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Author Topic:   1969 Interview with S/A Phil Chapman
ColinBurgess
Member

Posts: 2031
From: Sydney, Australia
Registered: Sep 2003

posted 07-23-2018 07:09 PM     Click Here to See the Profile for ColinBurgess   Click Here to Email ColinBurgess     Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote
Here's a fascinating ABC interview with Australian-born scientist-astronaut Phil Chapman in which he discusses his and NASA's plans, and includes some rare training footage from that time.

ManInSpace
Member

Posts: 114
From: Brooklin, Ontario Canada
Registered: Feb 2018

posted 07-23-2018 08:20 PM     Click Here to See the Profile for ManInSpace     Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote
Nice find. Thank you Colin.

Always interesting to look back and see how the future of manned flight was viewed (still with optimism) in those early Apollo years.

It was too bad that Dr. Chapman like may of those later selected, saw their dreams unfulfilled due to the stark economic realities that were beginning to impact the program; even before the first landing attempt. He may very well have benefitted from even a second (now a museum piece) AAP launch not to mention the 12 man concept that was on the drawing boards.

His Wikipedia entry states that he left the program in July, 1972; as he disagreed with the decision to build the Shuttle (although that wasn't officially authorized until December).

oly
Member

Posts: 905
From: Perth, Western Australia
Registered: Apr 2015

posted 07-24-2018 03:26 AM     Click Here to See the Profile for oly   Click Here to Email oly     Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote
Fantastic find, thank you for posting.

capoetc
Member

Posts: 2169
From: McKinney TX (USA)
Registered: Aug 2005

posted 07-24-2018 08:40 AM     Click Here to See the Profile for capoetc   Click Here to Email capoetc     Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote
Great find! Thanks for posting.

Speaking of Dr. Chapman, here is a link to his blog.

The most recent posts in the blog are from 2010, but he has some fascinating insights. Good stuff!

dtemple
Member

Posts: 729
From: Longview, Texas, USA
Registered: Apr 2000

posted 08-11-2018 03:32 PM     Click Here to See the Profile for dtemple   Click Here to Email dtemple     Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote
Nice find Colin. Thank you for posting it! When one listens to the planning for the future at that time, the lost opportunities certainly are starkly revealed.

The Apollo Applications Program was meant to go well beyond what Skylab ultimately accomplished. (Fortunately, at least, one Skylab space station flew.) The 12-man space station that never was as well as the lunar bases that never were make me wonder where space exploration would be now if those plans had come to fruition.

Blackarrow
Member

Posts: 3120
From: Belfast, United Kingdom
Registered: Feb 2002

posted 08-13-2018 03:28 PM     Click Here to See the Profile for Blackarrow     Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote
Where indeed?

I often wondered why no one (as far as I know) considered a space station consisting of a Saturn V S-II second-stage and a Skylab-type S-IVB upper section. The S-II would, of necessity, have been a "wet workshop" but the third stage, like Skylab, would have been constructed for astronaut occupation. The S-II was certainly capable of putting such a stack into orbit, since Skylab's S-II went into orbit for almost 20 months.

One problem which didn't occur to me when I first thought of this in the late 1970s was residual hydrogen and residual oxygen in the S-II, but if some sort of flushing system had been used, that surely needn't have been a show-stopper. After all, an S-IVB "wet-workshop" had once been considered.

Using an S-II/S-IVB core stage, a space station with added modules and boosted into a long-life orbit by a visiting Apollo crew would not only have extended the life of the Saturn rocket family and Apollo spacecraft, but would have given America a large-volume space base decades before the ISS. Too good to be true, or just another good idea that wouldn't have got funding?

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