Spacecraft of the Week #16

This weeks' honored spacecraft has traveled almost as much after its mission as during it. Apollo 9, nicknamed Gumdrop for its shape, was launched to low Earth orbit 41 years ago this week. During its stay in space, it rehearsed the upcoming lunar missions by docking to and extracting a Lunar Module, transferring crew, separating and going through the paces of a moon landing. After 10 days in orbit, it returned to Earth, splashing down in the Atlantic Ocean.

After its return, it was sent to the Johnson Space Center in Houston, Texas where engineers went over all parts of the spacecraft, checking and double checking to ensure craft and crew survivability of what was yet to come. After this inspection, it was placed on public display in the JSC Visitor Center.

Apollo 9 was later transferred to Jackson, Michigan and became the crown jewel of the collection at the Michigan Space and Science Center, located on the campus of Jackson Community College. While the collection was impressive, the center proved to costly and the college had to close it and remove the artifacts. Many of them, as well as curator Stewart Bailey, wound up at the Air Zoo in nearby Kalamazoo. Apollo 9 was a sweeter plum sought after by many. Since the spacecraft (as almost all flown spacecraft) is on loan from the Smithsonian National Air & Space Museum, they evaluated the requests and settled on San Diego.

The San Diego Air & Space Museum is located on the grounds of Balboa Park in the Ford Building, built as part of the California Pacific International Exposition, which was held in 1935 and 1936. There it was placed prominently in the entrance rotunda, sharing it's starring position with other aircraft manufactured in California (the Apollo spacecraft was built in Downey, California). The capsule is very accessible, forgoing the plexiglas cover seen on other Apollo capsules. It is displayed without it's hatch, which is sitting nearby.

So after 10 days in space and criss-crossing the US, Gumdrop finally rests about a 200 miles form where it was created. For that, and to celebrate its launch anniversary, Apollo 9 is this weeks' "Spacecraft of the Week'.

Spacecraft of the Week #12

Gemini VII was launched 44 years ago on December 4, 1965. Commanding the flight was Jim Lovell, with Frank Borman as Pilot. Two things made this flight unique: at the time, it was the longest US spaceflight and remained so until the Skylab missions, and it was part of the first dual-spacecraft mission conducted by NASA. Scheduled for a 14 day stay in space, the Gemini crew members were to investigate long term spaceflight. An added bonus came when Gemini VI's Agena target vehicle crashed into the ocean shortly after liftoff. Rather than cancel the mission, VII became VI's target for rendezvous. It provided immeasurable experience to the mission control teams in handling two spacecraft simultaneously, a needed skill for the upcoming Apollo missions with its separate command and lunar modules. Photographically, it provided the first good images of a manned spacecraft in orbit. We are so used to seeing the shuttle or the space station floating in space we forget these images used to be the exception rather than the rule.

For the rendezvous Gemini VII was the passive target, but the long duration flight provided the real challenges. Imagine spending two weeks with another person in an area the size of a bathroom stall and you'll get the idea. And you would have a toilet to use! For the crew of G-VII space was a premium. Packing enough food for the mission, and then where to place the trash, was a job for puzzle solvers. The crew practiced shoving trash behind their seats. They did not have the option of depressurizing their craft and opening a door to toss the stuff outside, as they wore a new long-duration spacesuit that was not made for such an event.

These new suits could be removed, even in the cramped quarters of the capsule, though mission rules only allowed one astronaut to doff his suit at a time. After five days, NASA relented and allowed both men to remove their pressure suits. Although much more comfortable, the chore to stash the suits so as not to interfere with spacecraft operation became a new challenge.

After a week, the novelty of spaceflight wore off. The crew was allowed free time, an unthinkable thing for previous flights. They took to reading books they packed for the time: Borman reading Roughing It by Mark Twain, and Lovell reading Drums Along the Mohawk by Walter D. Edmonds.

Recovery came on the fourteenth day with a flawless use of the retro rockets, and found the spacecraft had landed in the Pacific just 11.8 kilometers from the recovery ship, the USS Wasp. The astronauts were a little week from their time in microgravity, but were able to stand and greet the naval crew that recovered them. The spacecraft spent time at Johnson Space Center under investigation for it's long term in space, and then was turned over to the Smithsonian's National Air & Space Museum. For several years it was suspended in the second floor hall of space exploration, but has since been moved to a new display area near the Space Shuttle Enterprise at the Stephen F. Udvar-Hazy Center. There it is displayed without doors, enclosed in a plexiglas envelope to allow a good view of the interior.

For paving the way for future flights to the moon and our first long duration mission in space, Gemini VII is this week's Spacecraft of the Week.

Name that Apollo!

I solicited images of the spacecraft displayed at JSC before Space Center Houston opened, and received several replies. Among them was Jonathan Ward description and pictures of his father's VIP visit to both JSC and KSC in June of 1969. Among his many pictures was this one of an Apollo spacecraft on display.

Ward writes, "Unfortunately, the number on the side of the vehicle is turned away from us, so I am not sure which one it is. Since there is so much of the Kapton foil still

attached to the CM (i.e., not burned away from the heat of re-entry from return from a Moon trip), I assume that it was from an Earth-orbital mission, either one of the unmanned flights or Apollo 7." This

presented itself as a challenge to me, as I'd like to place this in the Field Guide, but as which

spacecraft?

Here are things we know:

1) It is a flown capsule (apparent)

2) It flew before June 1969 (Ward's description)

3) It is a Block 2 spacecraft (most visible, the side by side forward RCS thrusters above the hatch) and therefore a manned flight

This leads us to Apollo 7, 8, 9 or 10. Only Apollo 7 and 9 remained in Earth orbit (a good hypothesis by Ward to account for the foil thermal tape). So, let's compare these, with Apollo 8 and 10 thrown in for comparison.

Apollo 7

Apollo 8

Apollo 9

Apollo 10

OK, now this can get tough. But there is a distinct area on each spacecraft that could aid us in identification of our unknown. It is the burned area to the right of the hatch around the reaction control thrusters. Here are close-ups of each of these areas with our unknown.

Apollo 7

Apollo 8

Apollo 9

Apollo 10

Unknown

I believe the pattern in the unknown most closely resembles that of Apollo 9. There are also some correlations in the patterns of the foil tape, although there appears to have been a cleaning and possibly some tape removed before it was placed on display. Pictures of Apollo 9 at the Michigan Air & Space Center show very little difference to the display at San Diego, so any cleaning was done before hand.

You may also note that in the unknown picture the outer window frames are removed. Of the four, only Apollo 9 shows signs the attachment screws were accessed . With these clues in place, I believe we can call this unknown Apollo on display at JSC in 1969 the Apollo 9, returned to Earth earlier that year on March 13.