Here we have a more “traditional” film regarding the flight of Apollo 7 – the typical official NASA Film covering the mission in concise detail, and what detail it is. The launch footage shown in this film is outstanding – an incredible close up of the Saturn IB booster as it lifts off of the […]
On October 22nd, 1968 the Apollo 7 command module carrying Wally Schirra, Donn Eisele, and Walter Cunningham safely splashed down in the Pacific Ocean, bringing an end to the first manned Apollo mission, and bringing confidence back to the nations space program, and our efforts to make it to the Moon before the end of […]
This is it. 50 years ago today on October 11th, 1968 the manned portion of the Apollo Program began with the launch of Apollo 7, a mission designed to test the newly redesigned Apollo Command / Service Module in Earth orbit with an actual crew for up to 2 weeks – the estimated length of […]
February 21st, 1967 was the original planned launch day for the Apollo 1 mission. Of course, we all know the fire on January 27th put a grinding halt on the Apollo program until the problems that caused the death of the crew could be isolated and solved An American wouldn’t fly in space again until […]
News spread rather quickly following the fire of Apollo 1. This was back when news really focused on telling the story, rather than on what ratings it will bring in – certainly a different time in media. In any case, many news reports, or snippets from such, are available online. Here are a few more […]
Ad Astra Per Aspera “A rough road leads to the stars” 6:31 PM Eastern Time, January 27th, 1967 This post was shared at 5:31 PM on January 27th, 2017, exactly 50 years to the instant from when the fire happened. It was originally set to share via social media, but didn’t for some reason.
This is a day I’ve been thinking about for many years now, as I rekindled my love of space flight and its history – The 50th anniversary of the Apollo 1 fire, and event which nearly killed the Apollo program, but at the same time caused such improvements to the spacecraft that it may have […]
January 27th, 2017 marks the 50th anniversary of the Apollo 1 fire, an event I’ve written about more than any other single event on this site. For the past 50 years, since the disaster, NASA has pretty much buried it. Unlike Challenger and Columbia, which occurred in 1986 and 2003 respectively, the 1967 deaths of […]
48 Years ago today, Apollo 7 launched on the first manned flight of the Apollo Program, and the first manned flight on a Saturn 1B rocket. This mission, a planned 2 week stay in orbit testing the Apollo Command / Service Module system with a crew, was the mission originally planned for Apollo 1. 18 […]
In 1975, the Apollo program ended. Spanning nearly 15 years, from the programs inception in 1961, the final moon landings in 1972, all the way to Apollo Soyuz in 1975, the Apollo program was, at current, the ultimate in exploration, setting distance records, mission duration records (for that time) on Skylab, and of course, it’s […]