Posts: 3387
From: Netherlands
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posted 12-01-2007 03:14 AM               

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Fred Haise can be seen in the cockpit of the Enterprise before the start of one of the flights in the Approach and Landing test series at the Dryden Flight Research Center in 1977. The photo was taken from the Mate/Demate Device before the Enterprise/747 combination was backed out of the structure to taxi to the runway. Haise formed a crew together with Gordon Fullerton.

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From: Delray Beach Florida USA
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From: Geneva, Switzerland
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posted 12-01-2007 10:01 AM               

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It doesn't look like a space shuttle!

Notice above Haise's head, what looks to be a part of Enterprise that can be blown away for the ejection seats to go through. But you raise an interesting question... Were there ejection seats during the tests?

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From: Bluffton IN USA
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posted 12-01-2007 10:10 AM               

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I always considered Haise as having gotten one of the shortest ends of the stick among Astronaut careers. He was the highest-rated member of his selection group, and the first to be assigned to a flight crew. He backed up Apollo 8, and was technically in line to fly Apollo 11 (but assigned to the backup crew instead for legitimate reasons we're all aware of). He was then in line to fly Apollo 14 and walk on the moon, but moved up to 13 to accommodate Al Shepard, and we all know how that turned out. After backing up Apollo 16, he lost another chance to walk on the moon when Apollo 19 was cancelled. By my count, he had 5 opportunities to walk on the moon, more than any one else, and came up empty-handed. His only flight was the miserable Apollo 13 experience from which he got a kidney infection.

He was badly injured and near death following a 1973 crash of a vintage Confederate Air Force plane he was flying. He recovered, flew Enterprise, and was assigned as Commander of STS-3 when it was designated as the Skylab re-boost mission. The OFT program was delayed 2 years, however; the re-boost mission cancelled when Skylab re-entered the atmosphere, and Haise retired from NASA in 1979 without flying the Shuttle into orbit.

He should have landed on the moon a couple of times, and commanded a couple of Shuttle missions in my opinion. Seems like kind of a waste of an awesome astronaut.

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From: Brussels, Belgium
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Posts: 451
From: Ellicott City, Maryland
Registered: Dec 2005

posted 12-01-2007 10:19 AM               

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This is an outstanding photo. It's always exciting when you can see the astronauts through the windows. It's interesting seeing the flight helmet they used during the Approach and Landing tests.

Ed, you make every Saturday morning exciting with every photo you post!! You must put a lot of time and effort into finding and deciding which image to post. THANK YOU SO MUCH for sharing these outstanding photos!

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posted 12-01-2007 01:12 PM            

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The Enterprise and Columbia were both equipped with ejection seats for the ALT and OFT programs. They remained installed in Columbia through STS-5, when they were de-activated (or so they said) due to the fact that they could only get two of the four man crew out.

Fred Haise's flight suit from ALT is displayed at the Smithsonian beside Enterprise, along with Joe Engle's helmet.

Anybody know who the other face in the window is? I don't think it's Fullerton. Hopefully, the hatch was still open!

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From: Huntington Beach
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posted 12-01-2007 02:24 PM               

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Fred Haise inscribed a litho of the ALT separation to me as follows, "This day was the highlight of my professional career as a test pilot!" "Best Wishes Enterprise CDR"

I recall looking up the rate of decent of the ALT with and without the rear fairing or cone that was attached over the engines. I think it took about 5 minutes or so from separation to landing with the fairing and half of that without. Talk about the effects of drag! Wow!

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From: Netherlands
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posted 12-01-2007 04:30 PM               

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Fred Haise wrote a real nice comment on your ALT-separation picture.

I am curious what he would have written on Ed's preflight picture.... I hope back then (when Ed's picture was taken) he realized that he was about to have one of the greatest moments in his test pilot career.

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Posts: 3811
From: Midwest, USA
Registered: Jul 2005

posted 12-01-2007 07:01 PM               

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quote:

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Originally posted by Philip:
Don't forget that the orbiter was intensively tested in the Ames Research Center's wind tunnels and although the thing might have been called "the flying brick", the test pilots knew what to expect...

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That doesn't take away one ounce of respect and admiration for Haise's (and Fullerton's) courage to fly the orbiter.

You can test in a wind tunnel all you want, but when you're really flying you depend on all of the systems on board working properly... and on your own skills to successfully execute the mission.

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From: West Midlands, UK
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posted 12-01-2007 10:21 PM            

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Were the ejection seats armed for the shuttle flight's?

I remember Hartsfield saying that once more than two crew members started flying they were not in use. He jokingly said something along the lines that the others would get a bit nervous seeing the commander and pilot walking in with a parachute over their shoulders.

It was also pointed out that they had a limited use. After a certain speed they were dangerous to use and it was pointed out that anyone ejecting would go out and probably hit the OMS pods or go into the SRB plumes.

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From: BURTON ON TRENT /England
Registered: Nov 2002

posted 12-02-2007 02:52 AM               

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quote:

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Originally posted by uk spacefan:
Having met Fred Haise earlier this year I was amazed at how friendly and amiable he his.

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Ditto on what Pat said.

Doug, I had a ALT separation photo signed by him here in the UK this year, this time without the fairing.

His grin on his face got wider when I asked what the difference speed and handling wise the Enterprise was like without the fairing.

Posts: 339
From: Houston, Texas, USA
Registered: Jun 2004

posted 12-02-2007 02:21 PM            

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quote:

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Originally posted by robsouth:
Were the ejection seats armed for the shuttle flights?

I remember Hartsfield saying that once more than two crew members started flying they were not in use. He jokingly said something along the lines that the others would get a bit nervous seeing the commander and pilot walking in with a parachute over their shoulders...

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In one of his oral history interviews in 2004 and 2006, reprinted in Quest (vol. 14, no. 3, 2007, p. 32), Joe Allen commented on that very point.

He and Bill Lenoir were the mission specialists on the first four-man crew, STS-5, so they were the ones without ejection seats aboard Columbia. At a flight techniques meeting just after STS-4, his commander, Vance Brand, stated unequivocally that the ejection seats were to be "pinned" (deactivated) on STS-5.

Both Lenoir and Allen told him that was not necessary for their peace of mind: "If it gets down to 'nobody gets out' or 'two get out'" they wanted at least two of the four crewmen to get out.

Brand stated categorically, "That's not a choice" and no-one argued with him.

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From: Bellevue, NE, USA
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posted 12-03-2007 09:23 AM               

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The ejection seat rails practically sat in positions that mission specialist seats would have occupied on the flight deck. I believe for STS-5, they did manage to install one seat right between the rails for Lenoir to sit in, but the second seat (behind the pilot seat) would not fit there as long as the ejection rails were installed. Thus Joe had to sit on the mid deck.

Yes, Enterprise had live ejection seats for the ALT tests. The specific seats used here and on Columbia were a Lockheed design based on ones used in the SR-71 program.

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From: Delray Beach Florida USA
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posted 12-03-2007 09:26 AM               

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Hank Hartsfield stated on a "Frontline" TV special with Judy Woodruff (in 1988 after the Challenger explosion) that you can't have ejection seats for two and not provide the same for the rest of the crew. He asked "if you were on an airplane and you saw the pilots come aboard with their 'chutes, wouldn't you be nervous? I would!!"

John Young chimed in that the ejection seats were no real solution either as you'd likely get "eaten up" by the corrosive plume of the solids.

Hartsfield said you also could get hit by the tail, or the OMS pods etc so I think the commanders and pilots were pretty clear that "riding the stack" is risky and the ejection seats probably won't save you or if they do, it's within a relatively narrow band of scenarios.

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From: West Midlands, UK
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posted 12-03-2007 11:30 PM            

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I do remember that those quotes came from a documentary that I taped off the TV. It was about one man's journey back to NASA following the Challenger disaster. Lots of good astronaut interviews and a superb clip of the shuttle crew from Engle's second flight doing some on orbit precision military drilling to the song "Southern Cross" by CS&N. It also showed the clip where Allen hid in a shuttle locker and slowly emerged from this tiny looking storage space.

John Young was also interviewed and he said something about you being kinda crispy if you ended up in the shuttle SRB plume.

The other bit that really stands out in the memory is when Robert Gibson was being asked about possible causes of disasters and he was asked whether something could end in failure and he said yes, the camera stayed on his face and his expression slowly went to one of deep sorrow, probably as he remembered the crew that had just been lost.

This is all from memory so I'm sure someone else will correct me if I'm wrong.

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From: Delray Beach Florida USA
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posted 12-04-2007 07:55 AM               

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The Hoot Gibson quote you refer to was regarding the story of one of his early flights where they received an indication they had lost a helium purge of a chamber which mixed explosive fuels (obviously LH and LO) and when the interviewer asked if that situation could create an explosion potential Gibson replied "it WILL explode".

I still have the VHS tape of the whole show. My favorite part is the beginning showing Challenger's initial trip on the crawler out to the pad with a ground fog allowing only the top of the ET to show through the cloud, and the voice over (with the sound of wind in the background) is John Young answering a question "is spaceflight risky? I think 51L proves it's risky".

Very poignant start to the documentary.

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