Word: earthness
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Dates: during 1960-1969
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...minutes and 50 seconds away from time of loss of signal," Commentator John McLeaish reported, as Apollo began to curve around the back side of the moon, where its radio communication with earth would be blocked. "Here in mission control we're standing by with certainly a great deal of anxiety at this moment...
Then, after a terse "Roger" from Borman, all was silent. Apollo would be behind the moon and out of contact for 45 minutes. Until it emerged, no one on earth would know if the SPS engine had fired on schedule (25 minutes after LOS) or fired long enough to place the craft in orbit. Too short a burn, the controllers knew, could send Apollo smashing into the moon. But there was another problem that caused concern on the ground. Apollo's third-stage S-4B rocket, jettisoned shortly after it pushed the spacecraft out of earth orbit and toward...
...they briefly fired their SPS engine to change their orbit from a 70-by-194-mile-high ellipse to a near-perfect 70-mile circle. Using an assortment of cameras, they shot color and black-and-white movie and still pictures of the lunar landscape and of the distant earth. Firing their 100-lb.-thrust control jets, they continually changed the attitude of the spacecraft so that its four-dish, high-gain TV and radio antenna remained pointed directly at the earth...
Navigational data that the astronauts gathered will help NASA scientists plot Apollo's orbit more precisely than they could by tracking it from earth. Once the rises and dips in Apollo's orbital path have been identified, the scientists will be able to map their cause: variations in the lunar gravitational field believed to be caused by concentrations of massive material beneath some craters and seas. With better knowledge of the gravitational field, NASA will be able to plan more accurately the paths of future landing missions, on which errors of only a few feet could be dangerous...
...View from 207,000 Miles During the second of the two telecasts on their outward journey, the as tronauts managed to send back some spectacular views of the earth - from a distance of 207,000 miles. Jim Lovell acted as commentator of the show. "In the center," he explained, "is South America - all the way down to Cape Horn. I can see Baja California and the Southwestern part of the U.S. There is a big cloud bank going northeast of the U.S. It appears now that the East Coast is cloudy. I can see clouds over parts of Mexico...