everyone's Gone to the Moon" by Jonathan King. 

As seen and heard in the 7th episode the excellent HBO miniseries "From Earth to the Moon",  the Apollo 12 crew brought along a tape that included "Sugar, Sugar" by the Archies, which hit the top of the Billboard charts just six weeks before the mission's launch. The tape also included Dusty Springfield's groovy "Son of a Preacher Man." 

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Commander Jim Lovell recalled listening to the soundtrack from the movie "2001," the aforementioned "Also sprach Zarathustra". Given the intense focus on the accident and the desperate effort to save the crew, little seems to have been written about their musical choices.

The Apollo 14 crew's tapes included songs by Marvin Gaye, Simon and Garfunkel, and the Beatles. It also included the classic Buck Owens hit "Act Naturally", complete with a customized introduction from Buck himself.

The Apollo 15 tapes included songs like "My Girl" by the Temptations, The Animal's cover of "The House of the Rising Sun", and  "Jesus Christ Superstar" soundtrack.

Apollo 16's Command Module Pilot Ken Mattingly played Berlioz’s Symphonie Fantastique as he orbited along while the rest of the crew was romping on the lunar surface. 

As for live performances, the NASA archives includes Cernan breaking out in an impromptu adaptation of the song "While Strolling Through the Park One Day" from a 1941 Disney Mickey Mouse cartoon. Lunar Module Pilot Harrison Schmidt joined in, before they stopped abruptly, unable to remember the rest of the lyrics! 

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It had been eight years, and now NASA was ready to fulfill John F. Kennedy’s challenge. 

On the morning of July 16^th, there were an estimated one million people crowded along the streets and beaches with views of the launch pad (I was one of them). 20,000 guests were given seats in the NASA viewing stands. 3,500 of them were journalists from around the world. The launch would be televised and seen live by up to a billion people. 

The launch was spectacular. The crew reported a smooth ride, without any of the pogo oscillations previous flights had been through. 

After trans-lunar injection, they jettisoned the third stage and retrieved the Eagle.

They required only one mid-course correction on the journey to the moon.

On July 19^th, Apollo 11 crossed over into the lunar sphere of influence. The world was watching as the hatches on Columbia and Eagle were opened, and Aldrin floated into the Lunar Module for the first time. 

Apollo 11 slipped behind the dark side of the Moon and fired up the SPS for the lunar orbit insertion. During their first two orbits, they could see their landing site growing brighter.

There was a nine-hour rest period, but none of the crew slept well. 

After a quick breakfast, Armstrong and Aldrin boarded the Eagle. Collins went through the lengthy process of closing up the hatches and running through the details of his checklist. On their thirteenth orbit, the two spacecraft separated. “The Eagle has wings,” Armstrong reported.

The crew aboard Eagle meticulously checked out their systems. They fired up the landing radar. Then the real drama began. Armstrong slowly fired up the descent engine, slowing Eagle and dropping to down toward the surface. The process would take twelve minutes, but to everyone watching, it seemed to take forever.

On the way down, a series of alarms jangled nerves. The tension was intense in Mission Control, as the team of controllers tried to confirm everything was okay. 

The Eagle rotated, and with just three minutes left, Armstrong and Aldrin got their first good look at the path ahead of them. They were less than two thousand feet above the surface. Armstrong recognized the landing site immediately and saw it was crowded with boulders. He gave the engine a goose to fly past the boulders and spotted smoother ground ahead. 

The Descent Module’s fuel supply was quickly running out, and Mission Control began to sweat. Aldrin called out the altitude and speed. At a hundred feet, the Descent Engine started kicking up lunar dust, obscuring the view from the windows. At thirty feet, the Eagle began drifting slightly backward and to the left. Armstrong corrected the backward movement. He was concentrating so hard, he didn’t hear Aldrin call out “contact light,” the point at which the sensors hanging sixty-seven inches below the Eagle’s landing pads touched the surface. 

The Eagle settled to the surface, and Armstrong cut the engine. The instruments in Mission Control indicated a landing.

“We copy you down, Eagle,” radioed CapCom Charlie Duke.

“Houston, Tranquility Base here. The Eagle has landed.”

238,900 miles away, there was a moment of joyous celebration in Mission Control, and from the people watching around the world. Walter Cronkite was sitting next to Wally Schirra for the live coverage. Schirra could be seen wiping a tear from his eye while Cronkite breathed a sigh of relief. “Man on the moon,” he said, removing his classes. “Whew. Boy!”

“Roger, Tranquility, we copy you on the ground,” Duke responded over the cheers. “You got a bunch of guys about to turn blue. We’re breathing again. Thanks a lot!”

 “And then the backroom literally erupted,” Flight Director Gene Kranz recalled. “The people were pounding on the floors, cheering and applauding us. And then my control room started to pick up the same buzz, and I said okay all you guys, settle down.” Kranz would go on to say he wished he and his team could have enjoyed the moment more. But there was no time for celebration in the moment. Mission Control had to determine if it was safe to stay on the surface. And before anything else could happen, Armstrong and Aldrin would have to prepare the Eagle for an emergency liftoff. 

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With that checklist completed, the crew was supposed to have a five hour rest period before stepping down to the surface. But they knew they’d never actually rest. Mission Control agreed to begin the EVA early. 

It took almost twice as long to prepare as it had during training, mostly because they were especially cautious. Suited up, they depressurized the Eagle, and six hours and twenty-one minutes after landing they pulled open the hatch.

Armstrong, with his bulky backpack, had to wiggle carefully through with Aldrin guiding him. Out on the porch, he surveyed the landing site and pulled the latch that released the experiments compartment and the television camera that would monitor his climb down to the surface.

Then he descended the nine-rung ladder and stepped on to the land pad. He hopped back up to the ladder to make sure he’d be able to reach it easily, before dropping back down to the landing pad. After making some observations about the surface, he radioed Mission Control. “I’m about to step off the LM now.” With hundreds of millions of people watching back home, he took the step.

“That’s one small step for [a] man, one giant leap for mankind,” he reported. He had intended to say it was a “small step for a man,” and may have, but the transmission was garbled. 

Now Armstrong took a few minutes to get a feel for moving around on the surface. He reported that it was easier than it had been in the simulations, “it’s absolutely no trouble to walk around.” To make sure they would have something to show for all the trouble if something went wrong, he collected a sample of the lunar soil and tucked the bag into a pocket on his suit.

Aldrin then joined him on the surface, describing the view as “magnificent desolation.” The two experimented with moving around. Their backpacks, even in the one-sixth gee of the moon, tended to pull them backward, but they had no problem balancing. Aldrin attempted moving by hopping like a kangaroo, but they eventually determined that loping, taking long, bounding strides, was easiest. 

One of their tasks was planting an American flag. It wasn’t easy, and they struggled with the telescoping rod and then could only drive it five inches into the hard surface. Because there was no atmosphere, the flag was designed to hang from the flagpole as if it was being flown by a stiff wind. 

At that point, NASA patched in a telephone call from President Richard Nixon. Frank Borman, who was the NASA liaison to the White House had convinced the President to keep his remarks brief. Nixon concluded by saying, “For one priceless moment in the whole history of man, all the people on this Earth are truly one: one in their pride in what you have done, and one in our prayers that you will return safely to Earth.”

Armstrong and Aldrin then deployed the experiment package they had brought with them. It included a passive seismic device and a reflector array to enable an Earth-based laser ranging experiment. They took photographs and collected samples. Aldrin attempted to take core samples, but again, the hard lunar surface made it impossible to penetrate more than six inches. 

The moonwalk had gone well enough that Mission Control had granted a fifteen-minute extension. But after about two and a half hours on the surface, the expedition came to a close. They loaded the film they had taken and two containers of samples weighing 47.5 pounds into the Eagle. Then they tossed out their backpacks, overshoes and other unnecessary items to lighten the load. They sealed the hatch and repressurized the Eagle before settling down for a rest period that lasted about seven hours. After their adventure, neither man slept much.

Once they were officially up again, they began the countdown to liftoff. Two and a half hours later, they fired the Ascent engine and rose quickly to meet the Columbia in orbit. The exhaust from the engine knocked the flag over, something that NASA would correct on later flights by moving the flag farther from the Lunar Module.

A number of items left behind deliberately as memorials. A plaque on the descent stage bore the inscription: “Here men from the planet Earth first set foot upon the Moon, July 1969 A.D. We came in peace for all mankind.” They also left behind an Apollo 1 mission patch in memory of Grissom, White, and Chaffee. 

While Armstrong and Aldrin had explored the surface, Michael Collins kept occupied with his duties aboard Columbia. He later reported that he hadn’t been lonely but had felt “awareness, anticipation, satisfaction, confidence, almost exultation.” He was also ready, at any point, for an emergency rescue that he might need to make.

But the Eagle’s reunion with Columbia went according to plan. After docking, the crew transferred their samples and film to Columbia. After running through the checklist, the SPS fired and put them on a trajectory home.

An approaching storm forced NASA to shift the recovery zone in the Pacific. The recovery helicopters spotted Columbia when the drogue parachutes were released. After splashdown, the Columbia floated upside down for ten minutes until the floatation system righted the spacecraft. Navy divers added floatation collars and positioned rafts around Columbia.

Concerned about the possibility the crew had been exposed to dangerous pathogens, NASA was taking extraordinary steps to ensure nothing would be spread. Before they left the spacecraft, divers handed the crew biological isolation suits to wear. When they finally made it into the rafts, both the astronauts and divers were scrubbed down with a bleach solution. They were then lifted into the recovery helicopter and flown to the U.S.S. Hornet. The helicopter was lowered to the hangar bay, and the astronauts walked thirty feet to the Mobile Quarantine Facility, a fancy name for a converted Airstream trailer. They would spend the next twenty-one days there to ensure they hadn’t been infected with anything. NASA would drop these precaution after the flight of Apollo 14 when it was clear the moon was sterile.

Columbia was lifted aboard and set in pace next to the quarantine trailer. A flexible tunnel between the two was installed, and the samples, film and other gear were transferred. When the Hornet arrived in Pearl Harbor, the trailer was airlifted to the Manned Space Center in Houston. The crew and their samples were transferred to the Lunar Receiving Laboratory. They were finally released on August 10^th.

Three days later, the crew took part in ticker-tape parades in both New York and Chicago. They then flew to Los Angeles where the President hosted a state dinner. A month later, they addressed a joint session of Congress. They toured the world, visiting twenty-two countries in thirty-eight days. They were hailed as heroes everywhere they went. 

The Space Race was over. NASA had met John F. Kennedy’s challenge. The Soviets, for their part, denied there had ever been a race to the moon. In 1989, that charade was revealed. 

Regardless, Apollo wasn’t done. There was much left to discover and explore. 

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There were many unanswered questions. Would micrometeorites be a hazard to the lunar module and the astronauts? What about radiation, especially from unpredictable solar flares? And what about the actual surface? Some experts predicted the surface was a layer of dust several meters deep that a lander would sink into. While the Surveyor probes had landed safely, they weighed 649 to 675 pounds, far less than the design specification for the Lunar Excursion Module. Many experts were still worried the heavy manned lander might just sink deep into the dust on the surface of the Moon.

The NASA Apollo Site Selection Board spent two years studying the photographs and date gathered by Ranger, Orbiter, and Surveyor. They had a number of criteria to guide their choices. They knew any site chosen would have to be relatively smooth and flat, with an approach that was clear of deep craters and large hills. The site would have to be within reach of the free-return trajectory required to get the spacecraft back home if the Service Module engine failed during lunar orbit insertion. And getting to the site would need to use the least amount of fuel possible. 

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The lighting from the Sun would be critical for the astronauts to see the surface clearly during their descent. There needed to be some shadows to highlight the features on the surface. This would mean all of the lunar landings would happen during the waxing crescent phase. The angle of the sun would also determine the surface temperature during the landing. The surface during the lunar noon can reach 123 C (253 F). Like a jogger in the summer, landing during the lunar morning would be much safer and comfortable. 

Sea of Tranquility (Mare Tranquillitatis)

Ocean of Storms (Oceanus Procellarum)

Fra Mauro

Hadley Rille/Apennine Mountains

Descartes Highlands

Taurus-Littrow

Another NASA team had begun planning for a scientific package to bring to the surface of the Moon aboard the Lunar Module. Over the course of 1964 and 1964, a set of experiments was chosen for inclusion in what came to be known as the Apollo Lunar Surface Experiments Package (ASLEP). The instruments included would measure seismic activity, the moon’s magnetic field, and the flow of heat through the surface of the moon. Others were designed to detect ions and the solar wind. Bendix was selected to build the packages.

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Soviet hopes to beat the Americans to the Moon ended on July 3, 1969. Once again, the N1 was carrying a Zond version of the Soyuz, with the goal of reaching the Moon, for orbit or flyby.

The mission was doomed even before it actually started. Moments before liftoff, an explosion in one of the engines cut through nearby fuel lines and started a fire. As the rocket cleared the launch tower, there was another explosion and all but one of the engines shut down fifteen seconds after ignition. The N1 leaned heavily to one side and fell back on the 110 East launch pad. 

The resulting explosion was enormous and devastating. “Today,” one witness said, “I saw without exaggeration the end of the world, and not in a nightmare but while fully awake and standing right next to it.” 

Windows nearby were shattered for miles around. Debris was scattered as far as six miles away. Light from the explosion could be seen twenty-two miles away. Amazingly, no one was hurt. Once again, the only thing that went right was the launch escape system which pulled the unmanned Zond up and away to safety.

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The launchpad was destroyed, and it took eighteen months to rebuild. American satellite photos revealed the aftermath of the launch. Although the Soviets kept everything secret, the Americans now knew what they were attempting.

But now it was too late for the Soviets to beat the Americans to the Moon. Apollo 11 would launch in thirteen days. 

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When the Apollo 10 mission was first planned, the Lunar Module would only be tested in the same way Apollo 9 had tested. It would be retrieved, and the crew would perform rendezvous and docking tests. But six months before it's scheduled launch, mission planners convinced NASA administrators to go farther. They agreed to fly the LM down, close to the surface, to check out the landing radar. Preparations for the flight were complicated by the Apollo 9 launch but didn’t delay Apollo 10.

Command Tom Stafford and his crew, Command Module Pilot John Young and Lunar Module Pilot Gene Cernan, chose the names Charlie Brown for the CSM and Snoopy for the LM. All three were veterans of space flight. 

The Saturn V was rolled out to Launch Complex 39B and on May 18^th, 1969, the rocket was launched.

Once in orbit, all of the spacecraft systems were tested before the third stage S-IVB was re-ignited for the trans-lunar injection burn. Safely on the way to the moon, the S-IVB was jettisoned, and Young proceeded to extract Snoopy. 

After reaching lunar orbit, Stafford and Cernan boarded Snoopy, leaving Young behind in Charlie Brown. They fired the descent engine and began their approach. At 50,000 feet above the surface, the landing radar went to work. This was the altitude the real descent to the surface would begin. They surveyed the Apollo 11 landing site in the Sea of Tranquility.

Trouble reared up when they jettisoned the LM Descent stage and fired the ascent engine. Snoopy began rolling violently. The crew had accidentally put the flight computer in the wrong mode. Cernan said the lunar module rolled over eight times. Stafford and Cernan got the LM under control again, but it had been an extremely dangerous situation.

After docking safely and transferring to the CSM, Snoopy was jettisoned. NASA fired up its ascent engine again remotely, sending Snoopy into orbit around the Sun. It remains there today, the only formerly manned spacecraft still in space without a crew.

Charlie Brown splashed down safely on May 26^th of the east coast of American Samoa in the Pacific Ocean.

Charlie Brown can be seen at the London Science Museum.

After thirty-one orbits, the SPS was fired up and kicked Charlie Brown back to Earth. On the way home, Charlie Brown set a speed record that stands to this day, traveling at a speed of 24,791 miles per hour. Re-entry and splashdown in the Pacific were uneventful. The dress rehearsal was complete.

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He brought the subject up with President Richard Nixon as they were flying to Hawaii to greet the returning Apollo 11 crew. The President, along with Secretary of State William Rodger and National Security Advisor Henry Kissinger, told Paine to explore the possibilities.

Paine began offering the Soviets opportunities to collaborate on projects including the Viking mission to Mars. The diplomatic courtship between Paine and Mstislav Keldysh, the president of the Soviet Academy of Sciences took months and slowly evolved into a discussion of developing a way for Soviet and American spacecraft to dock with each other. Paine put forth the idea of a Soviet craft docking with Skylab. “The Skylab docking proposal was made so that we could convince the Soviets of the reality of our proposal,” Paine late explained. “We made this specific to avoid initiating prolonged general discussions in which everyone agreed to 'cooperate' but nothing actually happened.”

These discussions were kept private, but in July of 1970, President Nixon publicly stated his interest in cooperation with the Soviets in space. NASA’s Office of Manned Space Flight went to work studying rendezvous and docking between the two very different programs and the spacecraft that would be involved. 

Paine resigned in September of 1970, and George Low became NASA’s Acting Administrator. He assured the Soviets he would continue Paine’s efforts and agreed to a meeting in Moscow in October of that year. 

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The specifications called for a two-stage vehicle. A Descent Module would house the engine that would carry two astronauts down to the lunar surface and legs for it to land on. The astronauts would be housed in the ascent module, which had its own engine and would take them from the surface back to the CSM in orbit. 

As it would never fly in an atmosphere, there was no need for an aerodynamic shape. It wouldn’t need a heat shield. And it could be built from lightweight materials that would never survive a flight through the atmosphere. The overall weight would become an obsession during the development by Grumman. 

Beginning in 1963, Grumman presented three concepts to NASA. The first involved a cone-shaped cabin sitting on a cylindrical section with an engine and three folding legs. The second version had seats, large curved windows, and a forward docking port. It was decided that three legs wouldn’t be stable enough and five would be too heavy, so it became four legs. The windows were far too heavy, the seats were unnecessary in lunar gravity, and the extra docking port wasn’t needed. 

Design changes were constant throughout 1964 and 1965 as NASA changed various specifications for the lander missions. By 1966, Grumman was moving towards production. But there were problems. Costs had soared, most of that coming from subcontractors. Ground checkout equipment wasn’t originally up to the task, which had delayed the start of the engine tests at the White Sands Test Facility. The Grumman team designing and building the test equipment was working a 56-hour workweek. Surplus checkout equipment from the Gemini program was shipped to Bethpage. 

Delays were of great concern to NASA. Hopes that the first lunar module would be shipped to the Kennedy Space Center in early 1967 faded. Both engines proved problematic, and solutions took time to develop. The ascent stage engine wasn’t deemed ready until more than halfway through 1968. The first vehicles on the production line were all behind schedule. There were problems with the windows, which had to be redesigned, tested, and installed. Stress cracks were found in some of the aluminum structures. They had to be replaced. Wiring problems were found in some of the production models and had to be corrected. Finally, NASA demanded weight reductions of 90 kg (198 pounds) from the spacecraft. 

The first production model, LM-1, flew in January of 1968 on the unmanned Apollo 5 mission. Both engines were tested, the descent engine three times and the ascent engine twice. LM-3, the first lunar module that would fly on a manned mission, arrived at the Cape on June 14, 1968. Inspections revealed more than a hundred defects, some of them major. By August, program managers realized that LM-3 wouldn’t be ready to fly in 1968. This problem led to the decision to send Apollo 8 to the moon, instead of using the mission to test the lunar module in Earth orbit. LM-3, renamed Spider, would fly with Apollo 9 in March of 1969. 

When the design was finished, the LM looked like no other spacecraft ever built. The ascent stage was an ungainly geometric shape that sat atop the descent stage and contained the crew cabin, as well as the flight instruments and controls. There was a hatch at the top, which allowed for docking with the Command Module, and an EVA hatch at the front. Two triangular windows in the front gave the astronauts a view of the surface, and a window at the top gave the commander a view during undocking and docking maneuvers.

The cabin was designed for two astronauts and had a habitable volume of 4.5m³ (160 cubic feet). Life support was provided for a 48-hour stay on the surface, which was extended to 75 hours on the final three missions. The instrumentation included a wide variety of antennas and a ranging radar for use in docking the CSM. Control of the Lunar Module’s attitude was provided by four sets of Reaction Control system thrusters power by hypergolic Aerozine 50 fuel and nitrogen tetroxide oxidizer. Power was provided by batteries.

The astronauts brought their spacesuits with them from the command module, but the rest of the gear and tools they would use on the surface were stored inside the Lunar Module. At the end of their stay on the moon, the astronauts would leave most of that gear behind to save weight for the rocks and soil samples and exposed film they were bringing back to Earth. The astronauts slept inside on hammocks or the floor. 

The most important part of the Ascent Stage was the LM Ascent Engine. “The ascent stage was far more critical,” said Lynn Radcliffe, the Grumman manager at the White Sands facility, “because it had no backup.” It was also powered by the Aerozine 50/nitrogen tetroxide mixture. It was designed and built by Bell, with help from Rocketdyne. It couldn’t be throttled, so it was all or nothing. It wasn’t gimbaled and relied on the RCS thrusters for steering. It could only be fired once, either to lift the astronauts and their samples off after separating from the descent stage on the surface, or if an emergency arose during landing and it was needed for the abort maneuver. If it didn’t work, the crew would die.

The octangular descent stage, covered with gold-colored mylar insulating foil, had four spindly landing legs that expanded outward. The descent stage engine was a highly advanced design at the time, which used Aerozine 50 fuel and dinitrogen tetroxide oxidizer. The engine, built by TRW, was designed to be throttleable and was gimballed to help control direction. The engine used pressurized helium to push the propellants instead of using a much heavier system of turbopumps. A doppler radar mounted on the bottom provided guidance for the landing.

On the surface, it took up a space 31 feet wide and 31 feet deep. It stood an inch over 23 feet high. Leg #1, at the front of the vehicle, had an attached platform (known as the ‘porch’) in front of the EVA hatch and a ladder leading down to the footpad. The other legs had sensors that dangled 67 inches down from the footpads, which signals contact with the surface, at which point the descent engine was to be shut down. Equipment for various experiment packages was stowed in compartments on the side of the LM, as was the lunar roving vehicle used in the final three lunar missions. 

Ten test versions and fifteen production model Lunar Modules were built. Two of the test models were flown unmanned on Apollo 4 in November of 1967 and Apollo 6 in April of 1968. Both were destroyed upon reentry to Earth’s atmosphere. The remaining test craft are on display at NASA facilities and museums. 

The first production model reached space on the unmanned Apollo 5 test in Earth orbit in January of 1968. The first manned test came on Apollo 9, also in Earth Orbit. Apollo 10 brought a Lunar Module to the moon for a dress rehearsal for landing. The next seven went to the moon for landing missions. The final three of those (Apollo 15, Apollo 16, and Apollo 17) used upgraded versions that carried the Lunar Rover Vehicle and provided for longer stays on the lunar surface. 

The Lunar Module used for Apollo 9 burned up on re-entry in the Earth’s atmosphere. The descent stage of Apollo 10 LM crashed on the moon, while the ascent module is in orbit around the Sun. The descent stages from the LM spacecraft used on Apollo 11, Apollo 12, Apollo 14, Apollo 15, Apollo 16, and Apollo 17 remain on the lunar surface. The Apollo 11 ascent stage was left in lunar orbit and eventually crashed. The other five were deliberated crashed into the moon’s surface. The Apollo 13 Lunar Module, which was vital in saving that mission from disaster, burned up on reentry. LM-2 was never flown and is now in display at the Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum. LM-9, which was replaced by an extended duration version for Apollo 15, is in display at the Kennedy Space Center. LM-13, which would have been used on the canceled Apollo 18 mission, was only partially completed and now is on display at the Cradle of Aviation Museum on Long Island. LM-14 and LM-15, for the last two canceled Apollo missions, were never completed.

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As 1969 began, the pressure was rising. Apollo 9 was set for a launch in March to test the Lunar Module in orbit. But problems with the Lunar Module, which had already forced the change in the Apollo 8 mission, lingered. The wiring of LM-3, designated for the Apollo 9 mission, was cause for some concern but was eventually judged to be safe enough for the mission. 

Another challenge was the fact that crews at Kennedy had their hands full, first getting Apollo 8 assembled and launched, while simultaneously checking out the components for Apollo 9 and Apollo 10. Fortunately for them, the early plan to launch the Apollo 9 mission using two Saturn IB boosters had been changed to using a single Saturn V.

On January 3^rd, just a week after the Apollo 8 splashdown, the Apollo 9 stack rolled out of the VAB to Launch Complex 39. For the first time, the Saturn V would launch fully operational versions of the CSM and the LM. By the end of February, all of the technical and engineering issues had been worked out.

For the first time since Gemini 3, NASA allowed the crew to give their spacecraft nicknames. They called the Lunar Module ‘Spider’ because of its spindly legs. The CSM was named ‘Gumdrop,’ both for its shape and the blue color of its protective wrapping.

Lift-off came at 11:00 am on March 3^rd. The first stage performed well, “an old lady’s ride,” according to Commander Jim McDivitt. Two minutes and forty-five seconds into the flight, the S-II second stage took over, and the ride got bumpier as pogo set in. The third stage S-IVB engines ignited at eight-minute and fifty-seven seconds after launch, and after burning for just over two minutes, the stack was in orbit.

After ensuring that all systems were operating correctly, it was time to retrieve the Lunar Module from its protective shell atop the S-IVB. The docking probe was extended, and Command Module Pilot maneuvered the Gumdrop in for a hard dock. After confirming everything was okay, Apollo 9 pulled away from the S-IVB. 

Now, they tested the Service Module Engine for the first of several times. The question was whether the CSM could maneuver successfully with the docked Lunar Module. The tests settled the question and raised the combined spacecraft orbit to an altitude of 316 miles.

For the first time, NASA let the crew sleep at the same time. The next morning, they prepared for the next major test. The crew got into their pressure suits. Scott opened the docking hatch and removed the CSM probe and the LM drogue from the tunnel. Schweickart pulled himself through the tunnel, opened the LM hatch and entered the lander. McDivitt followed about an hour later, and Scott closed the hatches. 

Schweickart and McDivitt ran through their checklist. They activated Spider’s landing legs, which sprang into position. McDivitt used the LM thrusters to maneuver into position and then fired up the Descent engine. The result was better than expected. Afterward, Spider was shut down, and McDivitt and Schweickart returned to Gumdrop.

On their fourth day in orbit, Schweickart suited up again and entered Spider. He was wearing the portable life support system backpack that would later be used on the landing missions. Tethered to LM, Schweickart opened Spider’s front hatch and stepped out on to ‘the porch.’

At that point, Scott opened Gumdrop’s hatch and stood up. Both astronauts took pictures of each other and retrieved experiment samples. The spacewalks lasted less than an hour, and the crew returned to Gumdrop to rest.

The next day, March 7^th, they began the ultimate test. Scott remained in the CSM, while  McDivitt and Schweickart returned to the LM. Scott released Spider, and McDivitt spun the LM around to let Scott check if the legs had properly deployed. Then Spider departed. McDivitt piloted the LM to an eventual distance of 115 miles from the CSM. Again and again, they tested the descent engine and the thrusters. They jettisoned the descent stage and fired up the ascent engine and returned to Gumdrop. They docked safely, ending their six-hour excursion.

The next few days were much easier. The crew would conduct further burns with the SPS, take pictures, and perform navigation sightings. On March 13^th, Gumdrop came home, splashing down within sight of the recovery ship east of the Bahamas.

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Trouble began almost immediately. An electrical spike shut down one of the main engines, and the N1’s control system immediately shut down another to balance the booster. Six seconds after launch, pogo oscillation ripped several components off their mounts and tore a hole in one of the fuel tanks. Nineteen seconds later, a fuel line ruptured, pouring the kerosene-based fuel into the booster and starting a fire. Three minutes and three seconds after liftoff the entire stack crashed back to earth 32 miles from the launch pad.

The only good news for the Soviets was that the escape system worked properly and the payload was saved.

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The Soviets had kept the launch secret, and American intelligence was unaware of the test at the time. They would try again, but at this point, the Soviets were running out of time before the Americans beat them to a lunar landing. 

January 14, 1969 2:30am
Crew: Vladimir Shatalov
Orbits: 48
Duration: 2 days, 23 hours, 20 minutes 47 seconds

Soyuz 5/Baikal (Lake Baikal)

January 15, 1969 2:04am
Crew: Boris Volynov, Aleksei Yeliseyev, Yevgeny Khronov
Orbits: 49

Duration: 3 days, 54 minutes, 15 seconds

The Soviets weren’t giving up on reaching the Moon. Their plan at this point was to launch a single cosmonaut into lunar orbit, have him descend to the surface in a lander, and then return to the orbiter for the return home. This, in essence, was exactly what the Americans were planning to do, with one very key difference. While the latest model of the Soyuz was designed to be able to dock with another spacecraft, there was no docking tunnel. That meant the cosmonaut would have to conduct spacewalks to transfer to and from the lander.

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There were two primary obstacles to overcome. They would have to learn how to dock. And they would need their N1 booster to work.

The docking and crew transfer became the goal of Soyuz 4/Soyuz 5. 

Soyuz 4 launched into orbit with Vladimir Shatalov on January 14^th, 1969. Soyuz 5, carrying Boris Volynov, Aleksei Yeliseyev, and Yevgeny Khrunov, reached orbit the next day.

On January 16^th, the two spacecraft approached each other and docked. Yeliseyev and Khrunov suited up, stepped out of Soyuz 5, and pulled themselves over to Soyuz 4 and boarded it. It took them 37 minutes. It was the first time two manned spacecraft had docked and was the first crew transfer. 

Soyuz 4 and its crew returned safely on January 17^th.

On the 18^th, Volynov began the re-entry procedure. But the Service Module failed to separate from the Descent Module. As it began moving through the atmosphere, the heaviest part of the spacecraft, the Descent Module was leading the way. The top of the module had nothing to protect it. Voynov was left hanging down in his straps as the gaskets sealing the entry hatch burned, filling the capsule with smoke and dangerous fumes. The heat eventually burned through the struts connecting the Descent and Service modules, which broke apart. At that point, the Descent Module righted itself with its heat shield in the proper position.

But that wasn’t the end of Volynov’ ordeal. The spacecraft’s parachute cables got tangled up. And then, just before reaching the ground, the soft landing rockets failed. Soyuz 5 hit the ground hard, breaking some of Volynov’s teeth. He landed far off course, and instead of waiting for rescuers to reach him, he abandoned the spacecraft and walked several kilometers in temperatures of -36° F to reach the home of a peasant.

The Soviets were now ready to try their lunar landing plan. If, of course, the N1 booster could get them there.

As a side note, the calls signs of the two Soyuz were a reference to the construction of the Baikal-Amur Mainline, a 2,687-mile-long trans-Siberian railroad line.

Volynov would go on to fly again on Soyuz 21 for a mission aboard the Salyut 5/Almaz military space station in July of 1976. That mission ended prematurely, either because of fumes filling the Salyut, a medical issue involving the other cosmonaut, or some sort of conflict between the two.

Regardless, when Volynov tried to undock from the station, the docking latches failed to disengage. It took more than ninety minutes before Volynov was able to free the Soyuz. After reentry, the descent module was buffeted about by heavy winds, the retrorockets fire sporadically, and the spacecraft made a hard landing.

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The A7L was a new design, which was worn during launch and re-entry, as well as on spacewalks and on the lunar surface. 

The suits were made of five layers with rubber joints. The sixth layer, on top, was white and made of fireproof materials. Connections at the neck and wrists allowed the astronauts to attach the gloves and the helmet quickly. NASA adopted the fishbowl helmet, giving the astronauts an unrestricted view. The black rubber gloves used inside the spacecraft were custom molded to give the crew additional flexibility. Boots were built into the suit. Life support came from the spacecraft via umbilical hoses. This basic configuration weighed 62 pounds and was worn only for launch and reentry. There was a zipper that allowed the astronauts to get out of the suits after launch. It started at the back of the helmet connection, went down the back and around the groin. 

Beneath the suit, the astronauts wore the Constant Wear Garment (CWG), which amounted to a heavy-duty suit of long underwear that covered everything except the head and hands. It had fly openings in the front and the back for waste elimination. Fasteners allowed the attachment of the biomedical sensor belt. It was designed to be worn for six to seven days before being replaced by a second set packed into a locker. During launch and reentry, the crew would wear the Urine Collection and Transfer Assembly, which amounted to a rubber condom with a tube leading to a collection bag. 

After launch, the astronauts would wriggle out of the A7L and wear a set of Inflight Cover Garments over the Constant Wear Garment. This lightweight suit was either white, light blue, or mustard colored. It consisted of four pieces made of flame-resistant beta cloth. The long-sleeve jacket had holes for the medical sensor connectors and was snapped closed at the wrists and down the front. The pants had snaps for the waist and at the ankles for the boots. 

During the mission, the crew wore the famous brown and white ‘Snoopy caps.’ Officially called the Communications Carrier Assembly, the caps were worn with or without the helmet and held the headset and microphone, which could be connected directly to the suit. 

Getting into the A7L wasn’t easy. The astronauts would have to climb in from the back and wriggle their hips and shoulders to get the suit on. The cooling garment and the belt sensors would then be plugged into the inside of the suit. At that point, the zipper would be pulled up with the help of a ribbon. Add the Snoopy cap, gloves, and the helmet and an astronaut was ready to go. 

For lunar missions, there were several additions to the A7L for the Commander and the Lunar Module Pilot. The Constant Wear Garment (CWG) was replaced by a set of heavy-duty underwear known as the Fecal Collection System (FCS) and the urine collection and transfer assembly. Over that came the Liquid Cooling Garment (LCG), a nylon suit that looked like long underwear woven with plastic tubes that circulated water. The biomedical sensor belt was attached over the LCG. An outer shell was used on the helmet to decrease light reflection and provide better thermal control. It also had a gold sunshade visor. A heavier glove was provided. It was wrapped in a metal fabric to protect against punctures. The fingertips were silicone to add a little sensitivity. An overshoe that slipped right over the A7L boot was used to provide extra protection against puncture. The soles were made of silicone, giving the astronauts more traction and additional insulation. Beginning with Apollo 13, red stripes were added to the Commander’s suit so that Mission Control could easily identify him.

Life support on the moon was provided by the Portable Life Support System (PLSS). This backpack supplied power, oxygen, scrubbed out carbon dioxide, and regulated the temperature and humidity inside the suit. With all of the extras, the full A7L suit worn on the moon weighed 200 pounds. But in the moon’s gravity, it felt like only 33 pounds and the astronauts were able to move about easily.

When the Command Module Pilot needed to wear the A7L for spacewalks, he would add the three-layer Intravehicular Cover Layer (ICL) and could rely on the life support umbilical hoses instead of using the PLSS. 

For the later, longer Apollo missions, the suit evolved into the A7LB. This design included new joints at the waist to allow astronauts to sit in the Lunar Rover. New joints were added to the neck as well, to increase the range of motion. The PLSS was modified to supply the additional oxygen, power, and water needed for the longer EVAs.

The Apollo spacesuits were custom fit for the individual astronauts. The prime crew of a mission required three — one for flight, one for training, and a backup just in case. The backup crew would have one suit for flight and one for training.

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The flight of Apollo 8 in December of 1969 marked the beginning of the end of the Space Race. 

Apollo 8 had originally been planned as a “D” mission, a test of the lunar module in low earth orbit. The initial crew was James McDivitt, David Scott, and Rusty Schweickart. Frank Borman and his crew would then fly the “E” mission, another test of the Lunar Module in a higher orbit. Only then would Apollo reach for the Moon, the “F” mission, testing the Lunar Module in orbit around the Moon. If all went well, the next step would be actually landing on the Moon in the “G” mission. 

But that schedule started falling apart when NASA inspectors examined LM-3, the Lunar Module selected for Apollo 8. They discovered more than a hundred defects, and NASA engineers realized it would take months to fix them all. It would be able to fly in 1968. With Kennedy’s deadline fast approaching, the delay would set the entire program back by months.

In addition, there was evidence that the Soviets were preparing to send a cosmonaut aboard a Zond spacecraft to circle the Moon and return to Earth. 

George Low, the Manager of the Apollo Spacecraft Program Office, had an idea. The plan was simple. Instead of waiting for the Lunar Module, Apollo 8 would launch in December and either fly around or orbit the Moon. In August of 1968, he began sharing his it with other NASA leaders. They agreed it could be done and were able to convince NASA Administrator Jim Webb to authorize the mission. There were conditions. The flight of Apollo 7 would have to be a success, and NASA would have to keep their intentions quiet until everything came together.

But preparations began immediately. Slayton offered the mission to McDivitt. He turned it down. He and his crew had been training rigorously for their mission to test the Lunar Module in low earth orbit, and he wanted to fly that mission. Frank Borman took the job. Jim Lovell replaced Michael Collins, who had to undergo back surgery in July, as the Command Module Pilot and William Anders was the Lunar Module Pilot. Anders was disappointed because he’d been training to fly the LM and Apollo 8 would only carry a boilerplate version. The crew went to work in the simulators on September 9^th. By November, they were training ten hours a day, seven days a week.

Von Braun and his team had been working on the problems experienced by the unmanned Apollo 6 test in April. They installed a system that used helium gas to counteract the pogo oscillations. And they traced the engine shutdowns to leaky fuel lines, which they corrected. AS-503, as it was called, was declared ready to fly. 

The assembled stack rolled out to Launch Complex 39A on October 9^th, two days before the launch of Apollo 7 from Launch Complex 34. Testing continued until the day before the launch. 

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At 2:30 am on December 21^st, Borman, Lovell, and Anders were awakened for breakfast. Afterward, they were wired up for the biomedical sensors and suited up. The transfer van drove them the three miles to their awaiting spacecraft. A huge crowd of invited guests, spectators, and journalists gathered in the pre-dawn hours to watch the launch.

At 7:51 am, the launch sequence began. The mighty F-1 engines of the first stage ignited and slowly built up thrust. Seconds later, the clamps that held the rocket down released. The support umbilical’s detached and the mobile launcher tower’s support arms swung away as the rocket began to move. For the first time, astronauts were riding the Saturn V. Borman and Lovell later said the launch was similar to what they had experienced on the Gemini missions that used the Titan II booster. Anders, who was on his first flight, said it was like riding “an old freight train going down a bad track.”

Step by step, Apollo 8 climbed through the atmosphere. The S-IC first stage did its job without a hitch, as did the S-II second stage. The third stage S-IVB kicked the stack into orbit right on schedule.

Now came the test. The S-IVB engine had to relight for translunar injection. It had failed on the last unmanned test. After checking and rechecking, Mission Control was ready. Two hours and twenty-seven minutes after launch, CapCom Michael Collins informed the crew: “Apollo 8, you are go for TLI.” The S-IVB engine fired up again, accelerating the stack from 17,000 mph to an astonishing 24,158 mph. The translunar injection was complete. Apollo 8 was headed to the Moon.

The CSM separated from the S-IVB and the boilerplate LM. The crew maneuvered around the third stage booster, taking photographs. They maneuvered away, and Mission Control sent the command for the booster to vent its remaining fuel. It entered solar orbit where it remains to this day.

Eleven hours after liftoff, the crew had to perform a mid-course correction. The fired the Service Module engine for 2.4 seconds, but it underperformed, and they had to use the Reaction Control System thrusters to make up the difference. The result was a perfect trajectory, and no further corrections would be needed.

At this point, Frank Borman took the first sleep shift. After tossing and turning a bit, he got permission to take a sleeping pill. After finally falling asleep, he awoke, feeling sick. He vomited twice and suffered a bout of diarrhea. The crew cleaned up the resulting mess. Borman wanted to keep the matter quiet, and the crew compromised, recording a message on the Data Storage Equipment, sent it via high-speed transmission, and suggested Mission Control review it for “an evaluation of the voice comments.”

After reviewing the situation with the NASA flight surgeons, they decided it was either a reaction to the sleeping pill or the 24-hour flu. As it turned out, he was suffering from space adaptation syndrome, which would be a recurrent problem on later missions. 

As the journey to the Moon continued, the crew carried out various tasks, including two television broadcasts, sending back the first live television images of the Earth. Although they were fast approaching the Moon, they were unable to see it because of the direction the spacecraft was required to face and because three of the five windows had fogged up. “We took it on faith the Moon would be there,” Lovell said later. 

Fifty-five hours into the mission, the CSM passed the point where the Moon’s gravitational influence became stronger than the pull of gravity from the Earth. Another correction burn adjusted their trajectory so that they would now fly just 71.7 miles over the Moon’s surface. The next maneuver would be the Lunar Orbit Insertion, which would have to be performed out of radio contact with Earth on the far side of the Moon. Mission Control gave them the go, and Lovell replied, “We’ll see you on the other side.” 

The crew got their first close up view of the moon just two minutes before the LOI burn. They had little time to appreciate it. Sixty-nine hours after the mission began, the Service Module Engine fired up and burned for four minutes and seven seconds. They were now in an elliptical orbit, 193.3 miles at its highest point and 69.5 miles at the lowest. 

Apollo 8 orbited the moon ten times in the next twenty hours. Jim Lovell described what he saw. “The Moon is essentially grey, no color,” he told Mission Control. “We can see quite a bit of detail.”

Bill Anders, who originally been training to fly the Lunar Module, was given the task of taking photographs of potential landing sites for future missions. On their fourth pass over the near side, they spotted the Earth rising over the horizon of the Moon. Anders captured the magnificent sight with a black and white photograph, and then the famous color photograph that became known as Earthrise.

Borman slept fitfully for two orbits, and when he awoke, he ordered his exhausted crew to get some sleep as well. He wanted them to be well-rested when it came time to fire the engine again for the trans-Earth injection and the trip home. 

Coming out from behind the far side on their ninth orbit, the crew began its second television broadcast. It was Christmas Eve, and the crew had planned something special. They took turns reading from the Book of Genesis.

Anders: 

“We are now approaching lunar sunrise, and for all the people back on Earth, the crew of Apollo 8 has a message that we would like to send to you. In the beginning, God created the heaven and the earth. And the earth was without form, and void; and darkness was upon the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters. And God said, Let there be light: and there was light. And God saw the light, that it was good: and God divided the light from the darkness.”

Lovell: 

“And God called the light Day, and the darkness he called Night. And the evening and the morning were the first day. And God said, Let there be a firmament in the midst of the waters, and let it divide the waters from the waters. And God made the firmament, and divided the waters which were under the firmament from the waters which were above the firmament: and it was so. And God called the firmament Heaven. And the evening and the morning were the second day.”

Borman:

“And God said, Let the waters under the heaven be gathered together unto one place, and let the dry land appear: and it was so. And God called the dry land Earth; and the gathering together of the waters called the Seas: and God saw that it was good. And from the crew of Apollo 8, we close with good night, good luck, a Merry Christmas – and God bless all of you, all of you on the good Earth.”

The live broadcast was viewed around the world, by what was the largest television audience to that point in history. Its impact was powerful. “The message from the crew really got to me,” Robert Bay, now a Grumman contractor, recalled. “I kept getting something in my eyes that kept them moist for a while.”

There was one final and critical task. On their final orbit, out of radio contact on the far side, the crew fired up the Service Module Engine again. Mission Control and the world waited almost breathlessly to learn the result. As contact was reestablished, Jim Lovell told those listening, “Please be informed, there is a Santa Claus.” The burn was perfect. Apollo 8 was now just three days from home.

It was Christmas day. The crew made another television broadcast. Then they discovered the gifts Deke Slayton had provided. There was a real turkey dinner, complete with stuffing, hidden in the food locker. And there were three miniature bottles of brandy. The crew relished the turkey, but the brandy bottles remained unopened for years. 

The remainder of the cruise home was uneventful. Re-entry began on December 27^th, controlled by the flight computer, and the Command Module splashed down in the Pacific southwest of Hawaii. The parachutes dragged the spacecraft over and left it bobbing upside down in choppy water, making Borman sick again. Six minutes after splashdown, the floatation system righted the capsule. Thirty-seven minutes later, the rescue helicopter arrived, and the crew was aboard the U.S.S. Yorktown forty-five minutes later. 

1968 had been a horrible year. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and Robert Kennedy had both been assassinated. There had been violent protests in the streets of the United States and Europe. The Soviet Union and its Warsaw Pact allies had invaded Czechoslovakia to shut down the political uprising there. The Vietnam War was intensifying in the wake of the Tet Offensive.

But Apollo 8 had ended the year on a much more positive note. Time Magazine made the crew its ‘Men of the Year.’  The Earthrise photograph was the first of Life Magazine’s 100 Photographs That Changed the World. It was also credited as one of the inspirations for the first Earth Day celebration in 1970. The television broadcasts were awarded an Emmy.

But perhaps nothing sums up the impact of Apollo 8 more than a telegraph Borman received from a stranger. “Thank you Apollo 8,” it read. “You saved 1968.”

It had been a risky decision, but NASA had now cleared one of the last hurdles before it could send a manned mission to the Moon. There was only a year left to meet Kennedy’s challenge. The focus would now turn to the last hurdle, the Lunar Module.

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With the Apollo Program now in full swing, the Soviets were falling behind. The cosmonauts had not perfected rendezvous techniques and had never attempted a docking. They would need to do both for missions to the planned Salyut space station. 

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Soyuz 2 was launched on October 25^th, 1968, and Georgy Beregovoy followed, alone, on Soyuz 3 the next day.

Shortly after reaching orbit, Beregovoy maneuvered to catch up to Soyuz 2. But, he was unable to dock with the unmanned spacecraft and failed again the next day before the Soviets gave up. The Soviets announced the successful rendezvous but never said there had been an attempt to dock. It wasn’t revealed until the fall of the Soviet Union. 

Beregovoy’s re-entry and landing were flawless, a relief after the disaster of Soyuz 1.

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The most noticeable problem is now known as Space Adaptation Sickness. It’s a motion sickness type nausea first experienced by cosmonaut Gherman Titov, who vomited during his flight in 1961. For the Americans, it became readily apparent during Apollo. Unlike the cramped Mercury and Gemini spacecraft, there was room enough for the astronauts to unbuckled and float around in the cabin.

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The issue that arises in a micro-gee environment is that the fluids in your body wind up pooling wherever they are. All life on Earth is adapted to the pull of gravity, with systems designed to compensate. The inner ear is calibrated to sense motion, and when it doesn’t match what we see, the result is motion sickness. On Earth, we experience motion sickness when the vehicle we’re riding in doesn’t appear to be moving, but our inner ears sense motion. A driver steering a car is aware of the subtle movements from steering, braking and acceleration, and the response from their inner ear matches. But a passenger experiences a disconnect when their inner ears register motion, but they’re not focused visually on where the car is going. The same happens to some passengers on boats or airplanes.

In space, without gravity, the cause is actually the opposite. Astronauts in Mercury and Gemini were strapped in their seats and didn’t have room to move around if they unbuckled. Beginning with Apollo, the astronauts were able to unstrap and float about the cabin. Visually, they knew they were moving. But without gravity, their inner ears didn’t register motion. For up to half of the people who have been in space, that causes motion sickness. 

In gravity, a passenger can alleviate the symptoms by simply focusing on the movement their ears are telling them they’re feeling. In space, motions sickness can be alleviated by closing the eyes or focusing closely on something that isn’t moving.

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The normal approach is to allow an astronaut to adapt to the new environment. All motion sickness can be treated with medications that suppress the signals from the inner ear. But they come with undesirable side effects, including drowsiness, which can impair an astronaut’s performance. One major exception is when astronauts are wearing their pressure suits and helmets. Vomiting in a spacecraft creates a mess. Sealed inside a helmet, vomiting is much more dangerous, blocking airflow and obscure vision. For spacewalks, transdermal anti-nausea patches are worn.

A lack of gravity means that bodily fluids don’t drain normally, which causes fluids to pool where they are. Fluid pooling in the head can be seen in the puffy appearance of an astronaut’s face. Pooling in the sinus cavities causes congestion and a reduction in the smell. Reviewing the audio from their landing on the Moon during Apollo 12, Pete Conrad and Alan Bean noted the change in their voices as their sinuses began to drain in the Moon’s gravity, which is 1/6^th what we experience on earth.

Long term exposure to weightlessness also reduces the stress on muscles and bones, which can cause them to atrophy and weaken. Many astronauts have temporarily shown visible signs of that weakness after returning from long-duration flights. Exercise programs have been adopted, adapted, and refined over the years to counteract these effects. 

There’s also the issue of radiation. High energy subatomic particles emitted by the Sun and other stars can cause serious, even deadly, damage to the body. The Earth’s magnetic field and atmosphere protect us from most radiation. But anyone who has had a sunburn is experiencing the effects of prolonged exposure to ultraviolet radiation from the sun. The damage from ultraviolet radiation can lead to skin cancer. 

In space, exposure to even more powerful and dangerous forms of radiation is a hazard that cannot easily be avoided. Once behind the Earth’s magnetic field, there’s nothing to naturally deflect cosmic rays or the intense bursts of radiation emitted during solar flares. NASA deemed the exposure to radiation on the flights to the moon to be an acceptable risk. But manned spacecraft traveling months to reach Mars will need to be shielded as will any long term settlements on the Moon or Mars. 

During launch and re-entry, astronauts are subjected to the opposite of weightlessness. They experience higher g forces. Without training, most people will black out after about 3g, as blood is forced out of the brain. That’s why astronauts launch and land lying on their backs, to help even out the distribution of blood under higher gravitational forces.

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Apollo’s race to the Moon resumed on October 11^th, 1968. Powered by a Saturn IB, Apollo 7 put Americans back into space for the first time in almost two years. There was a lot riding on the success of the mission.

Before launch, Schirra demanded a different Pad Leader. Gunter Wendt was the McDonnell employee who the company had installed as Pad Leader for Mercury and Gemini. But North American was the contractor for the Apollo, and they brought in their own Pad Leader. Schirra would have none of it and pressured Deke Slayton into forcing North American to hire Wendt. Then Schirra pressured North American into making sure Wendt would be the Pad Leader on duty for the launch itself. 

During the countdown, Schirra wasn’t happy that NASA had chosen to ignore its own mission safety rules and launch into a wind blowing in from the east. An abort would mean the capsule might come down on land instead of in the ocean. 

Everything went well with the launch, with Schirra describing the Saturn IB ride to be a lot smoother than what he had experienced with the Titan II on his Gemini VI flight. Upon reaching orbit, Command Module Pilot Eisele maneuvered to practice the rendezvous and docking procedures that would be used on later flights that carried a Lunar Module. One of the four panels at the top of the S-IVB, where the LM would have been stored, hadn’t fully opened. Had it been aboard, it might have been dangerous to try the docking and retrieval.

There were minor equipment problems throughout the duration of the flight, but they were all easy enough to overcome. But Schirra came down with a cold, and the entire crew became frustrated and testy. They’d discovered that the waste collection system took up to thirty minutes to use and it smelled bad. They argued with the CapComs working in mission control about their scheduled objectives. The astronaut’s boss, Deke Slayton, got involved in the discussion, and Schirra argued with him.

They would argue again, later, over the NASA requirement that they wear helmets when they were landing. Schirra objected, in part because sinus pressures from their colds might cause their eardrums to explode if they couldn’t equalize the pressure by holding their noses and blowing. Slayton got on the line again: “I guess you better be prepared to discuss in some detail when we land why you haven’t got them on.” Schirra responded that they had tried their helmets on that morning.

“The only thing we’re concerned about is the landing. We couldn’t care less about the reentry,” Slayton said. “But it’s your neck, and I hope you don’t break it.”

At that point, Schirra was already done with NASA, having announced his retirement before the flight began. Eisele and Cunningham never flew another mission for NASA.

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Launch Complex 34, which had been built to handle the Saturn IB launches, was never used again. It was torn down, and all that remains is the launch platform, some flame deflectors, and the blockhouse. Two plaques to honor the Apollo 1 crew have been affixed to the side of the Launch Platform. The first reads:

LAUNCH COMPLEX 34

Friday, 27 January 1967

1831 Hours

Dedicated to the living memory of the crew of the Apollo 1

U.S.A.F. Lt. Colonel Virgil I. Grissom

U.S.A.F. Lt. Colonel Edward H. White, II

U.S.N. Lt. Commander Roger B. Chaffee

They gave their lives in service to their country in the ongoing exploration of humankind's final frontier. Remember them not for how they died but for those ideals for which they lived.

The second:

IN MEMORY
OF
THOSE WHO MADE THE ULTIMATE SACRIFICE
SO OTHERS COULD REACH THE STARS

AD ASTRA PER ASPERA
(A ROUGH ROAD LEADS TO THE STARS)

GOD SPEED TO THE CREW
OF
APOLLO 1

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Apollo 6 would be the final unmanned test of the Saturn V, and the final mission before a manned flight would resume with Apollo 7.

Preparations for the launch were slowed because the Apollo 4 stack was still going through the checkout procedure. While the VAB could handle four Saturn V stacks at one time, there were only enough technicians to check out one at a time.

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At launch, everything looked good until two minutes after liftoff. The Saturn IC first stage began experiencing severe pogo vibrations. Parts of the adapter mating the CSM to the third stage were shaken loose. The S-II second stage had problems of its own. Engine number 2 struggled, and the Instrument Unit shut it down completely at T+412 seconds. Two seconds later, engine number 3 shut down. The flight computer adjusted, and the remaining three engines burned for an extra 58 seconds to make up the difference. Then the S-IVB third stage had minor problems but made it into orbit. 

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The S-IVB’s job included driving the CSM out of Earth orbit on a translunar injection to the Moon. But on this test, the S-IVB engine didn’t restart. NASA had to settle on firing the Service Module engine to drive the CSM to an altitude of 13,797 miles before sending it plunging back toward earth at a speed of 375 miles a second. That was slower than a CSM would experience returning from the Moon, but that had been successfully tested already on Apollo 4. 

Despite the pogo problems, NASA was satisfied with the results of the flight.

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Elliot See and Charlie Bassett had been assigned to fly Gemini 9. On February 28^th, 1966, they were flying to Saint Louis to go through two weeks of rendezvous and docking training at the McDonnell simulator. They took off from Houston in a T-38, while their backups Tom Stafford and Gene Cernan flew alongside in a second T-38.

The weather at Lambert Field in St. Louis was miserable. Rain, snow, fog, and clouds required the astronauts to fly an instrument approach. When they broke out of the clouds, they realized they had overshot the runway.

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See circled for a visual landing attempt, while Stafford pulled back up into the clouds to prepare for another instrument approach. After circling around, See lowered his landing gear and flaps but the T-38 was too far left of the runway. See lit the afterburner and made a sharp right turn. The plane hit the roof of the McDonnell facility, cartwheeled and crashed into a parking lot. See, and Bassett died instantly. Seventeen McDonnell employees and contractors were injured. The Gemini 9 spacecraft, which was being completed in another part of the building, was undamaged. 

Richard Bay, a McDonnell employee and Robert Bay’s older brother was in the building when the accident occurred. “I was working at my desk on the second floor of the Engineering building,” he wrote. “There was a loud explosion and flames shot down from the ceiling about thirty feet from my desk.” He evacuated but returned when it was clear there was no fire. “When I looked out the window, I could see the aircraft wreckage in the parking lot below.” The next morning, he found a piece of the T-38’s engine under some papers on his desk.

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See and Bassett were buried on March 2^nd at the Arlington National Cemetery. Stafford and Cernan became the prime crew for Gemini 9.

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I wanted to take a moment to mention the HBO series "From the Earth to the Moon." This 12 episode mini-series from the creators of the "Apollo 13" movie brilliantly encapsulates the majesty of the Apollo moon landings. If you haven't seen it before, I highly recommend watching it. 

Episode 1

"Can We Do this?"

The first episode sets the stage, as NASA realizes the magnitude of their goal of getting to the moon, and the intense pressure to succeed. There's a lot of foreshadowing, focusing on the members of the doomed Apollo 1 crew members, as well as Astronaut Elliot See, who would die before his Gemini mission. The episode covers a lot ground from Gagarin's first flight through the Gemini up unto the brilliant success of Gemini 12.

Episode 2

"Apollo One"

Knowing what's coming creates a sense of melancholy for me. This episode captures the horror and shock of the fire on the families, on the support engineers and administrators. It includes the bitter, tough investigation and the recriminations. The recreation of the fire is almost unbearable to watch and the episode ends with a heart-breaking last scene of Deke Slayton and Gus Grissom exchanging salutes.

Episode 3

"We Have Cleared the Tower"

From the Fire to the Apollo 7 launch from the POV of a documentary crew

The tension as the crew gets closer and closer to launch

Episode 4

"1968"

Amidst the chaos of 1968… Apollo 8 gets a new mission that will bring new hope to a weary world. Using historic footage of the Vietnam War, civil unrest and assassinations of Martin Luther King, Jr and Robert Kennedy, Jr as a backdrop, we watch as Apollo 8's flight becomes a daredevil trip to lunar orbit in December of that year. 

Episode 5

"Spider"

The story of the Lunar Module, from the perspective of Grumman's Tom Kelly, who headed up the project. It shows the evolving design of the spacecraft and the tension of meeting nearly impossible deadlines leading up to the mission of Apollo 9, and briefly, Apollo 10 in Lunar orbit.

Epsiode 6

"Mare Tranquilitatis"

It's the story of Apollo 11, the best known mission of the Apollo program, and the men who flew and guided it to the Moon. 

Episode 7

"That's All There Is"

Narrated by actor Dave Foley as Astronaut Alan Bean, this is my favorite episode of the mini-series. Its tone is light-hearted, as Bean and Commander Pete Conrad bounce over the lunar surface during Apollo 12, especially Bean's misfortunes with cameras during the mission.  I personally also get a kick out of the scene where Conrad curses up a storm during training while school kids are watching. My father recounted seeing such incidents in his own stories of the time. 

Episode 8

"We Interrupt This Program"

The story of Apollo 13 was well documented in the movie of the same name, so the producers focused this episode on the journalists trying to cover the impact of the crisis on the families of the crew. 

Episode 9th

"For Miles and Miles"

Alan Shepherd's triumphant return to space is documented in this episode, starting with his grounding in the lead-up to Gemini in 1963. The Astronaut's frustration is offset by the surgery that cured his inner ear problem, and he returns to the flight rotation as commander of the Apollo 14 mission. Software glitches build tension, before the successful landing. The episode culminates with Shepherd's famous swing the drove of a golf ball "for miles and miles and miles."

Episode 10

"Galileo"

The scientific goals of the Apollo program are the focus of this episode, as the Astronauts learn to become lunar geologists. David Scott, the Commander of Apollo 15 served as the technical advisor to the writers, and his mission is the culmination of this presentation. 

Episode 11

"The Original Wives Club"

Told from the perspective of nine of the Apollo Astronauts wives, this episode is focused on the Apollo 16 mission.

Episode 12

"Le Voyage Dans La Lune"

The final Apollo mission is featured in this episode is presented as a documentary, interspersed with the creation of French film maker Georges Méliès' epic film of a trip to the moon. The episode was written by Executive Producer Tom Hanks himself, who appears as one of Méliès' assistants. I didn't care much about the "Le Voyage" sections; I wanted more of the last minutes on the moon. 

The program is available on Max and as a DVD box set. The mini-series won a series of awards, ranging from an Emmy and a Golden Globe for Outstanding Miniseries to a Visionary Award for Executive Producer, Writer, and Host Tom Hanks. See also the IMDB entry (see especially the Trivia and Goofs section).

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 T-130:30:00 The Countdown sequence begins. Throughout the countdown, technicians will conduct a variety of tests to ensure all systems are nominal. 

T-130:00:00 – Command and Service Modules turned on for systems verification.

T-50:30:00 – F-1 Engine Hypergolic Cartridge Installed

T-48:00:00 – Oxygen and hydrogen from the service module tanks are fed into the fuel cells to provide internal power. 

T-36:30:00 – CSM Liquid Oxygen and Liquid Hydrogen Tanking

T-12:00:00 S-IC is loaded with 203,000 gallons of RP-1 Fuel

T-08:00:00 - Liquid oxygen is loaded into the S-IC, S-II, and S-IVB stages. This takes just over three hours. Heat will cause nearly a quarter of it to boil away, which is seen as the plumes of white vapor drifting away from the rocket. The tanks will be replenished closer to launch.

T-07:42:00 – Precooling of the S-II and S-IVB liquid hydrogen tanks begins. 

T-04:49:00 – The fueling of the S-II hydrogen tank begins. This is slow at first because the inside of the tank is still too warm. But it cools quickly as the LH₂ boils off. The entire process takes 46 minutes, and the tank will be replenished at various points before launch. When loading of the S-II is completed, the same process is carried out to fill the S-IVB hydrogen tank.

T-03:30:00 – Fueling of the S-IVB hydrogen tanks is complete. 

T-03:25:00 – The crew boards the spacecraft. The Commander enters first and sits in the left-hand couch. The Lunar Module Pilot enters and sits in the right-hand couch. Finally, the Command Module Pilot enters and takes the center couch. 

T-01:22:00 – The Command Module was pressurized and checked for leaks before the protective booster cover was closed. The Launch Control Center and Houston run through a series of checks to make sure they are receiving all the signals from the spacecraft, including the first motion signal that would indicate liftoff. The last weather balloon was released to determine wind direction.

T-01:14:00 – Closeout crew has secured the white room and begins clearing the pad area. Elevators are set at the 96-meter level in case they’re needed by the astronauts in an emergency.

T-01:01:00 – The Pad area has been cleared. 

T-00:56:00 – Swing Arm 9, which allowed access to the spacecraft, was retracted to a standby position.

T-00:50:00 Power transfer test. Up to this point, the spacecraft and the launch vehicle had been on external power. This test showed whether the internal electrical systems are functioning properly. The test would take about five minutes, and afterward, power was switched back to the external source. 

T-00:40:00 – The Launch Escape System was armed.

T-00:35:00 – The liquid hydrogen and liquid oxygen tanks were replenished as needed.

T-00:30:00 – The water system is ready to begin flooding the pad 2 seconds after liftoff. Final propulsion checks are completed. Reaction control systems on the service module are armed. Recovery helicopters are on station. 

T-00:25:00 – The Command Module pilot begins the process of arming and checking the Reaction Control System on the Service Module. 

T-00:20:00 – The second and third stage propulsion systems are chilled to prepare for the flow of the cryogenic propellants when they are ignited.

T-00:11:00 – The CSM is switched to full internal power. Communications between the astronauts and ground controllers are checked. 

T-00:05:00 - Swing Arm 9 is pulled back into its fully retracted position. Launch controllers give their Go/No-Go for launch. 

T-00:04:00 – The Launch Vehicle Test Conductor clears the launch vehicle for launch.

T-00:03:07 – Control of the countdown is switched to the automatic sequencer.

T-00:02:30 – The fuel and oxidizer tanks in all the stages are pressurized with helium to ensure a smooth flow down to the engine.

T-00:00:50 – Power for the launch vehicle stages is switched to their internal batteries.

T-00:00:45 – The Commander makes the final guidance alignment before launch.

Saturn V Launch Sequence Video

Harrison Schmitt, the lunar module pilot on Apollo 17, later described the last thirty seconds of the countdown this way: “Everything had come alive beneath us. The gimbals were moving and the rocket, you could feel it. You’re lying there on your back. You could feel the engines moving down a football field below you or more, as it prepared for ignition.”

T-00:00:8.9 The engine start sequence begins. LOX tank valves are opened, and LOX flows into the main thrust chambers of the F-1 engines. The F-1 gas generators and turbopumps are started. Ignition begins with the injection of a hypergolic solution into the main thrust chamber. Main fuel valves open, adding the RP-1 to the main thrust chamber. Thrust begins to build. The center engine was started first, and then the outboard engines were started in opposing pairs 300 milliseconds apart.

At full thrust, the restraining hold down arms were released. As the rocket begins to ascend, it is slowed by the by 12 restraining pins, which have to be pulled through dies mounted on the rocket. This lasts for about 150 milliseconds.

In a 1973 debriefing, Apollo 17 Commander Gene Cernan offered his memories of the launch. “You could feel the ignition. You could feel the engines come up to speed. Just prior to lift-off and during the first few seconds of lift-off when we were near the pad, both the CMP and I could see the reflection of the engine ignition out the left-hand window and the hatch window in the BPC. We could not see the fire but could see a red glow through the windows reflecting apparently off the surface. Ignition was like a big old freight train sort of starting to rumble and shake and rattle and as she lifted off."

When the rocket has moved two centimeters, the umbilical connector plates in the side of the rocket are released, and the five remaining service arms are automatically swung out of the way.

T+00:00:01.35 – The stack yaws 1.25° away from the launch tower. Witnesses often were concerned that something was going wrong, but it was a normal procedure to avoid a collision that might be caused by wind.

T+00:00:13 – The Saturn V has risen 430 feet, clearing the launch tower structure. The rocket begins its pitch and roll maneuver, which will take between fifteen seconds and twenty-one seconds, and put the stack on course. This was accomplished by gimbaling the outboard F-1 engines. At this point, control of the mission shifts from the Launch Control Center at Kennedy to Mission Control in Houston. 

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Gemini veteran Jim Lovell, described the launch of the Saturn V on Apollo 8 this way: “I don't think that the vibrations were any greater than they were in the Titan. Although there were a lot of small separate vibrations and a lot of noise, I think the flight itself was very smooth.”

“It is like an elevator slowly lifting off,” said Apollo 16 Lunar Module Pilot Charlie Duke. “At ignition, I had the lateral frequency of something or other. It just kept shaking at the same frequency throughout the whole S-IC burn. You felt yourself going faster and faster. I had the feeling it was a runaway freight train on a crooked track, swaying from side to side. That was all the way through the first stage.”

For the first forty-two seconds, Abort Mode 1a would involve the Command Module being separated from the Service Module and pulled away by the Launch Escape Tower. A small motor atop the LET would cause the Command Module to pitch over to the east toward the Atlantic Ocean. After firing for fourteen seconds, the LET would be jettisoned. The hypergolic fuels from the Reaction Control System would be vented. And the Command Module would then parachute to splashdown. After forty-two seconds, Abort Mode 1B would be used. The stack would already be pitched over. A set of canards would be deployed that would turn the Command Module so that its base and heat shield were facing in the direction of travel, and the parachutes would be deployed. 

T+00:00:56 – The atmosphere inside the Command Module was vented to lower the pressure from the level at launch. During this process, the oxygen/nitrogen mixture is slowly replaced by pure oxygen, which had the lower pressure, would be safe. 

T+00:01:23 – The stack passes through maximum dynamic pressure, where the drag caused by the atmosphere reaches its peak. This was experienced by the astronauts as a period of violent shaking and loud noise.

T+00:01:58 – The Aboard Mode now switches to 1C. The atmosphere at this point is too thin for the canards to have an effect, so the orientation of the Command Module after an abort would be controlled by the Reaction Control system until the canards become effective again. 

T+00:02:17 The center F-1 engine is shut down.

T+00:02:44 The outboard engines are shutdown. The astronauts felt this as if it was a physical blow. The acceleration of the S-IC would reach up to 4gs, driving the rocket forward and the astronauts backward into their couches. The stack in between them was physically compressed, but when the S-IC shut down, that tension was suddenly released. “When the outboards cut-off, as we had previously been briefed and as previous crews had discussed, there was a sharp unloading,” reported Apollo 12 Lunar Module Pilot Edgar Mitchell. “I expected to be thrown against the instrument panel, and I had my hands out to brace against it. But it was not as much as I expected. I do recall feeling the unloading reverberate through the spacecraft in several pulses.”

“It was what I'd call violent when the S-IC shuts down and everything recoils there,” recalled Apollo 15 Commander Dave Scott, who had also flown on Apollo 9. “It was really just a big bang.”

600 milliseconds after the S-IC shutdown, eight retrorockets fire to the pull the spent stage away from the S-II. The S-IC would continue to climb, reaching an altitude of about 366,000 feet before falling back to the Atlantic Ocean about 350 miles downrange. Eight ullage motors on the aft interstage at the bottom of the S-II fire for four seconds to settle the LH2 and LOX tanks. Then the S-II’s five J-2 engines are ignited. At this point, the astronauts were driven back into their couches again. 

T+00:03:13 - The S-II aft interstage is jettisoned. This was delayed after S-IC jettison to make sure there wasn’t a collision. 

T+00:03:17 - Escape tower and boost protection cover jettisoned. At this point, a launch abort would no longer involve the tower. Also, the Command Module windows would be completely uncovered for the first time.

T+00:09:09 - Second stage shutdown and separation

T+00:09:15 Third stage ignition

T+00:11:45 Third stage first shutdown, spacecraft now in Earth Orbit.

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