Word: lander
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...could hardly describe what he saw. "It certainly is a stark place here at Fra Mauro," he said. Then, as his image flickered onto millions of TV screens back on earth, the 47-year-old Navy captain took the last two steps down the ladder of Antares, the lunar lander. Finally his heavy boots scuffed the soft, grayish-brown dust of the moon's ancient highlands. "It's been a long way," said Shepard, the first and oldest American ever to journey into space. "But we're here...
...quite. After Shepard and Mitchell made the usual in-flight inspection of the lunar lander, an unexpected voltage drop was discovered in one of the two batteries of Antares' ascent stage, which would take the astronauts off the moon. The reading was only three-tenths of a volt lower than normal; yet mission controllers felt that it might be a sign of more serious trouble-a leakage in the LM's critical electrical circuitry, for example. That too could have barred a moon landing. Happily, a subsequent check by Mitchell, who holds a doctorate in astronautics from M.I.T...
...unsuccessful attempts were made to link up the command ship and the lunar lander. Unless this can be accomplished, the landing will not be possible...
...important details from the two previous successful manned lunar expeditions. For one thing, the command ship Kitty Hawk will descend to within 11.5 miles of the moon's surface before releasing the lunar module. Cutting down on the customary 67-mile altitude will conserve some of the lander's limited fuel reserves for the riskier touchdown on the rugged terrain...
...command seat. His ear now seems in excellent shape. "I still have a muted ringing in it, like a dog whistle," he says, "but I hardly notice it." He has also apparently mastered, in spite of initial difficulties, the split-second control techniques of the tricky lunar lander. Indeed, his confidence should help bolster all of NASA at a critical moment in its history. "I suppose," muses Shepard, "if we don't make it back to earth, somebody will say the poor son of a bitch wasn't ready. But I am ready...