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Apollo 1

arstechnica.com

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Re: Apollo 1

#11

Post by akiselev »

jdavis703 wrote: post #4
ahh wrote: post #3

But in less than 30 months following the Apollo 1 accident, NASA flew five Apollo missions. During the final one of those five, Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin stepped onto the Moon. Much later, in the last decade of his life, Armstrong would reflect on what it took to reach the Moon. “The rate of progress is proportional to the risk encountered,” he said. “The public at large may well be more risk averse than the ind…

Or is the problem that each incoming administration wants to rejigger the programs? If each president (thinking about Bush and Obama) would just hand the scientists and engineers a few billion dollars and tell them "go do something that'll make America proud," we'd have something to be proud of by now.

The Presidents don't have the final say in how much money each agency gets and how many Congressmen get a shiny new NASA facility or contract in their district. The slice of the budget that the executive branch has the authority to allocate is miniscule compared to debt payments, entitlements, and military spending.

NASA's problem isn't really the money, it's the ridiculous bureaucracy and systemic inneficies that inevitably occur when you are forced by opportunists to fragment your supply chain and distribute your engineering infrastructure across the entire country. The constant change in executive policy is a consequence of NASA's inability to achieve its potential in the face of a functionaly hostile legislature.

Re: Apollo 1

#12

Post by pogba101 »

The sheer bravery of the first men to sign up to go to the moon is outstanding. I remember listening to an interview where Buzz Aldrin said he estimated that there was a 60% chance of going to the moon and coming back home alive. He still decided to do it.

They even wrote a speech for Nixon in case Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin got stranded on the moon:

  Fate has ordained that the men who went to the moon to 
  explore in peace will stay on the moon to rest in peace.

  These brave men, Neil Armstrong and Edwin Aldrin, know that 
  there is no hope for their recovery. But they also know that 
  there is hope for mankind in their sacrifice.
  
  These two men are laying down their lives in mankind’s most 
  noble goal: the search for truth and understanding.

Re: Apollo 1

#13

Post by pjmlp »

pogba101 wrote: post #12

The sheer bravery of the first men to sign up to go to the moon is outstanding. I remember listening to an interview where Buzz Aldrin said he estimated that there was a 60% chance of going to the moon and coming back home alive. He still decided to do it. They even wrote a speech for Nixon in case Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin got stranded on the moon: Fate has ordained that the men who went to the moon to explore…

True, but not less brave than those that ventured into the endless oceans, when everything everyone knew was only Europe.

Re: Apollo 1

#14

Post by 19670127 »

On the evening of that day in 1967 I was a nine year old space junkie watching Batman -- a phenomenally popular TV show in my demographic -- when ABC interrupted the show with a bulletin that "one astronaut had died on the pad" at Cape Kennedy. No other explanation was provided. I was mystified. I knew there was no launch that day. Our astronauts just didn't die on the pad, and why only one? Before I could figure it out ABC interrupted again and said three astronauts had died.

It's flashbulb memory... I can remember where in the house I was sitting, I can remember the rabbit-ears black-and-white TV, and I can remember the black-circle dominated graphic that ABC put on the screen. And I remember the horrible picture of the burned spacecraft on the front page of the Washington Post two days later as my father held the paper up to read an inside page.

Apparently ABC got a lot of angry calls for interrupting Batman.

Weirdly, years later I was working at a very high profile Silicon Valley start-up, when our cock-sure management dramatically announced a huge new project that they had named "Apollo." I realized immediately that it was, to the day, the 30th anniversary of the fire. I confess that I am a small man, and did enjoy pointing out the anniversary to others. At least no one died when our Apollo failed. RIP Roger, Ed, and Gus.

Re: Apollo 1

#15

Post by 19670127 »

19670127 wrote: post #14

On the evening of that day in 1967 I was a nine year old space junkie watching Batman -- a phenomenally popular TV show in my demographic -- when ABC interrupted the show with a bulletin that "one astronaut had died on the pad" at Cape Kennedy. No other explanation was provided. I was mystified. I knew there was no launch that day. Our astronauts just didn't die on the pad, and why only one? Before I could figure it…

Hmm, Wikipedia says there was no Batman episode broadcast that night [0]. I don't believe it! [edit:] Well, maybe it was "Time Tunnel" -- my other favorite show of that era. It was on that night [1].

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Batman_(TV_series)_epi...

[1] http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0723777/

Re: Apollo 1

#16

Post by gambiting »

19670127 wrote: post #15
19670127 wrote: post #14

On the evening of that day in 1967 I was a nine year old space junkie watching Batman -- a phenomenally popular TV show in my demographic -- when ABC interrupted the show with a bulletin that "one astronaut had died on the pad" at Cape Kennedy. No other explanation was provided. I was mystified. I knew there was no launch that day. Our astronauts just didn't die on the pad, and why only one? Before I could figure it…

Hmm, Wikipedia says there was no Batman episode broadcast that night [0]. I don't believe it! [edit:] Well, maybe it was "Time Tunnel" -- my other favorite show of that era. It was on that night [1]. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Batman_(TV_series)_epi... [1] http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0723777/

It's fascinating that you can just look up what was on TV 50 years ago, without having to go into ancient archives of a TV station somewhere.

Re: Apollo 1

#17

Post by dnautics »

brianberns wrote: post #9
jdavis703 wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Or is the problem that each incoming administration wants to rejigger the programs? If each president (thinking about Bush and Obama) would just hand the scientists and engineers a few billion dollars and tell them "go do something that'll make America proud," we'd have something to be proud of by now.

We'd still need someone to provide a singular vision and focus. Human nature says you can't just throw money at a group of people and expect that to happen on its own.

Actually it's scientifically been shown that you can just throw money at people. However, that study was not conducted on scientists, whom I am certain will squander it as they do now.

Re: Apollo 1

#18

Post by pjmorris »

js2 wrote: post #8

Frank Borman, in his testimony before congress, referred to the accident being due to a failure of imagination. In searching for his full testimony, I found this: "Apollo 1-Challenger-Columbia Lessons Learned" - https://nsc.nasa.gov/sfcs/systemfailurecasestudyfile/downloa... I also found transcripts of his testimony, but they aren't searchable - http://www.hq.nasa.gov/office/pao/History/Apollo204/inv.html (I'll have…

Chaikin is terrific on the astronauts. Kranz is staring at me from my bookshelf, but I've not yet opted to read him. Let me add 'Apollo' by Murray and Cox to your list. It's focused on the Apollo engineers and managers, including great discussions of how they re-engineered things after Apollo 1, and of the behind-the-scenes work on Apollo 13, as well as many other elements.

Re: Apollo 1

#19

Post by Shivetya »

ahh wrote: post #3

But in less than 30 months following the Apollo 1 accident, NASA flew five Apollo missions. During the final one of those five, Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin stepped onto the Moon. Much later, in the last decade of his life, Armstrong would reflect on what it took to reach the Moon. “The rate of progress is proportional to the risk encountered,” he said. “The public at large may well be more risk averse than the ind…

NASA doesn't have a champion, if they do this person is not enough to spark the public interest. That takes it off the minds of the majority of Americans. Worse with regards to politicians supporting NASA doesn't really garner them many votes so they allocate money into areas that will.

We need a dreamer who can connect to the public in such a way that politicians support NASA. The issue is, what is good enough and reasonable enough of a dream to accomplish? I think a permanent base on the moon that suggests one day civilians will be able to go might work but it will be a hard sale

Re: Apollo 1

#20

Post by colinbartlett »

> The risk, of course, is that pure oxygen under high pressure requires but a spark to ignite and rapidly burn.

Frustrating to see even a technically-oriented publication report that oxygen burns.

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