(Above) The Apollo 8 spacecraft still attached to the Saturn V third (S-IVB) stage, heads for the moon at a speed of about 24,300 miles an hour.
Fast Fact: Apollo 8, the first manned mission to the Moon, entered lunar orbit on Christmas Eve, December 24, 1968.
This painting was done by North American Rockwell for NASA.
(Above) This painting is a North American Rockwell artist’s concept depicting the Apollo 10 Lunar Module descending to 50,000 ft for a close look at a lunar landing site.
The Command and Service modules remain in lunar orbit. The landing area is Site 2 on the east central part of the moon in southwestern Sea of Tranquility (Mare Tranquillitatis). The site is about 62 miles east of the rim of the crater Sabine and 118 miles west-southwest of the crater Maskelyne.
(Above) This is an artist’s concept of the Apollo 15 Command/Service Modules, showing two crewmen performing a new Apollo extravehicular activity.
The figure at left represents Astronaut Alfred M. Worden, Command Module (CM) pilot, connected by an umbilical tether to the CM. At right, a figure representing Astronaut James B. Irwin, Lunar Module pilot, stands at the open CM hatch. Worden is working with the panoramic camera in the Scientific Instrument Module (SIM). Behind Irwin is the 16mm data acquisition camera.
(Above) This painting is an artist’s concept illustrating the relative sizes of the one-man Mercury spacecraft, the two-man Gemini spacecraft, and the three-man Apollo spacecraft. It also shows line drawings of the Atlas, Titian and Saturn V launch vehicles to show their relative size in relation to each other.
FAST FACTS: If the Constellation Program schedule stays as planned, Orion 15 will be the Human Lunar Return Mission. Making Orion 15/Altair 2 the first Constellation lunar landing, and the seventh manned landing in human history.
(Above) This is an artist’s concept illustrating liftoff of the Lunar Module from the surface of the moon.
(Above) This is a cutaway diagram of the Saturn V launch vehicle showing the three stages, the instrument unit, and the Apollo spacecraft. The chart on the right presents the basic technical data in clear detail.
The Saturn V was the largest and most powerful launch vehicle in the world. The towering 363-foot Saturn V was a multistage, multiengine launch vehicle standing taller than the Statue of Liberty. Altogether, the Saturn V engines produced as much power as 85 Hoover Dams. Development of the Saturn V was the responsibility of the Marshall Space Flight Center at Huntsville, Alabama, directed by Dr. Wernher von Braun.
NASA scientists developing the next generation of exploration vehicles and heat shields for NASA’s Orion Crew Exploration Vehicle experienced “Christmas in July” when they uncrated the heat shields used on the Apollo missions some 35 years ago. These shields now are being analyzed to help with the development and engineering process.
Teams of NASA scientists and engineers working on the Orion Crew Exploration Vehicle Thermal Protection System Advanced Development Project went to the Smithsonian Institution’s National Air and Space Museum Garber Facility in Suitland, Md. The Garber Facility curators and conservators collect, preserve and restore all things air and space. This includes airplanes, spacecraft, and spacesuits.
The Orion teams included members from both NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md., and NASA Ames Research Center, Moffett Field, Calif.
“We started working together at the end of June to track down any Apollo-era heat shields that they had in storage,” said Elizabeth (Betsy) Pugel of the Detector Systems Branch at NASA Goddard. “We located one and opened it. It was like a nerd Christmas for us!”
The Orion team was interested in the archived heat shield material because it included an Apollo heat shield that flew into Low Earth Orbit and returned to Earth on August 26, 1966.
“We are examining the design of the carrier structure (the metal structure that connects the heat shield to the vessel that contains the astronauts) and the heat shield material’s thermal response,” Pugel said.
“The Smithsonian has been generous in their providing large pieces of the heat shield that we will be doing destructive and non-destructive testing on during the months before Orion’s Preliminary Design Review,” said Matthew Gasch, a research scientist at NASA Ames. “This information will further our confidence in our design and materials development.”
Orion will be capable of carrying crew and cargo to the space station. It will be able to rendezvous with a lunar landing module and an Earth departure stage in low-Earth orbit to carry crews to the moon and, one day, to Mars-bound vehicles assembled in low-Earth orbit.
Orion will be the Earth entry vehicle for lunar and Mars returns. Orion’s design will borrow its shape from the capsules of the past, but takes advantage of 21st century technology in computers, electronics, life support, propulsion and heat protection systems.
Making its first flights early in the next decade, Orion is part of the Constellation Program to send human explorers back to the moon, and then onward to Mars and other destinations in the solar system.
(Above) Astronaut Alan L. Bean, Skylab 3 commander, flies the M509 Astronaut Maneuvering Unit in the foreward dome area of the Skylab Orbital Workshop (OWS).
Bean is strapped in to the back-mounted, hand-controlled Automatically Stabilized Maneuvering Unit (ASMU). He is wearing a pressure suit for this run of the M509 experiment, but other ASMU tests are done in shirt sleeves. The dome area where the experiment is conducted is about 22 feet in diameter and 19 feet from top to bottom.
This is an artist concept of the Apollo spacecraft in lunar orbit. Two of the three astronauts are shown transferring from the Command/Service Module to the Lunar Module. The Command/Service Module will remain in lunar orbit while the Lunar Module is on the surface.