Word: nasa
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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...that Donald K. ("Deke") Slayton would never forget. On March 15, 1962, only two months before the taciturn astronaut was scheduled to become the second American to orbit the earth, NASA doctors abruptly grounded him. Reason: they had discovered an occasional irregularity in the rhythm of his heartbeat. The bitterly disappointed Slayton subsequently became chief of flight-crew operations at the Manned Spacecraft Center and played a key role in picking all future space crews, including the first men to land on the moon. But even as he sent other astronauts to the launch pad, he never stopped dreaming...
Last week, in a classic comeback story, Slayton got his wish. NASA named him to the crew of the Apollo spacecraft that will rendezvous and dock with a Russian Soyuz spaceship in 1975. His crewmates will be Air Force Brigadier General Thomas Stafford, a veteran of one Apollo and two Gemini flights, and Civilian Astronaut Vance Brand, another space rookie. Though obviously elated, the crewcut, 48-year-old Slayton-who will be the oldest American to go into space by the time of the launch -greeted the news in his characteristic gritty style: "I'd rather...
With each mission to the moon, U.S. astronauts have become increasingly skilled as photographers. Apollo 17 proved to be no exception to the rule. Last week, as NASA began releasing pictures shot by the Apollo 17 crew, it be came clear that the last lunar mission had produced the best photography of the entire Apollo program: more brilliant in color, sharper in detail and more imaginative in overall composition...
Gamble. The excellence of the Apollo 17 photographs is also due in part to the quality of the film used by the astronauts. On previous missions, NASA'S photographic advisers opted for a fairly sensitive film similar to Ekta-chrome-EF; because lunar lighting conditions were uncertain, they wanted a fast emulsion. But for Apollo 17, the space agency decided to switch to another Kodak film that is somewhat slower (ASA rating of only 64 v. 160 for the earlier film), but has significantly less grain and better color reproduction. The gamble worked. The record 3,800 frames that...
...they feel about the decision to end the Apollo program and manned exploration of the moon? Cernan was outspoken, calling it "an abnormal restraint of man's intellect at this point in time." Next day, however, Richard Nixon had some reassuring words for the astronauts and NASA: "The making of space history will continue, and this nation means to play a major role in its making...The more we look back the more we are reminded that our thrust has been forward and that our place is among the heavens where our dreams precede us, and where, in time...