Apollo 8 50th anniversary

Itssoeasy

At 12:51pm GMT(7:51am EST) today the 21st of December in 1968 Apollo 8 lifted off pad 39A at Merritt Island fifty years ago exactly on the first manned Saturn V launch. The most powerful rocket ever built to that point(and still to this day) standing 363ft high and what comes across clearly is the power it possessed which even after fifty years is evident by listening to Walter Cronkite trying to speak over the vibrations hitting the building he was in from the rocket that was miles away and the fact that in 65 years humans had gone from the wright brothers in 1903 to orbiting the moon in 1968 must have an amazing event to witness live. It was an inspiring event for a world that was in such turmoil in 1968.

There have been moments in the history of manned space flight that have been historic for not always good reasons. The Apollo 1 fire while a terrible tragedy ensured that the Apollo CM was made safe, and because of that the men of Apollo 1 did not die in vain. Likewise Apollo 8 was a moment that was a bridge that paved the way for Apollo 11 and a landing on the moon less than a year later and fulfilling the challenge set by the late president Kennedy. The moment when CAPCOM Michael Collins said that Apollo 8 was "go for TLI" was and is an historic moment in manned space flight. It was the first time ever that human beings would leave the pull of the earth and go into orbit around another celestial body. The three men of Apollo 8 Frank Borman, Jim Lovell and Bill Anders made history in December 1968 and even fifty years later the achievement still stands the test of time. One of the most historic images from that mission or in fact any mission ever in space flight was the earth rise picture taken in colour by Bill Anders. Humans went to explore the moon but learnt about Earth.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ddNf8Wuahd4

Wibbs

Funny enough in my collection/pile of stuff I have a copy of the launch engineering crews guide for the Saturn V's redlines for countdown/launch.



AS-503 being Apollo 8.

When I was looking out for this stuff a fair few years back only 11 was the really collectable mission, everything else was very, often dirt cheap. Now 11 was fantastic, but missions like 8, Gemini 6/7, Apollo 1 interested me more because of how like you say they lead to that point of landing. It would have been awful of for some reason they never landed on the moon, but Apollo 8 would have been still one helluva triumph.

Itssoeasy

Wibbs once again you provide the colour and nuggets of info to what seem like my constant tribute or anniversary threads. Which I like doing and hopefully I do them justice. Was Gemini 6 the one that didn't lift off ? I know Tom Stafford was one of the astronauts on that mission and Jim Lovell was in orbit waiting for Gemini 6 in orbit to rendezvous with.

Yeah but as you say Apollo 11 is the one most people know and remember, but like I said without 8 happening then 10 and then 11 wouldn't have happened when they did or not at all and we could be talking about Pete Conrad being the first man to walk on the moon.

I mean Apollo 8 was the first manned launch of the Saturn V, and the previous two unmanned launches(Apollo 4 and 6) were perfect and less than perfect respectively. The problems with Apollo 6 hadn't been tested in flight prior to today fifty years ago.

Beeker

Itssoeasy wrote: »

Was Gemini 6 the one that didn't lift off ? I know Tom Stafford was one of the astronauts on that mission and Jim Lovell was in orbit waiting for Gemini 6 in orbit to rendezvous with.

Gemini 6 indeed with Wally Schirra and Stafford on board. Schirra had balls of steel that day not to initiate a pad abort. That decision allowed Gemini 6 to launch three days later. The abort would have activated the two ejection seats on board and probably would have resulted in serious injury or even death for one or both of the crew. Ejection at the pad level would leave you very little height to open a parachute.

Itssoeasy

Beeker wrote: »

Gemini 6 indeed with Wally Schirra and Stafford on board. Schirra had balls of steel that day not to initiate a pad abort. That decision allowed Gemini 6 to launch three days later. The abort would have activated the two ejection seats on board and probably would have resulted in serious injury or even death for one or both of the crew. Ejection at the pad level would leave you very little height to open a parachute.

Wally schirra! I for whatever reason can never remember him as being on that mission. I've no idea why. Yeah didn't the spacecraft indicate they had lifted off but schirra didn't feel them lifting off so did nothing. You can't learn that feeling in a classroom.

Itssoeasy

The only things I can remember Wally Schirra was him proving that Gus Grissom didn't make the hatch blow on his mercury capsule and losing the spacecraft, and his spirited "discussion" with Deke Slayton during the Apollo 7 mission due to not wanting to keep their helmets on during reentry due to having a cold.

Itssoeasy

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=htmd4BrNJ5k

Aborted launch as mentioned above of Gemini 6A.

Wibbs

Oddly enough in the Master Countdown I have for 6/7 it's named 6B not A.

Itssoeasy

Wibbs wrote: »

Oddly enough in the Master Countdown I have for 6/7 it's named 6B not A.

Wibbs in the name of jaysus how do you get you hands on this stuff ? The mission was originally to dock with the atlas agena which exploded before it got to orbit, so the Gemini 6A was the mission to dock with Gemini 7 but that failed, so it's likely the mission that launched was 6B but i've never heard it called that.

Flyer29

Apollo 8 was always one of my favorite missions. It was a complete case of men doing something that had never been done before, flying to the moon in a relatively untested machine.

The mission objective was changed relatively close to launch too if I remember rightly. It still saddens me that Lovell never got to land on the moon. I can’t imagine it’s been easy for him coming to terms with that over the years

ps200306

Interesting to see that Apollo 8 is the only Apollo mission from which all three crew members are still alive. That's despite Borman and Lovell being the second and third oldest of all the Apollo astronauts, after Alan Shepard who's dead twenty years this year.

greedygoblin

Here's an interview with Borman & Anders on their memories of the mission.

Itssoeasy

Flyer29 wrote: »

Apollo 8 was always one of my favorite missions. It was a complete case of men doing something that had never been done before, flying to the moon in a relatively untested machine.

The mission objective was changed relatively close to launch too if I remember rightly. It still saddens me that Lovell never got to land on the moon. I can’t imagine it’s been easy for him coming to terms with that over the years

Yeah Apollo 8 was meant to be what Apollo 9 was eventually which was to test both the CM and LM in earth orbit and put the whole spacecraft through a thorough outing. but in the summer of 1968 the LM was behind schedule so they swapped missions and crews. It was a ballsy move as you say to send a spacecraft that had only been flown on one manned mission previous to Apollo 8 and send it roughly 250,000 miles away from earth was a bold move.

Also, the other issue that was a worry was the engine on the S-IVB which was a crucial part of any of the moon landing missions. It restarted once in earth orbit and was crucial to TLI happening. The issue was it failed to restart on Apollo 6.

Edit: well now to be absolutely fair the engine on the S-IVB didn't re ignite the second time possibly because well it along with the entire Saturn V rocket had had its fillings rattled due to pogo oscillations during launch. And the two engines of the second stage being damaged by the vibrations caused one engine to fail due to the fuel line breaking which the computer detected and went to shut down engine 2 but the wiring had been crossed between engines 2 ans 3, so engine 3 which had no issue shut down also.

Beeker

Ye might like this

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fIuSq5nAUSQ