I thought it might be fun to have a space based trivia quiz. The rules will be few and simple:

If you answer a question correctly you get to set another one.

Questions must be Space or astronomy based.

I know that there are some very knowledgeable people that visit this thread so I would ask that you do not make your questions too technical or specialist, set questions that everyone has a chance to answer.

That's the formalities over so now it is time for the first question.

I thought it might be nice to ask a topical question. Yesterday (Tuesday 8th April) Soyuz TMA-12 was launched. As well as the 2 cosmonauts making up expedition 17, South Korea's first astronaut So-yeon Yi. This means that South Korea's first astronaut is a woman. Only one other nation can claim that it's first astronaut was a woman, which nation is it?

Good luck and thanks for taking part.

Oh that's an easy one, why Britain, ofcourse.

After the Space Shuttle is retired in 2010, when is the replacement going to come into use and what is it called?

It will be called Orion.
Based on the present schedule, we hope to have the first manned Earth orbital flight of this vehicle in the autumn of 2014.

Correct, Helen Sharman became Britains first (and still only) astronaut when she was launched to the Mir space station on board Soyuz TM-12 on 18^th May 1991.


Good question, we''ll find out who pays attention to the Space News forum .
A bit of clarification though, do you want the name of the spacecraft or the programme?

Edited to add:
I see MID has gone for the name of the spacecraft. Your turn to ask a questin MID.

Oh!

Dopey me...

I thought his question was just an adjunct. What a moron I can be!



OK, trivia questions...we don't want to make this too hard, and certainly not technical...


During the Apollo program, only one man ever actually flew in a lunar module twice.
Who is he?

Gene Cernan - Apollo 10 & 17



Cz

That would be correct.
The question turns over to you Cz!

My hope was that this thread would be educational, it's educated me already. With all the books I have read on Apollo that fact had never dawned on me before. I am looking forward to Cz's question.

Ok... first question will be a rather easy one so we can get this thread rolling:

Ed Harris, Matt Frewer and Dan Butler all have what distinction in common?




Cz

They've all played Gene Kranz?

Correct!

Your turn for a question....



Cz

Ok, I'll keep things easy to try to keep the flow going:

What Saturnian weather event was last seen in 1990, and is expected to recur in 2016?

Would you be speaking of a Great White Spot storm..the one in question being observed in 1990, and which tend to recur in roughly 25-30 year cycles, which would mean we could expect another in the 2015-2020 timeframe?

Yep, that's what I was looking for, your turn

OK...I'm gonna get tough on you...

You know, on many of the hoax threads, alots been mentioned about radiation nonsense, and the hazards to astronauts that never actually manifest itself, since it wasn't there to begin with.


Nonetheless (and something I've never mentioned, for obvious reasons), four of our departed Apollo era astronauts (meaning Mercury through Skylab) did in fact "die of cancer", as it were.


Who can name them?

Wally Schirra
Jack Swigert
Alan Shepard
Deke Slayton


I'll be away from my computer for the rest of today and most of tomorrow, so if my answer is correct, someone else can take my place and ask a question.


Cz

The answer is correct.

And I add for emphasis:

None of these conditions for these 4 men had anything to do with radiation exposure from the deadly Van Allen belts!!!
In fact, two of these men, Deke and Wally, never transited the belts on their spaceflights...


As Cz can't ask another question...I'll continue the process.
________________________________________________________________________________
___________________

We've probably all heard people talk about the success of Apollo and make comments to the effect that we made all those flights perfectly without a hitch.

This of course is nonsense. Discounting Apollo 1 and Apollo 13, the process of getting to the Moon was in fact perilous and involved alot of risk, and a couple of critical situations that cropped up.

Three of our future Moon walkers got involved in serious or mission critical situations on their Gemini flights in the years prior to Apollo...very hairy situations.


Who were they, and what were the Gemini missions involved, and what were those situations?

? Neil Armstrong ,David Scott Gemini VIII and Gemini 7 Frank Borman ,Jim Lovells?

D:

I give you 33% correct.
I asked for the men, the missions, and the problem.

You got one mission and the right men: GT-8, Neil Armstrong and Dave Scott.


However, no problem defined for that mission.
GT-7 with Frank Borman and Jim Lovell is incorrect.


We're missing the problem with GT-8 (which was mission critical), and the other mission, men and problem...


Any bites?

Neil Armstrong and Dave Scott were tummbleing outta control after the un-dock from the GATV this happened 27 min into the intinal dock.

OK, D...I give you 50%!

That is correct. GT-8 began to roll out of control post-undocking. This was a critical situation, with a high rate of roll which threatened to render the men incapacitated. Neil Armstrong shut down the primary thruster sytem and activated the entry RCS and was able to stabilize the spacecraft. However, that action, per mission rules meant the end of the mission and re-entry at the earliest possible time.

A couple of pretty cool astronauts were able to render the situation nil. Both of them became commanders of Apollo lunar landing missions, Neil Armstrong, who everyone knows about, and Dave Scott, on Apollo 15 in the Summer of 1971.


Now, what was the other big problem?

Gemini IX Thomas P. Stafford and Eugene A, Cernan stuck protective shroud and bad fogging on his visir no dock done?

OK!

I give you 100%.

The other instance was GT-9A, June 1966!

You got it right...that was some serious stuff.

And it was Gene Cernan involved in some serious trouble aloft.
Gene, of course, became the Lunar Module Pilot on Apollo 10, and the Commander of Apollo 17, and thus, the last man on the Moon.

The stuck shroud on the ADTA wasn't the serious trouble. That was an annoyance.
The real problem came on the EVA.

The plan was a bit too expansive and the effort required caused some very serious difficulty physically for Geno. Leverage problems, physical exertion to due inadequate hand holds, fogging of his visor due to inadequate cooling, and the physical effort which caused his heart rate to approach 200 BPM were all very serious difficulties.


There was a point where flight surgeons feared he might pass out. He actually had no visibility inside the suit when Tom Stafford was attempting to help him back inside the spacecraft....and there was thought that Geno might not be able to get back in, and that he might die in the process...which would necessitate re-entering the atmosphere with his body attached to the spacecraft by the umbillical, since it was deemed unacceptable to cut him loose, acxcording to Tom Stafford (although I often wondered how one might close the hatch with the umnbillical still attached to ther astronauts suit).


At any rate, they did manage to get him back in, and I'll never forget Stafford saying something to the effect of, "I don't think I'd like to try that again..."


That was the other actually critical problem that occurred among the three moon-walkers I spoke of. It rather speaks to the risks and difficulty inherent in manned space flight, and exploring unknown realms.


Thus, I declare, DONTEATUS got the answer, and is now entitled to ask the next question!

Dough!!! now I done it . LoL heres one three hourses?Ex-Luna Scientia ? what was that?

Mission patch for Apollo 13. The latin text meant "From the Moon, Knowledge"




Here's my question...


What was the inspiration for Apollo 13's mission patch, and what eventually became of it....?



Cz

Apollo the Sun God.of Greek mythology symbolizing Apollo flights have extended the light of knowledge to all of Mankind. As for what became of the patch? I know three got wet and the rest is history Lol DONTEATUS

Incorrect.

Let me be more specific, or at least state my question more clearly:

What was the influence for the Apollo 13 mission patch design, and what eventually became of that inspirational object?



Cz

The three horse design came from an artist named Winter. He had designed a similar mural with 4 horses flying over the Earth, which was on display at the St. Regis Hotel in New York.




The mural had been lost for a time, and I think it found its way into Lovell's hands via Tom Hanks. It is currently on display at Lovell's of Lake Forest, a restaurant in Lake Forest, IL.

You are correct, Sir...



Cz

OK, now we'll get a little deeper into trivia...


On July 20, 1969, some time after the Eagle's landing, Buzz Aldrin enacted a religious observance aboard Eagle. A religious man, he had sought for some gesture he could make which he felt would be worthy of the moment when men stood on the surface of the Moon. What he did was to take Communion--he had a small flask of wine, some Communion wafers and a small chalice in his personal kit. Standing there, in the LM, he performed a Communion ceremony, silently reading a small prayer from a card on which he'd written a biblical passage.

No one knew anything about this on the ground, save Deke Slayton, and the general public didn't actually hear about this act for several years after the mission.

At the time, Buzz merely stated the following over the COMM:

"This is the LM pilot speaking. I'd like to take this opportunity to ask every person listening in, whoever and wherever they may be, to pause for a moment and contemplate the events of the past few hours, and to give thanks in his or her own way."

He had been warned by Slayton prior to the mission against broadcasting any religious observance or commentary over the air. Basically, Buzz's Communion ceremony was to be a secret.


The trivia question is:

Why?

It's because of the legal battle that took place on Christmas eve of 1968, one of the apollo 8 crew read Genesis 1. ?? xD

Legatus,

I'm gonna give that one to you!

Precisely speaking , it was due to the legal hassles that resulted from the crew of Apollo 8 reading from the book of Genesis on Christmas Eve, 1968; the lawsuit that was filed by noted atheist (model citizen, and bonified wacko) Madalyn Murray O'Hair in the Supreme Court (dismissed eventually...) which sought to ban any religious reference or public prayer by U.S. Astronauts.


In July 1969, the flap was still going on over that idiotic law suit and NASA sought a modicum of political correctness to mitigate the backlash.


Personally, whether religious or not (and I am not adherent to any organized religion), that moment in December 1968 was awesome, and appropriate...especially in THAT year. Wow, what an awesome thing to do! The emotion of that moment was incredible. Think about that year, if you can remember it, and the sight of our planet...never before seen from space like that...by men who were at the Moon (and who hours ahead, would place their fates in the hands of a single rocket engine that had to work!). Perhaps, Madalyn Murray O'Hair was the only person with the stones and the idiocy to file such a lawsuit.

Of course, she is deader than dead can be now... and her lawsuit was dismissed by the court (due to lack of jurisdiction...which meant, "This is nonsensical baloney"). But NASA felt an obligation to be skittish about such things in the future as a result of a very public lawsuit.


But you've got it right, and thus, you have the next question!!!

Yey! I wasn't expecting that I would get the right answer so I didn't prepare a question. ( I really don't know much bout space either. )

Question: What was the first American spacecraft to soft-land on the Moon?

The Surveyor 1 lander 11.000 pics taken May 30,1966 What a shot

Great! thought that was an easy question for you and the guys here.
It's your turn to ask a question.

whats the most junk in the trunk we brought back from the moon and what flt?

I have to assume by "junk in the trunk" you're talking about sample return, and that "what fit" means how much?

If that's the case, the most junk was Apollo 17's.
What fit was 244 pounds of lunar material, rocks, deep cores, soil, etc...

Apollo 17 brought back 110.4 kg (243 lbs) of lunar material, the most of any Moon mission.


Name the only flown LM ascent stage that still exists intact.

That would be Apollo 10's Snoopy...in heliocentric orbit.

Here's a trivia question for ya...


Which of the 24 men who flew to the Moon on an Apollo mission lost his wedding ring, and...under what incredible circumstances was it found and recovered by one of his crewmates, a week later?

Apollo 16's Command module pilot, Thomas Kenneth "Ken" Mattingly II or T. Kenneth Mattingly Jr.
Yet I don't know that is was recovered. xD

Maybe the brer rabbit got it? I wonder what John Young meant about the rabbit being back in the berer patch? Mid? any ideas?

You got it Legatus.

Ken Mattingly lost his wedding band inside the CM on day 2 of the Apollo 16 mission, according to Charlie Duke. One week later, they were on their way home from the Moon, when Ken did his EVA in cis-lunar space. Charlie was the EVA guy in the hatch during this EVA, and at one point late in the process, Charlie went back inside for a second and lo and behold, the wedding ring floated up past his head and straight out the hatch, like 180,000 miles out in space.

Charlie relates that he thought it was gone, but what happened was that Ken was out over the hatch, at the the end of an extension pole, and the ring ran into the back of his head, and it was then propelled right back down toward the hatch at a lazy clip and came right back in...where Charlie grabbed it.

Ken never knew it happened.

It was recovered!


Your question.

Little inside joke thing...

It was a reference to the old Brer Rabbit being thrown into the Briar Patch by Brer Fox story. John was making a reference to the fact that on his 4th space flight, NASA had finally thrown Brer Rabbit (himself) into the Briar Patch (the Moon).

Your makeing this seem easy I bet you have really hard ones to answer Mid

Well, D, I think I can come up with a few whoppers...but I have to be careful not to get technical about them...


But for now, Legatus has the next question!

MID is playing by the rules I set at the start as the other real experts (thanks guys, it is appreciated that you are not showing off but rather turning this into the fun and educational thread I hoped it would be), I didn't want this to get so tough that only a few space nuts could answer. I am rather hoping to get as many people involved as possible. In the mean time I'm looking forward to the next question.

Waspie:

I think it was a hell of a good idea, including the constraints. The potential for some really cool stuff to learn is inherent in your premise. That's what I found compelling at the start!

Question: Sally Ride became America's first woman in space aboard which orbiter?



Thanks for the Thread Waspie. Although I Don't have that much knowledge about space like you and mid does.

Challenger