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Author
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Topic: Limp American Flag
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Moonpaws
Member Posts: 685
From: Lee's summit, MO
Registered: Jan 2005
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posted February 05, 2005 12:01 AM
   
I was thumbing through Kipp teague's Apollo Archive and I was totally surprised to see photos of the Apollo 12 American flag flying limp in the lunar atmosphere. Has anyone else ever seen these? What happened to the supporting rod structure. Vince |
nasamad
Member Posts: 1821
From: Essex, UK
Registered: Jul 2001
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posted February 05, 2005 05:09 AM
As far as I can remember the latch which was supposed to hold the support rod out horizontally had broken. Pete Conrad can be seen holding the flag up in position in his "flag photo". Ironically Al Bean is the only lunar astronaut not to have a photo of himself on the moon with the flag. Hope this answers your question. Adam |
spaceuk
Member Posts: 2112
From: Staffs,UK
Registered: Aug 2002
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posted February 06, 2005 09:50 AM
The Apollo-12 flagstaff was in three pieces.The bottom section had a hard top on it where the crew would 'hammer' on it to get it pushed down into lunar surface.Once that was in the lunar ground, they then put on the second part - the upper rod.However,when they came to put on the third part - the horizontal arm that holds the flag out straight - it had broken at some stage and they could not get it to latch properly. So they did what they could to get it hang from the vertical rod. Alan Bean believed the flag arm latch had been broken since it was made.
Phill Parker
UK
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Duke Of URL
Member Posts: 1267
From: Syracuse, NY, USA
Registered: Jan 2005
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posted February 08, 2005 05:37 PM
AHA! It's a trick question! There is no lunar atmosphere!I'm still looking for that poster. |
BLACKARROW
unregistered
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posted February 08, 2005 09:17 PM
Several months ago I was talking to Jack Kinzler, the NASA engineer who designed (among other things) the Mercury escape rocket; the Apollo 11 commemorative plaque; the Skylab "parasol" which prevented the station overheating; and the Apollo lunar surface flag deployment system. Jack was a near neighbour and good friend of Pete Conrad. When the flagstaff mechanism on Apollo 12 didn't work, leaving the flag hanging limp, Jack pulled Pete Conrad's leg about it after the crew got home, saying he must have messed up the deployment. I think he probably accepts that the deployment mechanism got damaged somewhere along the line, but he clearly enjoyed pointing the finger at Conrad! | |
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