Word: apollo
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Dates: during 1960-1969
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Other, less perilous problems could turn Apollo 8 from a space spectacular into a humdrum engineering flight. Allowing for such contingencies as the failure of a backup system, an inadvertent early cutoff of the S-4B rocket while it is blasting Apollo toward the moon or unusually intense radiation from the sun, NASA has devised a number of alternative flight plans. Thus, Apollo 8 might merely remain in earth orbit, duplicating Apollo 7's eleven-day flight. It could also loop out as far as 25,000 miles from the earth and then descend into a low earth orbit...
Although they freely acknowledge the numerous possibilities of failure, NASA officials nonetheless exude confidence in Apollo 8 and its crew. They expect the mission to go all the way. In the thorough investigation that preceded the decision to send the spacecraft into lunar orbit, says Manned Space Flight ""Director George Mueller, "we found no incipient problems. The odds for complete success of Apollo 8 are as good as they were for Apollo...
...their most inspired moments, visionary authors of the past never imagined a mission so complex. Still, they dreamed endlessly of Apollo-like moon flights. Then, as now, some men yearned for a military base from which terrible new weapons could dominate earth. Some speculated on vast new reserves of mineral wealth. Others yearned for, no more than the challenge of the trip. For whatever reason, the moon, as it still does, beckoned to all. Its lure seems irresistible...
Nursery rhymes, too, began to reflect man's growing lunar interest. One, printed in 1805, even closely anticipated Apollo 8's timetable...
...mission to the moon, Apollo 8 will carry a three-man crew that is unusually well qualified, both by experience and temperament, for the pioneering flight: they are Veterans Frank Borman and James Lovell, both 40, and Rookie William Anders...