Word: moons
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Dates: during 1960-1969
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When U.S. astronauts finally reach the surface of the moon, they will land in an ungainly-looking little craft that is officially named the Lunar Module (LM) but is becoming known as "the Spider." Scheduled to be tested in manned flight for the first time next week during the flight of Apollo 9, the Spider is the homely offspring of a concept of Aeronautical Engineer John Houbolt, an unsung hero of the U.S. space program. NASA officials now agree that without Houbolt's lonely campaign early in the 1960s, the U.S. would have been hard pressed to meet John...
Monster Rocket. Wernher von Braun, director of the NASA facilities at Huntsville, Ala., favored an earth-orbital-rendezvous technique; two or more rockets would be used separately to launch a spacecraft and fuel-carrying stages into earth orbit, where they would be assembled for a flight to the moon. Pasadena's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, which is most concerned with unmanned space shots, proposed that extra fuel and supplies be rocketed to the surface of the moon and then be brought together into a supply depot by a remotecontrolled tractor. The astronauts would land near...
...proposals presented nearly insuperable difficulties. For direct ascent from earth to moon, a giant, 12-million-lb.-thrust rocket would be needed-and there were strong doubts that such a monster could be designed, built and tested before the end of the decade. For Von Braun's earth-orbital scheme, a minimum of two expensive Saturn 5 launches would be needed. Both plans called for the expenditure of as much as 100,000 lbs. of fuel merely to settle a spacecraft from 80 ft. to 100 ft. tall gently on the lunar surface. The JPL idea, while permitting...
Asteroid Closeup. The Martian moon-naping mission, which is Singer's most startling concept, stems from his longtime fascination with Phobos and Deimos, the two tiny, natural satellites of Mars. If the moonlets turn out to have been passing asteroids captured by Martian gravity, Singer argues, they would present a unique opportunity for man to have a first closeup look at asteroids. Even more important, he says, they may have been created at the same time as Mars-but because of their small size they probably did not experience the violent chemical and physical changes that occur during...
Lunar Life. Much of Singer's spare time is now taken up with work on the theory that the moon was once an independent member of the solar system; that it passed too close to the earth and was captured by terrestrial gravity (TIME, Feb. 3, 1967). After the capture, he speculates, an atmosphere and oceans may have formed on the moon and lasted long enough to support the evolution of complex molecules that were forerunners of life. Singer is attempting to complete the theory while keeping one eye on the fast-moving Apollo moon program. "The idea...