Word: gumdrop
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During his space walk on the fourth day of the Apollo 9 mission, Astronaut Russell Schweickart shot photos of Astronaut David Scott, who was standing in an open hatch of the command module (Gumdrop). Scott, at the same time, was taking pictures of Schweickart standing on the platform of the docked lunar module (Spider). Inside Gumdrop, Astronaut James McDivitt was busy photographing Schweickart. "Now we're all taking pictures of everybody taking pictures," Schweickart commented. The photographic frenzy continued unabated for the remainder of the mission. Thus last week the world was treated to pictures as varied and excellent...
Using 70-mm. Hasselblad still cameras, 16-mm. Maurer movie cameras and roll after roll of color and black-and-white film the Apollo astronauts literally photographed everything within sight: Gumdrop, Spider, the third-stage S-4B rocket, themselves, and the curved expanse of earth below. During the somewhat more relaxed final half of their mission, they also tried out a variety of filters and specialized film to shoot infrared, green-light and other pictures that should teach scientists more about the earth and its resources...
...discarded third-stage S-4B rocket while it orbited near by and recorded the sudden and startling spurt of flame as its engine was fired to shove it out of the way and into a permanent orbit around the sun. In a sequence showing Spider undocking from Gumdrop, Spider moved slowly away and then began a smooth and graceful demonstration of its maneuverability...
...worldwide TV audience had a close-up view of the astronauts when they splashed down and as they emerged from the bobbing spaceship they call Gumdrop. As the Guadalcanal moved to within 100 yards of the spacecraft, TV cameras on the deck zoomed in to show Astronauts David Scott, Russell Schweickart and James McDivitt tumbling into inflated rubber rafts-a surprisingly awkward operation after the precise maneuvers and sophisticated procedure of the space flight...
While they were awake, however, the astronauts made good use of their time to gain experience in navigation and tracking-skills that will be vital for landing Spider on the moon and returning to a lunar-orbit rendezvous with Gumdrop. In addition to plotting their position by star sightings, they became the first spacemen to use the planet Jupiter for a navigational reference. The astronauts also twice sighted and tracked Pegasus, a giant satellite orbited in 1965 to record meteor hits. Pointing their scanning telescope toward earth, they obtained fixes on islands, capes and other landmarks to establish Apollo...