Word: intrepid
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Dates: during 1960-1969
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FOUR months after the historic flight of Apollo 11, much of the mystery and tension that accompanied man's first landing on the moon seemed to be missing. But as Apollo 12's lunar module Intrepid swooped down toward the lunar surface last week, Charles ("Pete") Conrad's words conveyed the real excitement and significance of the second moon-landing mission: the newfound precision that enables the U.S. to pick a destination on the moon's rugged surface and reach it as reliably as a taxicab finds a street address in Manhattan. Directly ahead of Intrepid...
...Pete. Stay in there. Eighteen ft., coming down. He's got it made. Come on in there. Contact lights!" Although thick dust kicked up by the LM's rocket engine obscured his view during the last 30 to 40 ft. of the descent, Conrad coolly landed Intrepid a scant 20 ft. from the edge...
...fascinated geologists with their descriptions of small, strange-looking mounds. "Don't take this the wrong way," Bean cautioned, "but they look like small volcanoes-only they're just about 4 ft. high." After four hours of exploring, during which they strayed about 800 ft. from Intrepid, the astronauts were ordered back to the lunar module for the day. As he helped haul the rock samples aboard, a weary Conrad said: "Not going to have any trouble sleeping tonight...
Twelve hours later, the astronauts again suited up, left Intrepid and headed back to check the ALSEP experiments. As Conrad approached the ion detector, the instrument sensed his presence and reported it to earth. "Can the guy with the seismometer hear me running?" Conrad asked. Responded Houston: "Looks as though you're really thundering by it." Conrad also tested the seismometer by tossing a rock-he called it an "extra grapefruit-size goody"-into a small crater. The instrument promptly signaled to Houston that it had detected the lunar version of the rolling stones...
Bean will lug Apollo 12's Lunar Surface Experiments Package (ALSEP) to a site up to 1,000 ft. from Intrepid. There the two astronauts will spend an hour setting up five elaborate devices that will test the moon's tenuous atmosphere, measure magnetic fields and also study particles from...