SkyMan says 50 years ago this week was Apollo 10; 5/18-26/69
SkyMan
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In May 1969 Apollo 10 flew. Apollo 10 was a veteran crew. Tom Stafford who had flown on Gemini 6 and commanded Gemini 9, was the Commander. John Young who had flown on Gemini 3 and was the commander of Gemini 10, was the Command Module Pilot. Gene Cernan had flown on Gemini 9 with Stafford, and was the Lunar Module Pilot. The Apollo 10 Command Module was given the name Charlie Brown, and the Lunar Module was given the name Snoopy.
NASA's program to land astronaut's on the Moon's surface before the decade was out was very much a test flight program. Each mission was very much a step forward into some unknown. That's why test pilots flew the first missions. During the Mercury program the US learned whether it was possible for humans to survive in space for brief periods of time. In the Gemini program the US learned whether humans could survive in space for 14 days, the amount of time for a long Moon mission. Also in Gemini the US learned about rendezvous between two orbiting spacecraft, as well as doing spacewalks (EVA).
The early Apollo missions were very much set up as a series of steps to test the Apollo hardware, as well as increase our understanding of going to the Moon and orbiting it. In Apollo 7 NASA tested the Command and Service Module (CSM) in Earth orbit. In Apollo 8 NASA tested the CSM in lunar orbit. In Apollo 9 NASA tested the CSM and the Lunar Module (LM) in Earth orbit. It also checked out rendezvous techniques between the two spacecraft. During Apollo 9 the astronauts also did an EVA to check on the new Apollo EVA spacesuits.
Apollo 10 was designed to do everything that Apollo 11 would do, except for actually landing on the Moon. After traveling from the Earth, when an Apollo spacecraft, CSM/LM, goes into a lunar orbit it does two burns. The first gets in into an elliptical orbit with a low point of 60 miles above the lunar surface. A second burn is done within the first or second orbit to circularize the orbit to 60 miles above the Moon's surface. At this height the spacecraft completes an orbit every two hours.
To land on the Moon the LM is detached from the CSM. The LM does a preliminary burn that puts it in an elliptical orbit with a high point of 60 miles, and a low point of 47,000 feet. At this low point the LM initiates what's called a powered descent, and burns it's descent engine for 14 minutes going from roughly 3,500 MPH to a landing on the Moon's surface. Apollo 10's LM followed the exact trajectory that Apollo 11 would use to land on the Sea of Tranquillity. Snoopy got within 47,000 feet of the lunar surface at the point that Apollo 11 would initiate it's powered descent to the lunar surface. After orbiting twice in this orbit, which gave the astronauts a chunk of time to visually confirm that the landing site was relatively flat and clean, the astronauts jettisoned the LM descent stage, and burned the ascent stage engine to get back up into a 60 mile circular orbit with the CSM. The two spacecraft docked, and the LM ascent stage was jettisoned after the astronauts had transferred into the CSM. After another day or two the CSM burned it's engine to return to the Earth. It was during this return that the crew of Apollo 10 became the fastest humans ever in human history; 24,791 mph. This is a record that has stood until today, and will, at a minimum, last until the next group of humans go to the Moon, and may even last then (as can be seen by the fact that the 7 other Moon missions after Apollo 10 didn't beat the record; even Apollo 13, which was trying to get back from the Moon to the Earth in a very short period of time).
Here's a $1 bill that was signed by both Stafford and Cernan.
One of the reasons the Apollo 10 LM was called Snoopy was that the cartoon character Snoopy had been associated with NASA's manned program from the beginning. Charles Schulz was a big supporter of NASA, and created the Snoopy astronaut character. NASA, and it's associated contractors building parts of the Mercury, Gemini and Apollo spacecraft (this continues onto todays spacecraft), had/have Snoopy posters extolling the merits of high quality work. Over time, NASA began giving out small silver Snoopy pins to workers that had done jobs above and beyond the norm. For those that had done especially noteworthy jobs NASA would have the pins flown on some mission. As you might imagine, the most extolled silver Snoopy pins were ones that flew on the LM Snoopy. Here's one from my collection (ex: Stafford).
Comments
Great writeup. There's something impressive about that generation and that time. Somehow SpongeBob and the Kardashians don't really measure up.
Thanks @SkyMan for your write-up and how the Apollo missions built upon each other to achieve an overall objective of landing on the moon.
I did not know how close Mr. Schulz was to NASA. Thank you!
Much appreciated @SkyMan for the summary of Apollo missions. I did not know this history, concerning the building blocks of discovery, albeit precarious...
This history wasn't a part of my generation; yet, I remember distinctly, in the 5th grade, eating lunch in my classroom, as it was never done, and truly special, anticipating the launch of the space shuttle Challenger. We had an assembly a few days before this event- it was much anticipated, as Christa McAuliffe would have been the first "teacher" in space, and this was a matter of discussion several days before the launch...all of us students, teachers, everyone I knew was anticipating this event. Of note, I remember watching space shuttle lift off's in class prior to this...just not the same "buzz" as this one, or ever after...
When the Challenger lifted off, in her brief ascent, and journey into space, we all witnessed the separating boosters, viewed, listen to the confusion, disbelief, shock, and watched our teacher walk up calmly, to turn off the T.V...
I'll never forget it; she then said we could all take a restroom break, and motioned us out. I remember in the boys room, all of us were upset, in disbelief what had occurred, and we all thought sabotage by Libya! Gaddaffi had did it! We were convinced, as so much news was circulating with prior evils of this man, or, "dictator." The news didn't tell us he sabotaged- we drew our own conclusions...because,...this wasn't supposed to happen,..this tragedy; we couldn't have allowed this, someone else squashed our hopes!
...after all, we landed on the moon!
Moving forward from that disaster, we never again watched a space shuttle lift-off in the classroom...not sure if any occurred afterwards.
President Reagan's attempted assassination, along with Challenger disaster, I can remember distinctly from child-hood.
@SkyMan....Thanks for the space history review.... I followed the space program closely in those days... an incredible achievement indeed. I look forward to the future now that (it seems) the program is being restarted. I was working in Florida at the time of the Challenger disaster, and can remember standing in the parking lot (West Palm Beach) and looking up at that disastrous launch and explosion plume....We were stunned into silence...Cheers, RickO
Great write up.
Cernan in his bio said he was tempted to land the lunar module. He wisely followed protocol and deferred. Cernan was rewarded with command of Apollo 17 and was the last man on the moon.
I remember Charlie Brown & Snoopy, I was 10
Great Write up Sy
Steve
Phenomenal story. Thank you.
Two points, one, Stafford was in command, and while he certainly was tempted, he had decided long before the mission launched that it was more important to be a good test pilot and test the next stage of the program, not land on the Moon. Second, the ascent stage of Snoopy did not have enough fuel to reach orbit from the Moon's surface...
U.S. Type Set
I'm disappointed that Walter Cronkite didn't give us this level of detail at the time.