Word: splashdowns
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...less than Neil Armstrong, he is the smalltown boy who rose to fame, the upright citizen, the doer somehow left a bit unsophisticated despite his success and prominence. Nixon could scarcely contain his exuberance as he waited on the flag bridge of the carrier Hornet for the Pacific splashdown. Waving his arms, he exclaimed: "Oh, boy! Oh, boy!" As the Apollo command module bobbed in the sea, Nixon shouted down to the flight deck to ask the Navy band to play Columbia, the Gem of the Ocean...
...accomplished without grave risks-from the initial launching atop a rocket brimful of explosive propellants, to the final splashdown in rolling seas. Perhaps most perilous of all were the maneuvers near and on the moon-if only because they had never before been attempted. As the mission reached its climactic moments and Eagle, the lunar module, was curving down to within a few miles of the moon, Eagle's computer reported: "Program alarm." Eagle's on-board computer was being asked to make too many calculations in the frenetic moments before touchdown. It had begun to balk...
...flight was smooth, so was the landing-except for a brief moment after splashdown, when Columbia was capsized by 6-ft. swells. But it was quickly righted by large flotation bags, or balloons, released from its submerged...
...their earthly ordeal seems slightly annoying and anticlimactic, the astronauts show no signs of regret. To them, the conquest of the moon was far more than a personal triumph. "We've come to the conclusion," said Aldrin on the night before splashdown, "that this has been far more than three men on a voyage to the moon. More even than the efforts of one nation. We feel that this as a symbol of the insatiable curiosity of all mankind to explore the unknown. Apollo 11 has surely pointed the way for an era of exploration that carry...
...their domestic propaganda, and there was no evidence that Russians felt the same chagrin that bothered the U.S. when Sputnik 1 led the way into space. Russian TV provided only limited and delayed coverage of Apollo's flight. But President Nikolai Podgorny wired President Nixon after the splashdown: "Please convey our congratulations and best wishes to the courageous space pilots." Peking, on the other hand, attempted to jam all five of the Voice of America broadcasts in Chinese...