Check out my new shower curtain.
THE EAGLE HAS LANDED
I WILL SEE THIS EVERY SHOWER
I need one of these.
(via itsfullofstars)
Patrick was here
Boat racer, space nerd, physics student.
Scott Carpenter’s Aurora 7 capsule on display in the Space Park. Things were so different back in 1964, when something as priceless, fragile, and historic as a manned space craft could be displayed outside, completely exposed to the elements and human touch, for over two years, without any sort of covering. The only exception to this was the instrument package, the hatch, and the heat shield.
The information panel to the right of the capsule gave information on Aurora 7’s flight and the Mercury space craft in general.
It’s interesting to note the “dissected” heat shield, too.
I would love to climb inside a Mercury capsule or even a mockup of one. I would be interesting to get a feel for how small those spacecraft actually were and how far manned spaceflight has come in 50 years.
The Space Park of the Hall of Science of the 1964-65 New York World’s Fair. Listed below are descriptions of the exhibits numerically located on the above map, as written in a NASA Press release.
1. SATURN — Visitors who enter Space Park from the Ford Building pass under the business end of the five-engine S-1C stage of the three-stage Saturn V, which will propel American astronauts toward the Moon. This boattail alone stands 51 feet, but when fully assembled with the Apollo Command, Service and Lunar Excursion Modules mounted on top, Saturn V will be some 365 feet tall. Thrust: 7.5 million pounds (compared with 367,000 pounds for the Atlas, which launched Mercury astronauts).
2. APOLLO — Two of the three parts of the moonship are shown in this full-scale model: the Command Module (11 feet long, about 5 1/2 tons), which will carry the crew of three as well as guidance and control instruments; and the Service Module (23 feet long, about 25 tons), which holds main propulsion elements.
3. LEM (for Lunar Excursion Module) — This is the third major part of the Apollo craft, a full-sized model of “the Bug” in which two of the three astronauts will land on the Moon. A film depicts the Moon mission.
4. HEARTBEAT SENSOR— Visitors can see their heartbeat measured on this display explaining how biological sensors monitor physical state of men in space.
5. TITAN II - As seen in Space Park, with the Gemini spacecraft in place for launch, Titan II stands 109 feet tall and is 10 feet in diameter. Basically, it is a two-stage 90-foot booster developed by the Air Force. Its first stage develops about 430,000 pounds of thrust at sea level; its second stage, about 100,000 pounds at altitude. With two large solid-fuel rockets strapped on and a liquid-fuel third stage, it becomes Titan III-C, which stands 103 feet tall and can develop about 2.5 million pounds of thrust.
6. GEMINI— the two-man Gemini spacecraft externally resembles the one-man Mercury but is wider at the base (6 feet vs. 7.5), taller (10 feet vs. 11), and heavier (3,200 pounds vs. 7,700). It also has docking apparatus for connecting with another vehicle in space — i.e., the Agena — and, instead of an escape tower like the Mercury, has ejection seats.
7. MERCURY SPACECRAFT— This is the actual Aurora 7 in which Astronaut M. Scott Carpenter orbited the Earth three times May 24, 1962. It is about 6 feet across the base, 10 feet tall, and weighs 3,200 pounds.
8. MERCURY SPACE RIDE— Here’s a chance for the kids — and father, too, if he has the urge — to take a simulated trip into space in a full-scale animated Mercury spacecraft. Climb in, push the button, and the countdown begins for an up-and-down ride made realistic by colored film of the Earth as it looks to an astronaut from 100 miles up.
9. ATLAS— As shown in Space Park, with the Mercury spacecraft in place, Atlas stands 92 feet tall. The basic launch vehicle, developed by the Air Force, has three liquid propellant engines developing about 367,000 pounds of thrust, stands 69 feet tall and measures 16 feet across the engine nacelles and 10 feet across the tank section. With Centaur as a second stage, Atlas can rocket a 1,300-pound spacecraft to Venus or Mars or a 2,300-pound payload to the Moon.
10. RANGER— This is an exact full-scale model of the Ranger VII, which televised more than 4,000 photographs of the Moon’s surface before hitting the Moon July 31, 1964. It is identical with the successful Rangers VIII and IX.
11. THOR DELTA— The full-scale booster on display, 90 feet high, has three stages and can rocket about 105 pounds to the Moon. Among 22 consecutive successful launches, it orbited Echo I, the TIROS satellites, and Ariel I. The Thor booster, which develops 172,000 pounds of thrust, also is used in Thor Agena, a two-stage 76-foot-tall rocket, and the thrust-augmented Thor (TAD), which has three Thiokol solid-fuel engines mounted around the base and develops 332,000 pounds of thrust.
12. EXPLORER I the first U.S. satellite to achieve orbit, was launched by the Army January 31, 1958, from Cape Kennedy, and is generally credited with discovering the Van Allen radiation belt. It was launched by a four-stage Jupiter C.
13. OSO (for Orbiting Solar Observatory) is a series of satellites like the full-scale model shown. Purpose: to study the Sun and its atmosphere. Also displayed are 1/8-sclae models of OGO (for Orbiting Geophysical Observatory) and OAO (for Orbiting Astronomical Observatory).
14. MARINER II— It was a spacecraft like this full-scale model which on December 14, 1962, flew within 22,000 miles of Venus and made scientific observations of that planet and the region of space between Venus and Earth.
15. NUCLEAR TEST DETECTION RESEARCH SATELLITES like that shown in full scale here, are being used to design world-wide detection systems. The Air Force launched two such spacecraft, five feet in diameter with 14,000 solar cells to power their 40,000 electric components, with the same rocket and put them into separate orbits.
16. MARINER IV — Display shows a full-size model of the spacecraft launched toward Mars on November 28, 1964, on a 325 million mile space voyage to take measurements in interplanetary space and to photograph the Red Planet.
17. AGENA, named after a star, is 20 feet long, five feet in diameter, and its restartable rocket engine develops 16,000 pounds of thrust. With Atlas as a first stage, Agena launched Mariners and Rangers. In later Gemini flights, Agena will be a rendezvous-docking target.
18. ALOUETTE I, launched September 29, 1962, by a Thor Agena, was a project of the Canadian Defense Research Board and a part of NASA’s Topside Sounder Program to examine the structure of the ionosphere from above.
19. ARIEL — Both Ariel I, the first international satellite to be launched April 26, 1962, and Ariel II, placed in orbit March 27, 1964, designed and fabricated by the United Kingdom and launched by NASA.
20. DISCOVERER XIV, first U.S. satellite recovered from space by an aircraft in flight, was snared by an Air Force C-119 flying 8,000 feet over the Pacific southwest of Hawaii August 19, 1960. The 300-pound satellite, launched by a Thor Agena from Vandenberg Air Force Base, fired retro-rockets after 17 orbits, and a parachute lowered it into the recovery area.
21. TELSTAR I, launched July 10, 1962, was the first communications satellite to handle all types of signals, including black-and-white and color television. Telstar II was launched May 7, 1963, and though, like Telstar I, was launched by NASA, had all costs paid by the American Telephone & Telegraph Co. as a step toward developing commercial satellite communications.
22. SYNCOM, for Synchronous Communications, is a satellite orbiting 22,300 miles above the Equator at a speed which makes it appear motionless from the revolving Earth. Syncom II launched July 26, 1963. Syncom III was launched August 19, 1964.
23. ECHO II, this highly visible inflatable 135-foot sphere of 0.00035-inch Mylar sandwiched in 0.0002-inch aluminum foil, was put in orbit January 25, 1964. The passive reflector communications satellite has been seen by millions of people worldwide.
24. NIMBUS, an advanced weather satellite that demonstrated the feasibility of around-the-clock cloud-cover photography from orbit. Nimbus I, launched August 28, 1964, sent back High Resolution Infrared Radiometer (HRIR) pictures by night and APT (Automatic Picture Transmission) pictures by day.
25. TIROS is an acronym for a series of Television Infra-Red Observation Satellites, the world’s first weather satellites. One TV camera system can photograph more than 600,000 square miles at a time; the other, more than 200,000 square miles. TIROS VIII tested the Automatic Picture Transmission (APT) system, which sends cloud-cover photos to relatively inexpensive (about $300,000) mobile ground stations.
26. BIOSATELLITE - A series of six biosatellites will be put in near-Equatorial orbits, starting in 1966, at altitudes of 180-200 miles for three to 30 days to investigate the effects of weightlessness, space radiation, and changes in day-night rhythm on such living things as laboratory animals, plants, cells, and tissues. Purpose: to see how long-duration space flights might affect men.
27.SPACE SHUTTLE - The six-foot-high, jet-propelled, one-man craft shown here is a concept developed by the Air Force Aeronautical Systems Division for hauling cargo and personnel between orbiting spacecraft. Its three mechanical arms could be used to assemble structures in space.
28. EXPLORER XVI, launched December 16, 1962, by a Scout from Wallops Island, Virginia, responded to 1,600 commands to read out experiment data between December 16, 1962, and July 26, 1963. It recorded more than 15,000 meteoroid hits on sensors covering about one-tenth of its experimental surface.
29. SNAP-8 (for Space Nuclear Auxiliary Power System) a 35-kilowatt generator with 10,000 hour lifetime, is intended for such uses as Moon-based electric power plant and an on-board electric power plant for large manned space laboratories. AEC and its contractor, Atomics International, are responsible for the nuclear subsystem; NASA and its contractor, Aerojet General, for the power conversion subsystem.
30. NERVA (for Nuclear Engine for Rocket Vehicle Application) is a project to harness the power developed by hydrogen heated to a very high temperature in a nuclear reactor and expanded through a nozzle. Under the Space Nuclear Propulsion Office, a joint office of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration and the Atomic Energy Commission, the work is being done by an industrial contractor team on the basis of technology from AEC’s Kiwi reactor at Los Alamos.
31. X-15 - The full-scale model on display is the X-15(2), the newest configuration of the record-smashing rocket-powered airplane which was jointly sponsored and built by the NASA, Air Force, and Navy. The first craft was delivered in October 1958, to NASA’s Flight Research Center on Rogers Dry Lake near Edwards, California.
All text and images are from Bill Young’s excellent 1664-65 NYWF site, which can be found here!
This is part of a series on the Space Park of the 1964-65 New York World’s Fair.
I would love to see this in real life. It could be a museum exhibit that provides a glimpse into the American space program as it was in the mid-1960s.
Mir seen from Shuttle Endeavour during the STS-89 mission. (1998)
(Source)
It looks like a toy! =D
It looks like a mess.
What is Yuri’s Night?
Yuri’s Night is a global celebration of humanity’s past, present, and future in space. Yuri’s Night parties and events are held around the world every April in commemoration of April 12, 1961, the day of cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin’s first manned spaceflight, and April 12, 1981, the inaugural launch of NASA’s Space Shuttle.
Yuri’s Night events combine space-themed partying with education and outreach. These events can range from an all-night mix of techno and technology at a NASA Center, to a movie showing and stargazing at your local college, to a gathering of friends at a bar or barbecue.
This is brilliant!
(via abcstarstuff)
NASA Mega-Rocket Could Lead to Skylab 2 Deep Space Station
NASA’s first manned outpost in deep space may be a repurposed rocket part, just like the agency’s first-ever astronaut abode in Earth orbit.With a little tinkering, the upper-stage hydrogen propellant tank of NASA’s huge Space Launch System rocket would make a nice and relatively cheap deep-space habitat, some researchers say. They call the proposed craft “Skylab II,” an homage to the 1970s Skylab space station that was a modified third stage of a Saturn V moon rocket.
“This idea is not challenging technology,” said Brand Griffin, an engineer with Gray Research, Inc., who works with the Advanced Concepts Office at NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Ala.
“It’s just trying to say, ‘Is this the time to be able to look at existing assets, planned assets and incorporate those into what we have as a destination of getting humans beyond LEO [low-Earth orbit]?’” Griffin said Wednesday (March 27) during a presentation with NASA’s Future In-Space Operations working group.
A roomy home in deep space
NASA is developing the Space Launch System (SLS) to launch astronauts toward distant destinations such as near-Earth asteroids and Mars. The rocket’s first test flight is slated for 2017, and NASA wants it to start lofting crews by 2021.The SLS will stand 384 feet tall (117 meters) in its biggest (“evolved”) incarnation, which will be capable of blasting 130 metric tons of payload to orbit. Its upper-stage hydrogen tank is big, too, measuring 36.1 feet tall by 27.6 feet wide (11.15 m by 8.5 m).
The tank’s dimensions yield an internal volume of 17,481 cubic feet (495 cubic m) — roughly equivalent to a two-story house. That’s much roomier than a potential deep-space habitat derived from modules of the International Space Station (ISS), which are just 14.8 feet (4.5 m) wide, Griffin said.
The tank-based Skylab II could accommodate a crew of four comfortably and carry enough gear and food to last for several years at a time without requiring a resupply, he added. Further, it would launch aboard the SLS in a single piece, whereas ISS-derived habitats would need to link up multiple components in space.
Because of this, Skylab II would require relatively few launches to establish and maintain, Griffin said. That and the use of existing SLS-manufacturing infrastructure would translate into big cost savings — a key selling point in today’s tough fiscal climate.
“We will have the facilities in place, the tooling, the personnel, all the supply chain and everything else,” Griffin said.
He compared the overall concept with the original Skylab space station, which was built in a time of declining NASA budgets after the boom years of the Apollo program.
Skylab “was a project embedded under the Apollo program,” Griffin said. “In many ways, this could follow that same pattern. It could be a project embedded under SLS and be able to, ideally, not incur some of the costs of program startup.”
Living beyond the moon
Griffin and his colleagues envision placing Skylab II at the Earth-moon Lagrange point 2, a gravitationally stable location beyond the moon’s far side.Over the past year or so, NASA has been drawing up plans for a possible manned outpost at EM-L2. A station there would establish a human presence in deep space, serve as a staging ground for lunar operations and help build momentum for exploring more distant destinations, such as asteroids and Mars, advocates say.
The Skylab II concept could also help ferry astronauts to these far-flung locales, Griffin said.
“You can build multiple vehicles,” he said. “If we were to send this one, the first one, out to Earth-moon L2, you could build another that that could be a transit hab. So rather than having to go back and use space station parts, you would be able to pick these off the line.”
SKYLAB II: THIS TIME, IT’S PERSONAL.
Also, I WOULD GIVE A BODY PART TO BE ON THE NEW SKYLAB.
It’s an interesting concept; what needs to be remembered, however, are the problems that plagued Skylab I. We need to decide whether or not II would be a “wet” or “dry” workshop, and which would be the best suited for our exploratory needs.
Next, we need to realize that such methods sound great on paper until the time comes when we actually build the structure. Designs will change and many things will be omitted. (I’m currently reading “Living and Working in Space: A History of Skylab” by the NASA history office, so it’s only fitting this post comes around.
I’m not sure about this. It’s an intriguing idea, but still seems a little vague. There would be some technical hurdles to overcome with keeping contact with a station that is permanently on the far side of the moon.
Also, I hope it gets more use than the original Skylab, which only hosted three crews and deorbited before the Space Shuttle could get off the ground and boost its orbit again.
(Source: sagansense)
Wow, these old covers are cool. I would love to get a peak inside some of these manuals.
(via itsfullofstars)
While looking for the approaching Soyuz, I caught a glimpse of another orbiting body in the distance.
I don’t know what it is or what it wants, but it keeps repeating “Sloof Lirpa” over and over. Alert the press.
Somehow, I think this picture would be even funnier without the cartoon alien.
