[MID]

Apollo 9 continues...


March 4 featured three SPS (Service Module engine) maneuvers, and alot of nominal housekeeping and spacecraft operations.

The SPS maneuvers were part of an extensive engineering flight test program designed to test the entire Apollo spacecraft. The dynamics and stability of the docked Apollo spacecraft configuration had never been demonstrated, only predicted. Five SPS firings would be performed in this docked configuration, and one DPS (Lunar Module descent engine) firing.

A couple of these SPS firings including "stroking tests", which were simply firings combined with engine gimballing (steering inputs...the SPS swiveled). The configuration behaved beautifully during all of these test firings, and the stability of the docked spacecraft was very good.

These tests also proved the integrity of the docking interface between the LM and CM...also a very good performance.

You may be assured that everything happening on orbit was a first, and the folks in Mission Control, and at North American and Grumman were about as focused on their data as any human beings have ever been.

This stuff didn't have the drama of an Apollo 8, of course...but it had all the drama in the world to the Apollo program.

March 5 featured the donning of pressure suits, McDivitt and Schweikart entering the LM at about 07:00 EST, powering it up, aligning its guidance platform, deploying its landing gear, testing the landing and rendezvous radar systems, calibrating the AGS (Abort Guidance System) and pressurizing the DPS system. That first DPS burn in the docked configuration occurred today, 40 years ago...


All in all, a very busy day which provided alot of good data for analysis...
We were looking at an exhilarating exhibition of a really great spacecraft combination up there.
It was fun.



March 6 featured donning the EMUs again, this time in full EVA configuration...re-entering the LM, powering her up again, and, after a bit of a delay...


One of the less glamorous things about spaceflight is that people occassionally got sick (Apollo 8 featured a grand mess...nasty stuff that no one knew about...but let's not get into that...) Rusty had an episode or two of nausea...one shortly after sealing up his EMU on March 5 (Yea...we're talking about the ultimate mess...blowing breakfast in your suit...). Fortunately, he was able to "retain it" until he got his helmet opened and was able to ...uh...let's say, emit into an appropriate bag.


Once barfing had concluded, things stabilized, and we took it easy and slow for a while. March 6 was EVA day, and everyone wanted to be sure that everything was OK in the GI department before going outside, where vomiting is not an attractive prospect.


Sounds marvelous, doesn't it?

The EVA was shortened a bit from its orignal planned time of about 2.25 hours, and actually ran a little less than an hour.
It featured Schweikart exiting the LM's forward hatch, and Dave Scott coming out of the CM's main hatch in a stand-up EVA (He'd be doing another one of those...two and a half years later, in the docking hatch of the LM, while on the surface of the Moon). The test was to assess the mobility and functionality of the lunar surface EVA suit, and the feasibility of the emergency transfer procedures that could possibly be required in case of a docking failure or some hatch malfunction between the two spacecraft after the LM left the lunar surface.

Here's Rusty, on the porch of the LM, taken by Dave Scott...




And here's Dave, standing, as-it-were, in the CM hatch, taken by Rusty, "standing" on the porch of the LM...




Here's Rusty, from inside the LM




The EVA started at about 11:53 and was concluded by 12:49 EST. Around 5 hours later, the LM had been powered down, the crew were all back on board the CM, a TV broadcast had taken place, and the fellows would be bunking down soon.

March 7 was the really big day...the day when the LM would take flight, piloted by men.

On orbit, there was alot of work going on. It was busy, careful...sometimes tense. So too on the ground...but I'll tell you, it was exhilarating. We were doing it, and so far, the year of Apollo was going pretty darn well after about three days.


Let's go flying the LM.

[MID]

MAR 7 1969

It was to be a rather long day for Apollo 9, one which started with a wake up call in the wee hours of the morning.

Today, the LM flew for the first time with men at the controls. It was an exhaustive, detailed, and very complex test.

After the normal suit ups, entry into the LM, power up, and platform alignments, McDivitt and Schweikart, aboard Spider, and Dave Scott, aboard Gumdrop, were ready to go.

After a slight delay in capture latch separation, the first manned LM separated from the CSM at around 7:40 am.



The Spider away, landing gear deployed!




Point of interest: you may note that there are lunar contact probes on all 4 of Spider's landing pads. The one on the pad with the ladder would be removed for Apollo 11, since it was thought (correctly) that the probe might be bent up on landing and interfere with, and pose a hazard the astronaut attempting to descend the ladder to the lunar surface.


All eyes poured over data for the hours that followed.

What occurred was an extremely complex mathematical space ballet. Discussing the particulars would be rather pointless...and would bore you to tears. ALOT happened. Today, we were putting the LM through its paces...all of the LM, including the complicated rendezvous procedures that would be utilized around the Moon, when the LM ascended from the surface to meet up with the CSM in orbit.



Shortly after 08:00, initial separation was accomplished between the two vehicles. It was as small separation maneuver, resulting in a 5 foot per second rate of separation (initiated by Dave Scott in the CSM). This maneuver gave the crew time to pay attention to the many tasks involved with aligning their inertial measuring units and run systems checks without having to pay attention to the details of formation flying. About 45 minutes later, the LM DPS was fired to perform what was called a phasing maneuver. Basically, this provided a vertical separation between the two spacecraft by placing the LM in a "phasing orbit", from which either the complete "coelliptic flight plan" could be flown, or a terminal phase abort maneuver could be initiated.

Essentially, we went out to the end of the diving board, but didn't jump off yet.
Checking the DPS again, the AGS and rendezvous navigation systems, the LM then jumped...executing the descent propulsion insertion manuever at 10:39 EST.This inserted Spider into a coelliptic orbit with the LM above the CSM and moving away from the CSM.

About 40 minutes later, coelliptic sequence initiation took place. McDivitt and Scweikart were now out on a limb, as-it-were...some 85 statute miles away, horizontally, and roughly 14 miles above Dave Scott in the CSM. They would continue their outward trek, and close the vertical separation now. Ultimately...at around 11:30 EST, they'd be around 115 miles away from the CSM.

Coelliptic sequence essentially is a maneuver which provides horizontal velocity requirements at specific times during the rendezvous sequence in order to allow the LM to be in the desired conditions for transfer to an intercept trajectory (Christ...I'm sure that made a hell of alot of sense, didn't it?!?!)....the two spacecraft are in separate orbits. What we want to do is get them to a point where one will be able to precisely maneuver into that of the other, close in on the other, and arrive at a place where the two craft are in exactly the same orbit, in the same place in space. This involves rocket burns at very specific times, in very specific directions, which allow the orbit they're in, combined with the small adjustments to velocity (in this case, horizontal velocity) to gently and carefully get them where they want to be, when they want them to be there)...It's a mathematical dance, and suffice it to say that the guys in ther MOCR (those in the trench, where the math was being done), the LM computers, and Dave Scott (who was also performing backup computations aboard the CM), were damned busy figuring during this time...

At any rate, somewhere around 11:30 that morning, something which hadn't been done yet happened...the descent stage was jettisoned. Away she flew, and McDivitt and Schweikart were now alone out there in half of their LM. Personally, it seems somehow disconcerting that half of your craft is kicked off. In reality, it didn't matter, of course, since the ascent stage was the crew compartment and contained everything they needed...but a first is a first, and then there's the separation itself....how that's going to behave, the difference in handling, paying close attention to make sure there was no adverse ascent stage reaction, and of course the realization that now, that APS engine had to work...

But the descent stage had performed perfectly, the DPS was a champ, and its job was completed.

The descent stage of Spider would remain in orbit for two weeks, when her orbit would decay and she'd incinerate in the atmosphere...


Now that the descent stage was kicked off, things changed because the LM now had different mass, and calculations would take that into account. The spacecraft would be maneuvered by the flight crew with rather remarkably different handling, and we still had a ways to go...

[Sky Scanner]

Just wanted to say, it's a great read MID, fantastic photos too. Even the wife has bookmarked it on her laptop, as she's finding it fascinating too.

[MID]

Coming home...


The first APS maneuver occurred just before noon on MAR 7.
The maneuver was called Constant Differential Height, or Constant Delta Height (CDH).
Simply put, this maneuver makes the vertical separation (height) constant at the perigee and apogee of the orbit...in the case of Apollo 9, 10 nautical miles.

Around one hour later, at about 13:00 EST, after closing about 75 miles on the CSM, Spider executed Terminal Phase Initiation (TPI), which simply put, placed the LM on an intercept trajectory with the CSM, about 10 miles above her and about 22 miles in front.

Over the hour that followed TPI, Spider would climb toward Gumdrop and a pleasant sight would result...

From Gumdrop, a pleasant sight indeed, compatriots getting back where they belong after 6 and a half hours out there somewhere!



And from Spider...HOME!




Getting into station-keeping, checking things out, getting themselves trimmed-up, and moving in resulted in a successful docking between the two spacecraft at 14:02 EST.
By around 16:00, McDivitt and Schweikart had transferred back into the CM, sealed up the hatches, and at 16:22, Spider was jettisoned.

She'd been a hell of a spacecraft, performing admirably (it must've been hell for pilots just to set LM ascent stages loose after what they did!).

Shortly before 17:00 that evening, Spider's APS engine was fired to fuel depletion...

See you later Baby!



...Much later as it turned out. Spider would be inserted into an eccentric orbit around the Earth, at around 145 x 4100 miles, and would remain there for 12 years. She'd be there long after the Apollo program was over, and would see the first Space Shuttle mission fly! Spider's orbit would decay, and she'd burn up on OCT 23 1981...


A few hours later, a happy Apollo 9 crew went to sleep, 5 days into their mission, with the major goals accomplished in stellar fashion. Everything that happened on MAR 7 was going to happen around the Moon. The LM had performed splendidly, the coelliptic sequence maneuvers worked as planned, and the program at that point would proceed as planned.

And...Armstrong, Aldrin, and Collins, I would imagine, had a twinge , maybe a little, of excitement, realizing that the plan to have them try the first landing had essentially jumped its first hurdle...

[MID]

Sky Scanner on Mar 7 2009, 05:13 PM, said:

Just wanted to say, it's a great read MID, fantastic photos too. Even the wife has bookmarked it on her laptop, as she's finding it fascinating too.

I appreciate that Sky...a hell of alot. It's gratifying to see the interest in this!

It's a great story, really.
I can't write a novel about it in this format, of course...and Apollo 9 was a big, big mission. It's mission report was the largest of the Apollo program at almost 500 pages. Apollo 7's was the second biggest at 400+ pages.


Those missions proved the Apollo spacecraft, Apollo 7, the CSM, and Apollo 9, the whole package, with emphasis, of course, on the LM.
One could say that those two were the proofs of the hardware and procedures of the program. They were important in extremis, even though they didn't carry the drama of an Apollo 8 or Apollo 11.

They were priority one pieces of the Apollo chain, and Apollo 9, in my opinion, was the watershed moment. That mission told us, "We're gonna do this thing..."


I'll try to keep it interesting, without writing a novel, or getting into too much technish!

Thanks again.

[thefinalfrontier]

I am finding this amazing myself, Having watched all the happenings back when this was happening it truly is amazing the feat of these men,

[MID]

thefinalfrontier on Mar 9 2009, 08:07 AM, said:

I am finding this amazing myself, Having watched all the happenings back when this was happening it truly is amazing the feat of these men,

It was an amazing time, with amazing things happening, no?

[thefinalfrontier]

MID on Mar 9 2009, 05:01 PM, said:

It was an amazing time, with amazing things happening, no?

Quote

One could say that those two were the proofs of the hardware and procedures of the program. They were important in extremis, even though they didn't carry the drama of an Apollo 8 or Apollo 11.

They were priority one pieces of the Apollo chain, and Apollo 9, in my opinion, was the watershed moment. That mission told us, "We're gonna do this thing..."

I see you also have a Saturn V rocket as your avatar, I have one in my profile pic, I always looked back at a time when that was a symbol of power and feat, Man made his mark in human history and I cant wait until they do it again, Its all been a great time (past and current) but I think the apollo missions were the greatest of all time, I have been following your posts and enjoying them all, This is a good idea to comemorate our time in history,

This post has been edited by thefinalfrontier: 09 March 2009 - 09:25 PM

[MID]

After the LM shakedown was complete (and results were being poured over in full-bore mode on the ground), Apollo 9 remained pretty busy on orbit.

The final days of the mission featured a couple more tests of the SPS, designed to drop the perigee of the orbit, bring it back up again, and test the propellant gaging system. Landmark tracking exercises were also included in the flight plan. The mission was also loaded with photography experiments, operational and scientific, and they carried with them seven modified Hasselblads, four of which were used for what was designated the S065 experiment, which was a multi-spectral terrain photography experiment, and three for general photographic activities.

The S065 experiment was designed to check the feasibility of using visible and infrared band photography for applications in Earth resources studies. Operational photography meant photographs of in-flight operations, which were of course not simply for historical documentation, but were used in engineering analysis of operations.


Meteorological applications also found more value in Apollo 9 photography than in any prior manned orbital mission.

They even took a photo for DONTEATUS when they had a chance!



Dallas, Texas, taken on MAR 11 1969....




Anyway,

Taking care of a spacecraft is a big, continual job, and of course Apollo 9's crew spent alot of time doing so. Changing CO2 filters, stirring cryos, aligning platforms, charging batteries, waste water dumps, power-ups and power-downs, fuel cell maintenance, testing communications antennae, tracking the LM ascent stage with on-board optics, as well as evaluations of the passive thermal control mode were all performed during the flight.


Continually, the spacecraft was being analyzed by engineers on the ground...and alot of other stuff was going on down below as Apollo 9 continued.

I had previously indicated that Apollo was going full bore, and that activity at NASA was at a fever pitch.

On MAR 11 1969, while Apollo 9 was still two days from splashdown, at the Cape this was happening:








And Apollo 10, with LM-4 on-board, capped off by CSM 106, was rolled-out to Pad 39B, the first use of Pad B.
Things were moving along indeed. The VAB had lost another occupant. But another was still inside, the Apollo 11 launch vehicle, and Apollo 12's vehicle would soon be in the assembly phase as well, it's SIV-B having arrived on MAR 9.

In fact, for the first 6 1/2 months of 1969, there were only 8 days where a Saturn V Apollo launch vehicle was NOT on a launch pad at Complex 39. MAR 4 through 10 consituted seven of those days. The other day was MAY 19, the day after Apollo 10 launched. The next day, MAY 20, Apollo 11 would be on the pad!

No rest for the weary on the launch crews!

[MID]

thefinalfrontier on Mar 9 2009, 05:21 PM, said:

I see you also have a Saturn V rocket as your avatar, I have one in my profile pic, I always looked back at a time when that was a symbol of power and feat, Man made his mark in human history and I cant wait until they do it again, Its all been a great time (past and current) but I think the apollo missions were the greatest of all time, I have been following your posts and enjoying them all, This is a good idea to comemorate our time in history,

I couldn't agree with you more, TFF.

"...our time in history", indeed!

It was.

Still, today, the Saturn V stands as the behemoth of all behemoths, a marvel, and a testimony to the capabilities of man. We're all familiar with the Shuttle. She's a maumoo, no doubt about it...a 4,500,000 pound hunk of flying machine that gets pushed aloft by 6,800,000 pounds of thrust.

But above, we see various puctures of the Saturn V. Comparatively speaking, she was frightening.
She stood twice as tall as the shuttle, and her base diameter was 16% larger than the diameter of the Shuttle. She weighed in at 6,700,000 pounds, 70% more than the Shuttle stack weighs.

The Saturn V produced 7,600,000 pounds of thrust, 12% more than the Shuttle. The specific impulse of the Saturn V was 53% higher than the Shuttle's, and she made a noise that was louder than anything humans had ever produced, save an atomic explosion!

Today, it's impressive enough to realize that in order to climb aboard the Shuttle, one must ascend to the 147 foot level of the fixed service structure. For ingress into the Saturn V, you had to ascend to the 320 foot level to climb aboard!

The Saturn V could put 260,000 pounds into LEO. The Shuttle puts 54,000 pounds up there.

Yes, she was it---the rocket of all rockets.

We'll have to wait for ARES V to see something bigger, and bigger she'll be.
She'll stand close to 400 feet tall, will lift 410,000 pounds into LEO, and her 6 / RS-68B engines will provide as much thrust as the Shuttle's entire powerplant does...and you'll have to add the thrust of the two SRMs as well (that thrust level has not yet been finalized).

About 6 years or so down the road, we'll be seeing a heart-stopping behemoth again rolling out of the VAB...ever so slowly, and it'll remind us of the greatness we once knew. Hopefully, it will pave the road to amazing new accomplishments in space, as Apollo did.

[MID]

MAR 13 1969

It is said, and rightly so, that the most tense part of any space mission is re-entry.
I always thought so myself (still do!) and at 11:30 EDT on MAR 13, Apollo 9's SPS de-orbit burn took place...

About 15 minutes later, blackout...you wait...you stare...you wait...every once in a while, you breathe.


And then, what is generally acknowledged as the most wonderful sight in all of spaceflight occurred:



That's a little Gumdrop hanging from those three 60 foot diameter chutes---

12:00:54 EDT---THUD !



She immediately released her chutes, and remained Stable 1 (upright in the water).

Apollo 9 was a complete success, running 241 hours, 0 minutes, 54 seconds. Three guys-- happy, and likely rather smelly(OK, definitely a bit ripe!), boarded the USS Guadelcanal.




The year of Apollo had started with a successful bang.

Conclusions produced by analysis of Apollo 9 were that rendezvous procedures and equipment provided the required precision for rendezvous operations to be conducted on a lunar landing mission; the docking process and mechanics worked perfectly; the Apollo EMU pereformed in exceptional fashion, the procedure of intravehicular transfer (a contingency procedure) was shown to be feasible, and depressurization and re-pressurization of both spacecraft was demonstrated for the first time; the LM itself was thouroughly shaken down in all operational phases, and demonstrated itself capable of conducting a lunar mission; adequate LM consumable provisions for a lunar mission were demonstrated; and ground support and communications for a lunar mission were shown to be good.

Although the analysis of all the various aspects of Apollo 9 would take a thousand pages (and no one needs to hear all that !), suffice it to say that the Apollo package proved itself capable in almost every testable respect of executing a lunar mission on Apollo 9.

Jim McDivitt would not fly again in space, nor would Rusty Schweikart. As indicated earlier, Dave Scott was about to become real busy for the next couple years, and would serve on a backup crew, as well as Commander of a future Apollo lunar landing mission.



There were still a bunch of things to do, and as Apollo 9 was being recovered, the Apollo 10 crew was in full training mode for a launch in May, their Saturn already in the process of being worked on at Pad 39B at the Cape.



Apollo 10 would again test and demonstrate the complete Apollo package...this time, taking it as close as one could get to the actual landing without actually doing it. Apollo 10 would go to the Moon, and execute everything, save the final powered descent to the surface. It would be a dress rehearsal of Apollo 11...and would take the LM down to roughly 8 miles above the Moon.

The most experienced space flight crew yet would man Apollo 10. In fact, it was the first space flight with an all veteran crew.
Here's the gang.



That's Gene Cernan, Lunar Module Pilot, on the left. Gene had already served on backup crews for two missions, and was Pilot on Gemini 9A in 1966. He was on his second spaceflight. He'd make another a couple years later, as the last man to walk on the Moon as Commander of Apollo 17.

In the center is our Commander, Tom Stafford. Tom was Wally Schirra's Pilot on Genini 6A, and was the Command Pilot on Gemini 9A (Yes, the GT-9A crew was still together for Apollo 10). Tom was on his third spaceflight, and would in the future Command the ASTP mission in 1975.

On the right is Command Module Pilot John Young. John was on his third space flight as well, having flown as Pilot on the first Gemini mission with Gus Grissom, and having Commanded Gemini 10. In the future, he would Command Apollo 16, and walk on the Moon, and would also fly two Space Shuttle missions, including the maiden flight of the Shuttle (Columbia) in 1981. John would log six space flights in his career...


They were backed up by Gordon Cooper, Don Eisele, and Ed Mitchell.


Apollo 10 was slated for a May launch...

Apollo 9 had been a complete success. Apollo 10 would press on to the Moon...but we had a little time yet to wait...and so, Saturn 505 slept, with CSM 106 perched on top, and LM-4 slumbering in her shell...for the time being.



The beast would awaken soon...

[DONTEATUS]

The Best Post on the Internet By A Long Shot Mid! Ever pic and article up to the Facts and Leaves us wanting more! Like We were all there reliveing the Most wonderful Times Of Manned Space Flight! Some day Soon We need to Elect a Master Space Man Award to You! I Here by announce this thread As The Best Ever! Now why couldnt they of thought of a Camera on the Spider to see what happens in a Firey re-entry ? That would of been a great show. And Thanks for Spy Sat pics of my House ! Its the little two storie one in the middle of the block there near the center,right next to the Bush`s house! Love your work Mid! p.s Where did Gumdrop get to Go?

This post has been edited by DONTEATUS: 16 March 2009 - 08:29 PM

[MID]

DONTEATUS on Mar 16 2009, 04:28 PM, said:

The Best Post on the Internet By A Long Shot Mid! Ever pic and article up to the Facts and Leaves us wanting more! Like We were all there reliveing the Most wonderful Times Of Manned Space Flight! Some day Soon We need to Elect a Master Space Man Award to You! I Here by announce this thread As The Best Ever! Now why couldnt they of thought of a Camera on the Spider to see what happens in a Firey re-entry ? That would of been a great show. And Thanks for Spy Sat pics of my House ! Its the little two storie one in the middle of the block there near the center,right next to the Bush`s house! Love your work Mid! p.s Where did Gumdrop get to Go?

Thanks so much, D.
Your kind words are much appreciated!

More to follow...there were three more missions flown in 1969!


Yea...Apollo 9 was spying on you down there in BIG D!


As to gumdrop...there she is, forty years young!



Nestled in a corner of the Theodore Gildred Flight Rotunda at the San Diego Air and Space Museum in California sits Gumdrop...on loan from the National Air and Space Museum.

We'll continue with Apollo 10 sometime soon!

[Czero 101]

Hi MID,

Excellent postings so far. Looking forward to further info on the other missions.

In the mean time, I found another recap of Apollo 9 posted at the Education Forum:

http://educationforu...showtopic=14101

Also, NASA has the Apollo 9 Flight Journal online as well:

http://history.nasa....p09fj/index.htm





Cz

This post has been edited by Czero 101: 16 March 2009 - 09:24 PM

[johnk81]

Superb MID , excellent chronology of the events , and the pictures you have are astounding! - Bookmarked!

I still remember leaving the science museum in London after seeing the lunar lander and the Apollo rocket mock up and looking up and the blue sky , it's an amazing sense of awe for what these guys did! And to you MID thanks for keeping these detailed reports in public view , I sometimes think today's generation will forget just how much has been done with so little by what I can only describe as super humans , To have the cohonies to strap yourself to something like an Apollo rocket and go further than anyone else ever has is such amazing bravery.

ME