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Author
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Topic: Photo gallery: Apollo 17 crew walkout
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mark plas
Member Posts: 385
From: the Netherlands
Registered: Aug 2000
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posted 12-27-2009 05:17 AM
   
I found some new pictures of the Apollo 17 walkout:
The Launch of Apollo 17: Last Trip to the Moon Apollo 17, the eleventh and last Apollo mission, was launched shortly after midnight on December 7, 1972. The crew consisted of Eugene Cernan, Ronald Evans, and Harrison Schmitt (the only scientist-astronaut to fly and Apollo mission.) This was the first and only time in the history of the Apollo program in which the families of the astronauts were present at "astronaut egress" - the point at which the astronauts came out with their spacesuits on to board the van that took them to the launch pad.I had the good fortune of witnessing the launch - the only night launch of Apollo - from the press area. I took slides (a roll of Kodachrome and a roll of Ektachrome) with my Minolta SRT-101. Below are scans of those nearly 37-year old slides. |
dom
Member Posts: 866
From:
Registered: Aug 2001
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posted 12-27-2009 06:00 AM
Mark, great pictures but the "Cernan Reaching Out to His Wife" image is a very poignant! |
mark plas
Member Posts: 385
From: the Netherlands
Registered: Aug 2000
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posted 12-27-2009 06:07 AM
Yeah, I know that is Jan Evans.
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dom
Member Posts: 866
From:
Registered: Aug 2001
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posted 12-27-2009 06:19 AM
It's still a great shot though.  |
garymilgrom
Member Posts: 1966
From: Atlanta, GA
Registered: Feb 2007
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posted 12-27-2009 08:48 AM
Great photos Mark, thanks for sharing. How did you get access to the walkout? |
mark plas
Member Posts: 385
From: the Netherlands
Registered: Aug 2000
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posted 12-27-2009 08:53 AM
Gary I wish I was the one that took these pictures But it was impossible because I was born in 1975. I found these on the web.
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J.L
Member Posts: 681
From: Bloomington, Illinois, USA
Registered: May 2005
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posted 12-27-2009 10:23 AM
This was the first and only time in the history of the Apollo program in which the families of the astronauts were present at "astronaut egress" Regarding family members at the walkout, don't forget Al Worden's father was present for the Apollo 15 crew walkout.Great shots... and thanks again for posting. It is always refreshing to see quality non-NASA views of these events. Nice camera as well. I also had a Minolta SRT-101 back in 1972. It was used, but as a 14-year old it allowed me to take some pretty nice photos back then. |
KSCartist
Member Posts: 2913
From: Titusville, FL USA
Registered: Feb 2005
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posted 12-27-2009 11:07 AM
Those pictures were great. They brought back memories of my Dad and I being invited to watch the launch from the VIP site.I only had a simple Kodak camera but a couple of those photos look like the ones I shot. (Not of the walkout though). |
randy
Member Posts: 2231
From: West Jordan, Utah USA
Registered: Dec 1999
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posted 12-27-2009 03:37 PM
Great photos! |
Blackarrow
Member Posts: 3160
From: Belfast, United Kingdom
Registered: Feb 2002
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posted 12-27-2009 08:34 PM
Very evocative pictures, but it is obvious that the brightness of the Saturn V engine exhaust overwhelmed the film. Does something similar happen to digital pictures of a shuttle night-launch? |
Ben
Member Posts: 1896
From: Cape Canaveral, FL
Registered: May 2000
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posted 12-27-2009 08:46 PM
Yes. A night launch can easily be over exposed (on purpose or by accident) leading to a ball of fire appearance, however there is no way to adequately tell based on the scans from that website what the original image may have looked like. |
al309
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posted 12-29-2009 08:53 PM
Thanks to all on this thread for the kind comments (and corrections!) on my photos. It's really gratifying to have people talking about these 37 year-old pictures.I'm the guy who took them and I thought I'd fill you in on a bit of the backstory. In December 1972 I was a junior researcher in science and technology policy at Syracuse University Research Corporation. A good friend with connections to NASA invited me to accompany him to the Apollo 17 launch. He had a VIP pass and I was able to get press credentials by offering to write a personal account of my experience for our local paper, the Syracuse Post-Standard. I wrote the article on the flight home. The Post-Standard apparently didn't care for it, since they cut it to pieces and published it a couple of days later on the comics page. I subsequently re-wrote it and submitted it to Technology Review, which published it with minimal editing and paid me an author's fee that pretty much covered the trip. Assuming I can find a copy of that article, I'll scan it an put it up on the web where you can see it. I'll let you know when I do that and I'll also post some information on the photographs, which I scanned last summer hoping people would find them interesting. Ah, if I'd only had the Nikon D300 that I have today! |
ilbasso
Member Posts: 1522
From: Greensboro, NC USA
Registered: Feb 2006
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posted 12-29-2009 09:14 PM
Thanks for posting these wonderful photos!Could I trouble you to email me a higher-resolution photo of the Launch Complex 34 control panels? Was that photo in fact taken in 1972? |
al309
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posted 12-29-2009 09:35 PM
Yes, it was taken in 1972, as were all the others in that gallery. Just sent it. |
spaceheaded
Member Posts: 148
From: MD
Registered: Feb 2003
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posted 01-01-2010 08:53 AM
Al, I enjoyed your pictures. (And, Mark, thanks for the post.) Really took me back to that great night in '72. I, too, took pictures of that launch with a Minolta SRT-101 (borrowed from my older brother), but the closest I could get was Titusville. Funny, my brother gave me that old camera just last week for Christmas, knowing of its sentimental value for me. |
aeromed15&17
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posted 01-01-2010 04:46 PM
I may be stating the obvious, but note that the guy following the crew out of the building and into the van is Al Shepard. |
al309
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posted 01-02-2010 12:35 PM
Yes, it was Alan Shepard. I had a chance to meet him briefly at the Time-Life prelaunch luau. |
KSCartist
Member Posts: 2913
From: Titusville, FL USA
Registered: Feb 2005
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posted 01-02-2010 01:16 PM
I believe at the time Al Shepard was the Chief Astronaut. The tradition continues to this day of the Chief of the office escorting the crew out of the O&C. In fact Peggy Whitson was at Baikanor for the TMA-17 launch. |
al309
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posted 01-02-2010 01:22 PM
I've added a scan of my Technology Review article (mentioned in a previous post) to my photo gallery. I've also scanned my press pass (which you can see me wearing in one of the photos) and added it to the gallery. |
mark plas
Member Posts: 385
From: the Netherlands
Registered: Aug 2000
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posted 01-02-2010 02:17 PM
Al, thank you for posting the article especially the part where you got to meet the Chaffees at Pad 34 was very touching.
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aeromed15&17
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posted 01-02-2010 04:51 PM
Al - You are right about the sensations of being there for a launch. I had a VIP pass for Apollo 11. Asked Bob Dole, my Senator at the time, for one and he told me I could have his, he wasn't going to the launch. The sound was indescribable, you felt it more than heard it. It had the same sound as an old KC-135A "water wagon" with J57's on takeoff, the same stacato roar, but intensified like 100 of them doing it in formation. I was working in MCC the night of the launch of 17. Ended up working 16 hours straight, because the doc on the prime shift's wife went into labor and he asked me to take his shift in the Life Sciences SSR. I still have my MCC badge from the mission. If there was a place on this website I would post a scan of it. |
MCroft04
Member Posts: 1647
From: Smithfield, Me, USA
Registered: Mar 2005
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posted 01-02-2010 09:03 PM
quote:
Originally posted by aeromed15&17:
I was working in MCC the night of the launch of 17.
Geeze, someone who was there! I'd love to hear more of your experiences and stories. |
aeromed15&17
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posted 01-03-2010 04:51 PM
I was extremely fortunate to be able to work in MCC during Apollos 15 and 17. I was a medical student, and really wanted to do something at MSC after I went to the launch of 11. I knew I was going to have a break in the summer of 1971, so I called MSC and found out they had a summer program that I could participate in. A couple of weeks after I got to MSC someone suggested I go over to sit in on the sims for Apollo 15 because none of the docs wanted to go. For the 6 weeks before that mission I was sitting at the SURGEON console in the MOCR for every sim. And having done that, since they were short of docs anyway they assigned me on the night shift in the SSR position to back up the SURGEON during the mission. (The crews kept pretty much Houston hours). After that, knowing that 17 was going to be the last one, I figured out how to actually get credit for an Aerospace Medicine elective and go back for that one. Same deal, got to sit in the MOCR for all of the sims beginning 6 weeks or so before, then in the SSR during the mission. Sitting in on the sims (beginning with 15) I would take notes all day then go home and read my AOH's and other pubs to figure out what was going on operationally. And since I was sitting next to CAPCOM, during the breaks I would ask him questions and they were really helpful in explaining things. Regarding 17 specifically, I have a very vivid memory of Ken Mattingly describing how to use the toilet in 0 G. And of Ed Fendell, the INCO who ran the camera on the rover after the crew aimed the high gain antenna at each stop, cracking jokes and singing off key. He was sitting in the next row up behind me. I also remember the simulation people threw in a problem one day, that was the only time FLIGHT (Gene Kranz) actually gave me something to do besides take notes. The sim folks created a solar flare scenario. FLIGHT asked me what the danger was to the crew. I got all the info I could, and like any good flight controller, had a list of phone numbers ready just in case. Took about 10 to 15 minutes of calling around and getting advice, but I was able to tell FLIGHT that it shouldn't be any worse than a couple of chest xrays for the crew. All in all, it was a wonderful experience being there for those two missions. Especially being a student and to be given the access I had was a remarkable stroke of fortune. Apollo was far and away something special that has not been repeated at NASA. From my point of view, even with the ISS, they are not doing anything now that Gagarin and Glenn hadn't already done. Although I have followed the space program since then over the years, I never had the interest after that to try to go back and work there as a doc. Instead I launched on a combined career as a pilot and ER physican, went to military flight training and have been flying as a captain for a major airline for many years, doing ER work on days off. |
Obviousman
Member Posts: 438
From: NSW, Australia
Registered: May 2005
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posted 01-03-2010 05:55 PM
An airline captain AND a doctor?Listen son - you have to go out and do something with your life; the world doesn't make allowances for underachievers. (very much tongue in cheek and in awe!) |
aeromed15&17
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posted 01-04-2010 04:48 PM
Not that dificult or unusual to combine flying career with a medical career. I have known about a dozen other airline pilot physicians. And a few astronauts have come from the military with a "dual designator" background, (Navy term and mostly Navy people). Joe Kerwin who flew on Skylab was the first. Sonny Carter and Dave Brown, both of whom are dead (Sonny in a commuter airline crash, Dave in the Columbia breakup) were Navy flight surgeon/ naval aviators. The USAF has a similar program. In fact we have an organization, the International Association of Military Flight Surgeon Pilots, which to be a full member you have to have served as both a military pilot and as a military flight surgeon (I'm a charter member - Google "IAMFSP"). |
Obviousman
Member Posts: 438
From: NSW, Australia
Registered: May 2005
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posted 01-05-2010 04:02 AM
I have enough on my plate meeting the mental demands of a single stream military career! |
BA002
Member Posts: 177
From: Utrecht,NL
Registered: Feb 2007
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posted 07-04-2010 02:43 AM
Al, I was watching some Apollo 17 footage yesterday and remembered seeing your pictures earlier this year, so I wanted to go over them again and this time I also read your article.Boy, how I wish I could have been there, but as a 7 year old living in Holland my options were rather limited... But your pictures and your wonderful and well written article do give a taste of what it must have been like. Thanks for sharing! |
gleopold
Member Posts: 31
From: Reston, VA, USA
Registered: Jun 2010
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posted 07-07-2010 07:37 PM
Regarding press access to astro walkouts: KSC screens equipment and piles you on a bus to the crew quarters where photographers (with ladders) and reporters jockey for position near the back of the astro van. The more launch scrubs, the easy it is to get a good position from which to shoot photos. These photos are from a prime spot. Thanks for posting them. |
alanh_7
Member Posts: 1252
From: Ajax, Ontario, Canada
Registered: Apr 2008
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posted 07-07-2010 09:11 PM
Does anyone know who the suit tech is standing next to Al Shepard in the photo that shows Ron Evans hugging his wife with JacK Schmitt behind him? It looks like Suit Tech/Artist Ron Woods (less his mustache). |
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