In Memoriam

[Czero 101]

38-image photo essay put together by The Atlantic:

http://www.theatlantic.com/infocus/2012/08/neil-armstrong-1930-2012/100359/

Cz

[MID]

As we remember the passing of Neil Armstrong, let us also rmember Apollo friends, and comerades who have already passed:

John F. Kennedy 35th President of the United States, responsible for Apollo.

The Apollo 1 crew.

Virgil I Grissom,

Edward White,

Roger Chaffee,

Charles... Pete Conrad, Apollo 12 CDR, Skylab 2, CDR

Jack Swigert Apollo 13 CMP

Alan Shepard, First American in space, CDR, Apollo 14

Stuart Roosa, Apollo 14 CMP,

James Irwin, Apollo 15 LMP

Gunter Wendt PAD Leader, Apollo Launch Complexes at KSC during Apollo.

Ronnie Evans, Apollo 17 CMP

Rocco Petrone, Former launch director at KSC , and Director of the Apollo Program at NASA HQ

and of course,

Neil Armstrong, Savior of GT-8, and Apollo 11 CDR

Edited August 28, 2012 by MID

[TheMacGuffin]

I watched this landing on TV with my great grandmother, who literally grew up in the horse and buggy era and would never even have imagined that such things would have been possible when she was young. That was a great deal of change in one lifetime, for in the world that she had been born into, slavery still existed in the U.S. and there were no electric lights, airplanes, automobiles or computers--nothing like that--but before she died she was able to see men walking on the moon. Think of that.

I also agree that Neil Armstrong was really the right stuff, and made a landing that very few others on earth could have done. Had it gone wrong, they would have been on a strictly one-way trip.

[MID]

I watched this landing on TV with my great grandmother, who literally grew up in the horse and buggy era and would never even have imagined that such things would have been possible when she was young. That was a great deal of change in one lifetime, for in the world that she had been born into, slavery still existed in the U.S. and there were no electric lights, airplanes, automobiles or computers--nothing like that--but before she died she was able to see men walking on the moon. Think of that.

A worthy thing to think about!

Think about that! She had to have been over 100 when Apollo 11 took place! She had to have been born before 1862, when slavery began to be abolished nationally, and the invention of the electric light in 1874, or the automobile in 1885-1890, and the first manned flight in 1903.

If so...imagine her life! When this little boy named Neil Armstrong was born, we were in just beginning a depression and she'd have been around 70. Seeing the depression run its course, WW 2, the development of the automobile, it's rapid accelleration into American life, jet aircraft flying people all over the world, and technological advances she couldn't have imagined, ever, followed by three young (relatively) men going to the Moon????

To have experienced it from her perspective would've been a fantastic thrill in itself.

It's thrilling to just think about her sitting there watching that happen.

[MID]

I also agree that Neil Armstrong was really the right stuff, and made a landing that very few others on earth could have done. Had it gone wrong, they would have been on a strictly one-way trip.

Well, let's put it this way.

Neil made a landing that only one or two others had ever trained for a little, and no one who followed AS-11 trained fior the first landing, nor did they experience the same things he and Buzz did.

I'd venture to say that I agree with you, that he made a landing that not only was difficult, but that no one else could've done. Jim Lovell had some training, was a hell of a pilot, and woul've taken over for Neil if something happened to him but you're also right...

...Anything going badly wrong may well have meant a one-way trip for Neil and Buzz on 7-20-69.

But Neil did it. He will always and forever be known as the first...and, he greased it!

Love you, Neil!

Thanks for all you gave us!

[DONTEATUS]

Like they say ! Every Landing you can walk away from is a Good Landing ! THey all came back with Great Landings ! Now we need to plan more trips of the Imagination,to become Reality !

[MID]

Like they say ! Every Landing you can walk away from is a Good Landing ! THey all came back with Great Landings ! Now we need to plan more trips of the Imagination,to become Reality !

Well, D, rthere's a difference between flying a craft through the atmosphere to a nice landing (i.e Apolllo v. shuttle), and not doing so. We never failed during Murcury, Gemini, or Apollo.

We'll succeed, again!

[DONTEATUS]

I know I know the drill ! by the numbers 5 by 5 on the marks. shinny side up as always !

[MID]

I know I know the drill ! by the numbers 5 by 5 on the marks. shinny side up as always !

Yes, and, the rubber meets the road...or,

Re-enter BEF (blunt end forward), and put the blunt end in the water...nice and easy, under a few large chutes that inflated some 3 3/4 miles up!

[DONTEATUS]

Yes, and, the rubber meets the road...or,

Re-enter BEF (blunt end forward), and put the blunt end in the water...nice and easy, under a few large chutes that inflated some 3 3/4 miles up!

The Good news is were back to this type of re-entry in the future missions ! Beats the heck outta a Dirt slpash down I say !

[Waspie_Dwarf]

Let's try to show a bit of respect here please and don't take this thread off topic. This is a thread to remember those that have passed on, NOT a thread for general chit chat.

Thank you.

[flyingswan]

RIP Patrick Moore, astronomer, writer, TV presenter and de-bunker of nonsense.

He was an inspiration.

[Waspie_Dwarf]

Here is the statemnent announcing Sir Patrick's death:

Statement from Julia Knight, Peter Cattermole, David McCahearty, Brian May, Iain Nicolson, and Patrick’s staff and friends.

We are sad to announce that the distinguished astronomer and broadcaster Sir Patrick Moore passed away peacefully at 12.25pm this afternoon, at his home in Selsey, at the age of 89. After a short spell in hospital last week, it was determined that no further treatment would benefit him, and it was his wish to spend his last days in his own home, Farthings, where he today passed on, in the company of close friends and carers and his cat Ptolemy.

Over the past few years, Patrick, an inspiration to generations of astronomers, fought his way back from many serious spells of illness and continued to work and write at a great rate, but this time his body was too weak to overcome the infection which set in, a few weeks ago. He was able to perform on his world record-holding TV Programme “The Sky at Night’ right up until the most recent episode. His executors and close friends plan to fulfil his wishes for a quiet ceremony of interment, but a farewell event is planned for what would have been Patrick’s 90^th birthday in March 2013.

Patrick’s executors do not wish to make any further statement for the time being, but are setting up a website for well-wishers to post tributes to Patrick:

The Sir Patrick Moore Memorial Website.

www.banguniverse.com/sirpatrickmoore

In addition, it was Patrick’s wish, as a great animal lover, for donations to be made to Cats Protection on his behalf.

http://www.cats.org.uk/

enquiries@catsprotection.co.uk

0845 371 2734

Queen member Brian May, a close friend of Sir Patrick Moore, and along with astrophysicist Chris Lintott co-author of two books with Sir Patrick, ‘Bang! The Complete History of the Universe’ and most recently, ‘The Cosmic Tourist’, has posted his own personal message, which can be be viewed at his website: www.brianmay.com

In his message, May refers to Sir Patrick as ‘a dear friend and a kind of father figure to me,’ and paid tribute to Sir Patrick writing:

‘Patrick will be mourned by the many to whom he was a caring uncle, and by all who loved the delightful wit and clarity of his writings, or enjoyed his fearlessly eccentric persona in public life.

‘Patrick is irreplaceable. There will never be another Patrick Moore. But we were lucky enough to get one.’

Source

[Waspie_Dwarf]

Jesco von Puttkamer: 1933-2012

http://img18.imageshack.us/img18/9772/716508mainjescoputtkame.jpg

Jesco von Puttkamer, who began his NASA career in 1962, when he worked on Wernher von Braun's rocket team as an engineer at the agency's Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Ala., during the Apollo Program, has died, following a brief illness. He was 79.

Von Puttkamer most recently worked in the International Space Station Program at NASA Headquarters in Washington as a technical manager. For more than a decade, he authored the ISS Daily Report, which chronicled the lives and activities of the crew members living aboard the International Space Station. He also was instrumental in advancing U.S. and Russian cooperation in human spaceflight. His personal relationships in Russia and the U.S. allowed him to bring both communities together in dialogue and activities. The space station program still is benefiting from his work.

Von Puttkamer arranged the translation from Russian to English of the Boris Chertok series "Rockets and People" that chronicled the history of the Russian space program. He also was instrumental in Russian exhibitions of U.S. accomplishments in space, including museum series on von Braun, Apollo 11 and the Hubble Space Telescope.

"Jesco was an institution at NASA," said William Gerstenmaier, associate administrator for Human Exploration and Operations at NASA Headquarters in Washington. "His time here spanned almost the entire breadth of the agency's human spaceflight programs. He was a direct link from von Braun's efforts to get people off the ground to the International Space Station and 12 years of continuous human presence. We lost an outspoken advocate for NASA's efforts to explore farther than we ever have gone before."

http://img853.imageshack.us/img853/7104/716470mainvonputtkamerb.jpg

Von Puttkamer received numerous awards during his 50 years at NASA. Among those honors was NASA's prestigious Exceptional Service Medal in 2004. In 2007, he received a NASA Honor Award for successful initiatives of advancing American-Russian cooperation in spaceflight. In December 2008, the U.S.-wide German-American Heritage Foundation in Philadelphia honored von Puttkamer with its “Distinguished German-American of the Year” award. For this honor, he received congratulatory letters from President George W. Bush, then-NASA Administrator Michael Griffin and the Governors of the states of Pennsylvania and Virginia.

He is the author of more than a dozen books on spaceflight. His novelette, "The Sleeping God," was published in the anthology "Star Trek: The New Voyages 2." His diary/book on the first lunar landing by Apollo 11 was published in Beijing in 1982 in a Chinese translation. A revised edition of this book was published for the 40th anniversary of the Apollo 11 mission in July 2009.

Von Puttkamer lived in Huntsville beginning in 1962 when he worked at Marshall with von Braun in the aeroballistics division. He came to NASA at von Braun's personal invitation. In 1974, von Puttkamer transferred to NASA Headquarters.

Von Puttkamer is survived by his wife, Ursula.

Below is a segment from "This Week @ NASA" from March 23, 2012 in which von Puttkamer was featured.

Source

[Waspie_Dwarf]

In Memoriam: Carl Woese

The astrobiology community deeply mourns the loss of Dr. Carl Woese, the University of Illinois microbiology professor credited with the discovery of a “third domain” of life. He died on Sunday, December 30th at his home. He was 84.

In 1977, Dr. Woese and his colleagues overturned a universally held assumption about the basic structure of the tree of life. Microbes known as archaea are as distinct from bacteria as plants and animals are, they wrote in a published paper. Prior to this finding, scientists had lumped archaea together with bacteria and asserted that the tree of life had two main branches — bacteria (called prokarya), and everything else (eukarya). Their discovery added archaea as a third main branch of the evolutionary family tree.

Dr. Woese was born on July 15, 1928, in Syracuse, N.Y. He earned bachelor’s degrees in math and physics from Amherst College and a Ph.D. in biophysics at Yale University. He studied medicine at the University of Rochester, was a postdoctoral researcher in biophysics at Yale and worked as a biophysicist at the General Electric Research Laboratory in Schenectady, N.Y. before he joined the microbiology faculty at the University of Illinois in 1964. He was also a professor at the UI’s Institute for Genomic Biology.

“Carl was truly a man of vision, creativity and passion, with a deep love of this university,” said Gene Robinson, director of the UI’s Institute for Genomic Biology in a statement. “Carl not only rewrote the textbook in evolutionary biology, but his discovery also has given us the tools today to study the human microbiome, the incredibly diverse and complex assemblages of microorganisms in our bodies that contribute so much to both health and disease.”

Woese received a number of awards for his research: a MacArthur Foundation grant in 1984, election to the National Academy of Sciences in 1988, the Leeuwenhoek Medal (microbiology’s premier honor from the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences) in 1992, a National Medal of Science in 2000 and many more.

Source: [University of Illinois]

Source

[Waspie_Dwarf]

Dyer Brainerd Holmes, former NASA manned flight director, dies at 91

Dyer Brainerd Holmes, who directed NASA’s manned space flight program in the early 1960s and who was instrumental in developing the plan that sent the first astronauts to the moon, died Jan. 11 at a hospital in Memphis. He was 91.

He had complications from pneumonia, said a stepson, Pierce Ledbetter.

Source

[Waspie_Dwarf]

Reg Turnill: Veteran BBC aerospace correspondent dies

Reg Turnill, the BBC's aerospace correspondent from the beginning of the space age through to the shuttle era, has died aged 97.

After being sent to Moscow to cover the first manned space launch, he regularly reported from Cape Canaveral and Houston on the Apollo Moon missions.

In 1970, he broke the story to the world that Apollo 13 was in trouble.

Mr Turnill's eldest son confirmed the news of his father's death to BBC Radio Kent.

Read more...

First Patrick Moore, now Reg Turnill.

Like Sir Patrick, Reg Turnill taught me much and fuelled my love of all things space when I was young. His appearances on TV were always worth watching and several of his books still sit on my shelf.

Unlike Sir Patrick I never got to meet him.

Edited February 12, 2013 by Waspie_Dwarf
corrected link.

[Waspie_Dwarf]

Retired NASA Astronaut, Research Test Pilot Gordon Fullerton Dies

C. Gordon Fullerton, who compiled a distinguished career as a NASA astronaut, research pilot and Air Force test pilot spanning almost 50 years, died Aug. 21. He was 76.

Fullerton had sustained a severe stroke in late 2009, and had been confined to a long-term care facility in Lancaster, Calif., for most of the past 3½ years.

Fullerton logged 382 hours in space flight on two space shuttle missions while in the NASA astronaut corps from 1969 to 1986. He then transferred to NASA's Dryden Flight Research Center at Edwards Air Force Base, where he served for 22 years as a research test pilot on a variety of high-profile projects. During the latter years of his career at NASA Dryden, he served as Associate Director of Flight Operations and as chief of the directorate's flight crew branch prior to his retirement at the end of 2007.

Read more...

[Waspie_Dwarf]

Retired Astronaut Gordon Fullerton Dies

This two minute silent movie clip highlights the career of retired NASA astronaut and research pilot Gordon Fullerton, who died on Aug. 21 at age 76.

Fullerton flew the shuttle Enterprise during landing tests at NASA Dryden in 1977 and went on to fly into space twice, on Columbia on STS-3 in 1982 and as commander of Challenger on STS-51F in 1985.

Credit: NASA

Source: NASA - Multimedia

[Waspie_Dwarf]

Former JPL Director Bruce Murray Dies After a Long Illness

PASADENA, Calif. – Former JPL Director Bruce C. Murray died today at the age of 81 after a long illness.

Murray was at the helm of JPL from 1976 to 1982, during a very busy time for planetary exploration – when the Viking spacecraft landed on Mars, and Voyager 1 and 2 were launched and flew by Jupiter and Saturn.

Read more...

[Waspie_Dwarf]

Moments With Former JPL Director Bruce Murray (1931-2013)

Through his own words and historical footage, this video offers a view of former JPL Director Bruce Murray and his accomplishments. Murray died on Aug. 29, 2013, at the age of 81.

Credit: NASA

Source: NASA - Multimedia

[Waspie_Dwarf]

Albert Jones (1920–2013)

Albert Jones, a legendary variable star observer, passed away this week, leaving behind a voluminous legacy of observations.

The international astronomy community lost one of its greatest visual observers with the passing of Albert Jones on September 11th at the age of 93. Jones was best known for his phenomenal skill as a variable star observer, having made more visual brightness estimates than anyone in history. He is also remembered as a comet observer, and his discovery of a comet in 1946 when he was 26 and another 54 years later at the age 80 set a record for the greatest time span for comet discoveries by an individual.

Read more...

[Waspie_Dwarf]

Canadian Space Pioneer Passes Away

The Canadian Space Agency wishes to extend our sincere condolences to Mrs. Colleen Lapp and the family of Canadian space pioneer Dr. Philip Lapp who dedicated his life to space and aerospace innovation, ingenuity, and excellence. He passed away on September 25th in Toronto at 85 after a long illness.

Dr. Lapp was the co-author of the "Chapman Report", which launched Canada's Space Policy in 1967. While John H. Chapman is deemed the Father of the Canadian Space Program, Dr. Lapp is considered as one of its main architects and was instrumental in launching Canada in space over half a century ago.

Read more...

[Waspie_Dwarf]

NASA Administrator Remembers Mercury Astronaut Scott Carpenter

The following is a statement from NASA Administrator Charles Bolden on the passing of original Mercury astronaut Malcom Scott Carpenter from complications following a stroke. Carpenter, who was the second American to orbit the Earth in 1962, was 88.

"Today, the world mourns the passing of Scott Carpenter. As one of the original Mercury 7 astronauts, he was in the first vanguard of our space program -- the pioneers who set the tone for our nation's pioneering efforts beyond Earth and accomplished so much for our nation.

Read more...

[Waspie_Dwarf]

Dr. George H. Herbig (1920–2013)

Dr. George H. Herbig, astronomer emeritus at the University of Hawaii at Manoa and a member of the prestigious National Academy of Sciences, has died at the age of 93. He joined the faculty of the UH Institute for Astronomy in 1987 after a long and distinguished career at the Lick Observatory, now part of the University of California, Santa Cruz, and he attained emeritus status at UHM in 2001.

He has been widely acclaimed for his pioneering studies of star formation and the properties and evolution of young stars. His contributions laid the foundation for much of what we know about the birth and early development of stars

Read more...