Word: nasa
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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...always been a source of great annoyance to scientists: though the Apollo program is one of the milestones in the history of scientific exploration, they have been precluded from participating directly in it. Now, confident of the Apollo landing techniques perfected by the military pilots on previous missions, NASA has chosen a handsome 37-year-old geologist named Harrison ("Jack") Schmitt to be copilot of Apollo 17. If all goes well, Schmitt next week will take a historic step: he will become the first scientist from earth to walk on another world...
...armed with a new doctorate in geology from Harvard, Schmitt joined the U.S. Geological Survey at Flagstaff, Ariz. There he was assigned the job of assembling photographs taken by unmanned Ranger spacecraft into detailed lunar maps for future moon walkers. Schmitt was fascinated by the task. Recalls former NASA Geologist Gene Shoemaker: "Jack caught the space bug." Indeed, as soon as NASA began recruiting scientist-astronauts in 1965, Schmitt applied. He was accepted despite a minor physical problem: an unusual and painful elongation of the large intestine...
...decision by NASA doctors proved sound. Throughout his rigorous preparation, the geologist-astronaut has maintained superb health and excelled as a trainee. He ranked second in his class of 50 at Air Force flight school, and has spent countless hours on field trips everywhere from Iceland to Hawaii teaching fellow astronauts how to spot and select geologically significant rocks. He worked closely with NASA scientists in devising scoops, shovels and other tools for the moon. Says NASA Flight Director Gene Kranz: "If anyone deserves a flight, it is Jack Schmitt...
Commander Ronald Evans, 39, Apollo 17's third crew member, is also a Navy flyer. In fact, he and Cernan were studying together at the Navy's Postgraduate School in Monterey, Calif., in 1963 when Cernan learned that he had been accepted by NASA and Evans was told that he had been turned down (he made it three years later). "That night," Evans recalls, "Gene and I went out and got totally sloshed." Born in the Kansas wheat-belt town of St. Francis, where his father worked for a wheat-silage company, Evans was an Eagle Scout...
...will finally have the services of a professional geologist on the moon. The Taurus-Littrow landing site contains what may be small, volcanically created cinder cones; they seem to be miniature versions of earthly features like Honolulu's Diamond Head. The cones may well be remnants of what NASA Geochemist Robin Brett calls "some of the last belches of lunar activity before the moon turned off." Finally, Apollo 17 planners have scheduled a program of experiments and observation far more sophisticated than any of the earlier scientific efforts on the moon...