Author
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Topic: Apollo 17 crew selection and rotation
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Tom Member Posts: 1683 From: New York Registered: Nov 2000
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posted 01-19-2023 05:17 PM
When Cernan declined the offer as Apollo 13 back up LMP, was there any reason why it wasn't offered to Bill Anders (who also trained as an LMP)? That would have gotten him to the surface on Apollo 16. |
ashot Member Posts: 66 From: Registered: Mar 2010
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posted 01-20-2023 05:44 AM
For the sake of precision and accuracy: Anders was a backup Apollo 11 CMP. As far as I know, it is not exactly known whether there was an actual offer (by Slayton) for Anders to be a CMP of next prime crew to be announced (which eventually turned out to be Apollo 13 after 14 and 13 crews swap). (Anders could, as well, come to this conclusion by himself; rotation rules were known and evident to anyone in the astronaut corps.) It is also known that, realizing that Anders leaves in August 1969, Slayton initiated Mattingly's training as a parallel backup CMP — in case Apollo 11 slipped into August or later. As I see it, it seems logical to assume that everything (including Anders' future plans) was already decided by the moment Mattingly joined the Apollo 11 team. What Cernan rejected was the offer to become a LMP of the Apollo 13 backup crew (the prime crew was then headed by Shepard). That's not the same crew Anders could have ended up on had he stayed. |
mecca Member Posts: 28 From: Pittsburgh Registered: Jan 2023
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posted 01-27-2023 09:03 PM
quote: Originally posted by ashot: Collins takes 14 backup command...
If Michael Collins had accepted the offer to be backup commander of Apollo 14, does anybody have any idea of who his CMP and LMP would be? |
Tom Member Posts: 1683 From: New York Registered: Nov 2000
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posted 01-27-2023 09:13 PM
Most likely Evans as CMP and Engle as LMP. |
ashot Member Posts: 66 From: Registered: Mar 2010
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posted 01-28-2023 05:06 AM
quote: Originally posted by Delta7: Collins does not have surgery in 1968...
It's a pure guess, of course, but I think if Collins does not have his surgery in the summer of 1968, his problem is going to be anyway discovered (sooner or later). So he very likely gets removed from 8. If this happens late enough, this may even cost him his seat in 11 (as he may not be fully recovered by early January 1969). If so, then it's probably reasonable to expect, that 11 is then Armstrong, Aldrin and Haise (or Anders? I would still think of Haise, as by then he was considered to be one of the better LM guys) with the backup crew, likely, as Lovell-Anders-Irwin (or Duke). The future of Collins would then really depend on when exactly he is back to flight status. Maybe, the next opening for him is Scott's (or Shepard's, or he replaces Anders in Lovell's) crew... |
Blackarrow Member Posts: 3551 From: Belfast, United Kingdom Registered: Feb 2002
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posted 01-30-2023 09:47 AM
I can understand Mike Collins' declining the offer to go back in the flight rotation after Apollo 11. He had already flown one of the most spectacular Gemini flights, complete with EVAs, and was (at the time of Deke Slayton's proposal) about to participate in the most important mission in NASA's history, as second-in-command of that mission. To paraphrase his response, how could he top Apollo 11? It was a very worthy and appropriate final mission. I suspect he might still have said no if he had been offered a straight jump to prime crew commander of a later mission, basically for the same reasons. After Apollo 11, it was entirely reasonable and understandable for him to say, in effect, "my work here is done." His place in history was, is, and will remain secure (although I don't think he was the kind of man to worry too much about his place in history). As for Gene Cernan, he has written that if he had known Deke would offer Mike Collins the Apollo 14 back-up command, he might not have turned down the chance to walk on the Moon with John Young on Apollo 16. But, to the benefit of Charlie Duke and ultimately Cernan himself, he didn't know....and the rest is history. |
ashot Member Posts: 66 From: Registered: Mar 2010
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posted 02-02-2023 05:04 AM
Slayton seemed to think that the actual landing was THE highest prize. And while some (like Borman, McDivitt, and Collins) decided they had enough of it, there still were others who would accept that offer eagerly (and, as we know, there were even those who wanted to fly ANY mission after their Apollo flights, even a less ambitious one.) As to Collins, if I recall correctly, he wrote something like "the more I looked at the Moon getting smaller and smaller, the more I had no willingness to return to it again" in his book. I wonder whether he would want to fly another mission had he flown on Apollo 8. |
carmelo Member Posts: 1102 From: Messina, Sicilia, Italia Registered: Jun 2004
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posted 02-02-2023 12:43 PM
If Apollo 18 hadn't been cancelled, presumably Harrison Schmitt would have flown on that mission with Dick Gordon and Vance Brand, and Joe Engle on 17.But considering the month of December 1972 for Apollo 17, when would be launched Apollo 18? In April 1973? |
Tom Member Posts: 1683 From: New York Registered: Nov 2000
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posted 02-02-2023 03:31 PM
I believe "18" would have flown sometime in '74 after the Skylab missions. |
carmelo Member Posts: 1102 From: Messina, Sicilia, Italia Registered: Jun 2004
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posted 02-02-2023 04:32 PM
This is surprising! |
Skylon Member Posts: 318 From: Registered: Sep 2010
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posted 02-03-2023 07:18 AM
It is, but it is pretty rational when broken down. - Since the number of Saturn rockets were finite, saving two landings provided launch vehicle in case the backup Skylab workshop would be needed.
- The scientific community was having a hard time processing all the data from the lunar landings and making modifications to experiments for subsequent flights. So, giving a break between Apollo 17 and 18 would allow them some breathing room to do just that.
- It provided a reason for retaining the Apollo workforce longer.
The risk was that it made the last two landings an easy target for cancellation — which is exactly what happened. |
carmelo Member Posts: 1102 From: Messina, Sicilia, Italia Registered: Jun 2004
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posted 02-03-2023 08:22 AM
So Apollo 18 (and possibly Apollo 19) would be launched in 1974, AFTER Skylab missions! But 1974 was not a year of heavy solar activity, or I remember wrong? |
Headshot Member Posts: 1180 From: Vancouver, WA, USA Registered: Feb 2012
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posted 02-03-2023 11:00 AM
Skylon is right on with the reasons listed for potentially delaying the last two lunar landing missions. This gap was being considered seriously enough for AW&ST to publish an interesting Manned Spaceflight Master Schedule on page 65 of the 9 March 1970 issue.Another possibility shown was labelled "Under Review" in the Master Schedule, was to launch the backup Skylab Workshop in the fourth quarter of 1974, with several manned (Saturn Ib) missions following. This, of course would have used the Saturn V allotted for Apollo 19. Thus, Apollo 18 would have been the only manned lunar mission to be launch after the Skylab "hiatus." These possibilities, along with flying all the lunar missions sequentially and then flying the Sklab missions later than originally planned, were being debated in the spring/summer of 1970. It all became moot when NASA decided to cancel the H-4 (Apollo 15) and J-4 (Apollo 19) missions on 2 Sept 1970, renumber them, and fly the lunar landing missions and Skylab missions as we followed them. |
MartinAir Member Posts: 261 From: Registered: Oct 2020
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posted 02-03-2023 12:37 PM
According to the NASA long range plan from July 1969 to 2000, Apollo 18 was slated for 1974 and Apollo 19 for 1976. |
Headshot Member Posts: 1180 From: Vancouver, WA, USA Registered: Feb 2012
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posted 02-03-2023 02:05 PM
The Master Schedule to which I referred had Apollo 18 set for late Jan/early Feb 1974 and Apollo 19 for what appears to be early July 1974. The J-2 (Apollo 17) mission was marked for a March 1972 launch. It is a little difficult to determine as the arrows on the chart are fat and fuzzy.Of course all these plans were tossed out the window after Apollo 13's failure to land, which occurred only three months after Apollo 20 was cancelled. All launch dates were subject to change caused by the choice of the target landing site(s). Due to Apollo's limited operational envelop, some sites were only "available" for a few months out of the year. The machinations behind the final choice of Taurus-Littrow for the J-3 Apollo 17 mission is well documented in Wilhelms' To a Rocky Moon in the section title "The Best Remaining Site." Cernan and company certainly lucked out by getting what I believe to be the second best of all the Apollo landing sites. (Hadley-Apennine being the winner.) |
carmelo Member Posts: 1102 From: Messina, Sicilia, Italia Registered: Jun 2004
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posted 02-04-2023 06:53 AM
According by the book "US Spacesuits", Apollo 18 and 19 could have the new Litton AES spacesuits for lunar EVAs.The suits were too much bulky for launch/entry, so would be used only for EVAs, and launch/entry would been performed with the tobacco flight suits used for Skylab and a oxygen helmet (maybe the ancestor of clay shell helmet of Space Shuttle). Is not clear to me as to how would be performed the trans-earth EVA. CMP would have the A7Lb suit, but commander and LMP could not wear AES because too much bulky, and the whole capsule had to be depressurized. Maybe on 18 and 19 trans-earth EVA was not expected. |