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  Photo of the week 165 (December 29)

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Author Topic:   Photo of the week 165 (December 29)
heng44
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Posts: 3387
From: Netherlands
Registered: Nov 2001

posted 12-29-2007 06:35 AM     Click Here to See the Profile for heng44   Click Here to Email heng44     Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote

To be a Boeing technician at Cape Kennedy in the 1970s meant you’d better not be afraid of heights. I have no idea what these two men were doing atop the Skylab 1 stack on Launch Complex 39 in May of 1973, nor do I know how they got there. There was no swing arm this high up the launch tower, only a v-shaped bar (out of frame at bottom right) that looks too narrow to walk on.

Ed Hengeveld

Gilbert
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Posts: 1328
From: Carrollton, GA USA
Registered: Jan 2003

posted 12-29-2007 07:53 AM     Click Here to See the Profile for Gilbert   Click Here to Email Gilbert     Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote
Wow. I wonder who those guys are.

Michael Davis
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Posts: 528
From: Houston, Texas
Registered: Aug 2002

posted 12-29-2007 08:40 AM     Click Here to See the Profile for Michael Davis   Click Here to Email Michael Davis     Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote
Ed,

Do you have another photo to show some perspective on this shot? I'm struggling because the shroud they are working on appears flattened, not the nice circular shape I would expect from the one on Skylab 1. It's probably just an optical effect.

heng44
Member

Posts: 3387
From: Netherlands
Registered: Nov 2001

posted 12-29-2007 10:15 AM     Click Here to See the Profile for heng44   Click Here to Email heng44     Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote

Here is a view from a similar angle. I posted it mirrored to get the same perspective.

Ed

gliderpilotuk
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Posts: 3398
From: London, UK
Registered: Feb 2002

posted 12-29-2007 10:25 AM     Click Here to See the Profile for gliderpilotuk   Click Here to Email gliderpilotuk     Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote
NASA photo 108-KSC-73P-256 seems to show the "A" frame at the top of the tower which admittedly is very narrow and with no apparent floor to it. The platform these guys are on extends via hydraulic rams to bring them closer to the nosecone. Not a job I'd fancy....

Paul

Ed beat me to it!!!

nasamad
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Posts: 2121
From: Essex, UK
Registered: Jul 2001

posted 12-29-2007 05:36 PM     Click Here to See the Profile for nasamad   Click Here to Email nasamad     Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote
What is right up the top there what they could be working on? I don't imagine there was a Q-ball there for an unmanned flight, I thought they were only on manned LES.

Adam

Rolf
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Posts: 21
From: Netherlands
Registered: May 2007

posted 12-30-2007 11:35 AM     Click Here to See the Profile for Rolf     Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote
Hi Ed,

Frightening picture! I am glad having an office job.

divemaster
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Posts: 1376
From: ridgefield, ct
Registered: May 2002

posted 12-30-2007 02:28 PM     Click Here to See the Profile for divemaster   Click Here to Email divemaster     Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote
And a viewpoint that's no longer possible, either.

Robert Pearlman
Editor

Posts: 42988
From: Houston, TX
Registered: Nov 1999

posted 12-30-2007 04:47 PM     Click Here to See the Profile for Robert Pearlman   Click Here to Email Robert Pearlman     Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote
quote:
Originally posted by divemaster:
And a viewpoint that's no longer possible, either.
At least not for the moment, but an even higher vantage point is currently under construction at Pad 39B: three 594-foot-tall steel and fiberglass towers that will serve as a lightening protection system.

Atlantis
Member

Posts: 111
From: Cullman, AL
Registered: Dec 2007

posted 12-31-2007 01:31 PM     Click Here to See the Profile for Atlantis   Click Here to Email Atlantis     Edit/Delete Message   Reply w/Quote
That takes some serious cajones to work on something like that.

All times are CT (US)

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