A view of Apollo 16's Lunar Rover, a good dependable car that cost $2 Million.

Apollo 16’s Lunar Rover was driven over 20 miles on the three EVA’s at Descartes, and this is a good picture of the television camera on the right front of the vehicle, that took hour after hour of color television, and made it seem like those watching back on earth, were the third Astronaut, viewing where no man had been before.

 

 

                             And a picture of Charlie Duke working near the rover on the surface of the Moon.

                   And a good processed image to remove glare, showing the rover and the LM Orion.

Apollo 16 Lunar Rover Grand Prix: My Favorite Apollo movie film.

Towards the end of EVA-1, John Young drove the Lunar Rover solo, with Charlie Duke filming his drive to and from the direction of the LM for engineers at Boeing, so they could have documentation of how the Rover actually performed on the lunar surface. This movie is one of my all time favorites from Apollo, and shows how much the Rover drove like “A combination of a bucking bronco, and a rowboat in a rough sea”, according to Dave Scott of Apollo 15, the first Rover driver. 4-wheeling - On the Moon!

The first flight of Orbital Science Company’s Taurus rocket on the A-One maiden launch went well. The booster delivered the dummy Cygnus payload simulator into orbit, and everything appeared to go well with the launch. Delayed twice, first by an umbilical and unacceptable weather Saturday, the Antares rocket ignited, and roared off the pad and arced northeast away from Wallops Island, Virginia, and NASA TV provided live coverage of the launch.

 

Television from both ground tracking cameras and onboard the first and second stages of the Antares rocket were sent down to the ground, and here is what some of the images looked like:

 

    First stage burning properly during the first stage of ascent.

         First stage separation and the first stage falling away as the upper
         stage accelerates to orbit.

 

Second stage shutdown and the Cygnus payload simulator is in orbit.

 

All in all an apparently very successful debut flight for the second COTS resupply company, and the International Space Station is going to have a second company able to supply cargo to the orbital outpost. Hurrah for OSC/Taurus! Way to Go!

 

 

 

 

41 years ago today - Apollo 16 EVA 1.

                               Immediate area of the LM, and AlSEP site.
 

  41 years ago today, Apollo 16 astronauts John Young and Charlie Duke were walking on the moon on EVA 1, their first excursions outside of the Lunar Module Orion. Young and Duke had stepped onto the lunar surface, set up the flag, deployed the lunar rover, unloaded the ALSEP scientific package, and then began to set up the ALSEP southwest of Orion.

   I was in 8^th grade at the time, and left school early that afternoon, playing hooky, to watch EVA 1 on television. I had not gotten home till Young and Duke were at Station 1, and did not see Young rip the cable from the Central Station to the Heat Flow electronics box, because he couldn’t see the cable because the control unit for his spacesuit was in the way.

  I did get home in time to see Young and Duke working at Station 1, and saw Duke pick up a medium sized rock that was sticking out of the surface near the lunar rover. He told capcom Tony England back at Mission Control in Houston, Texas, that if he fell in Plum crater, Mulhberger, one of the scientists back in the science support room behind the MOCR, had “had it!”

   I wanted to include several pictures of the landing site from orbit, pictures from the surface, and some personal reminisces of my watching the exploration of Descartes by Young and Duke, as witnessed by me, and millions of others, on live television from the surface of the Moon.

 

 

  I remember Young jumped up twice for both the television camera on the rover, and Charlie Duke’s Hasselblad, and this was one of the more memorable flag saluting pictures from all of Apollo.

 

 

  Once at the ALSEP site, Young accidentally tore the cable for the Heat Flow probes loose from the ALSEP central station to the electronics box, and this was the worst loss of the mission. The rest of the ALSEP deployment went nominally, and everything else worked.

            The Heat Flow Electronics box, view looking Southwest.

Young and Duke then drove west south west of the LM to sample around Flag Crater, Station 1 on their itinerary outside Orion on EVA 1. They sampled on the Northeast corner of Plum Crater, then back near the Rover, where Charlie Duke picked up a “Great Scott’ sized rock with white crystals on top of it, on direction of the geologists in the Science Support Room. It was during this part of EVA 1 that I got home, turned on the TV, and saw some limited amount of live coverage on the networks, (ABC & CBS as I recall)

                      John Young's panorama at Station 1

        A  TV Capture image of Charlie Duke grabbing the Great Scott rock on the rim of Plum Crater.

 

 

 

Antares launch postponed due to weather, crowds, will try again Sunday.

   Orbital Sciences Corporation had to scrub the second launch attempt of their new Antares expendable launch vehicle due to unacceptable winds aloft, and people being too close to the areas where the vehicle could come down in pieces if there were to be a range safety destruct command and the vehicle exploded on command as it should. So, they will try again tomorrow, and hopefully the weather and crowds will cooperate then, as was not the case today.

  The first attempt to launch the Antares rocket with a dummy Cygnus spacecraft aboard was scrubbed with 10 minutes to go on the countdown, due to an umbilical coming out from the second stage of the booster prematurely. The launch control team ended the countdown, and they will try again in two days or more. These things happen, and at least the booster and its payload weren’t destroyed in a failure on ascent, or any other malady that can bedevil a launcher’s first try to launch a spacecraft to orbit.

   The launch team will recycle and try again, and maybe next time Antares will vault into orbit, and Orbital Sciences will prove they have the Right Stuff to send cargo to the International Space Station, as they are determined to do for their customer, NASA. Better luck next time OSC. You can do it!

A Victory for Freedom, and a respite from Tyranny. Gun Control Fails in the US Senate !

  

  Well, Freedom and the Bill of Rights triumphed today, and the Forces of Tyranny received a blow I hope they won't soon recover from. Turncoat Toomey, a RINO, Failed to gut the 2nd Amendment, and the Socialist's in the Senate Failed to take what is NOT theirs to take in the first place, namely Rights ! Thanks Be to God !

  Polls show the general publilc is way more concerned with the stagnant state of the US economy, the decade long stagnation in earnings and wages, the continual erosion of purchasing power caused by creeping inflation brought on by a decade of spending on war, bailouts, and waste, fraud, and abuse. The siren song of gun control failed to convince those who can stll think and reason in the US, that a further erosion of the Bill of Rights in general, and the 2nd Amendment in particular would do anything to make American's safer, and lessen crime.

  At least I will be able to buy a hunting rifle from a private party, and not have to go onto a government list of who does and does not own a hunting rifle, or any other firearm. It's NONE OF YOUR BUSINESS Federal, State, or Local government. Let today's vote in the US Senate be a wake up call to Tyrants and Bureaucrats at All levels of government, everywhere in the USA: "We don't need or want any more gun control; we will control Ourselvese !". Leave us, the Constitution, and the Bill of Rights Alone.

  The next step, in my opinion, should be to organize the pro-Freedom, Pro-Gun and Gun Rights, and Pro Constitution-Limited Government-Individual Rights people into a Network that can form at a moment's notice to defend Freedom and Defeat Tyranny and Opression, and work on defeating the RINO's and Socialists come the next election, in November 2014. Then we can breathe a little easier, and let Tyrants and Socialists know, that they are NOT Welcome in the Land of the still Free, and the Home of some us who are Still Brave !