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My DVR is programmed and ready to go. Looks like and interesting 7 part series. Starts tonight at 9pm Eastern.

http://dsc.discovery.com/tv/nasa/nasa.html

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I saw it and liked it, but it missed a little in some segments. It also screwed up a little when it said that Gemini 9's space walk was a failure and implied that Gemini 10's was also. Nothing could be further from the truth, as Mike Collins had two very successful spacewalks, including one to Gemini 8's dead Agena to retrieve a micrometeorite package and bring it back to Earth. It wasn't as gripping as the HBO series FROM THE EARTH TO THE MOON, but it was more documentary in nature, so that is to be expected. Clear skies to you.

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David W. Knisely
Hyde Memorial Observatory
http://www.hydeobservatory.info

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I just got through watching part 2. It was similar to the first episode in one notable way: it screwed up by leaving out Apollo 15! It covered 14 ok, but then started talking about the lunar rover (first *used* on Apollo 15) and jumped immediately to Apollo 16. That kind of miffed me a bit, as 15's descent and landing was probably the most radical of the program, and its science was at least as important as that of Apollo 16. Clear skies to you.

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To All

The problem with the show is that it's covering so much in so little time a lot of interesting facts are left out. I did like the part about "underfueling" the LEM descent stage so the Apollo 10 astronaughts wouldn't try to land on the Moon. I was also suprised to see Neil Armstrong on the program.

Rich (RLTYS)

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Yes, but Apollo 15 had so many interesting "firsts" about it that it really should have at least been mentioned. The mission was the first of the "J" series. It was the first attempt to "go off the beaten path", with a true science mission in a geologically spectacular location. Its landing required flying over the 14,000 ft Apennine range and landing in a relative compact location near Hadley Rille without as much margin for error as in the previous missions. The mission included the first use of the lunar rover, as well as the discovery of "the Genesis Rock" (the first sample of anorthosite ever to be found on the moon). It had Dave Scott's famous "Falcon feather and hammer" drop in a vacuum to demonstrate how all bodies fall at the same rate. In short, if any mission should have been slighted, it should not have been Apollo 15's. Apollo 16 did a lot as well, but it could have been mentioned more briefly in the program rather than just omitting Apollo 15. Clear skies to you.

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David W. Knisely
Hyde Memorial Observatory
http://www.hydeobservatory.info

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To All

The problem with the show is that it's covering so much in so little time a lot of interesting facts are left out. I did like the part about "underfueling" the LEM descent stage so the Apollo 10 astronaughts wouldn't try to land on the Moon. I was also suprised to see Neil Armstrong on the program.

Rich (RLTYS)

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Yep, I was pleased with those two things, too. Also pleased with the quality of the footage and the production values...but...yeah...too much in too little time. I walked into the kitchen to fix myself a..."sasparilla"...and missed the Apollo 1 fire!

Verdict? Record, don't buy.


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Uncle Rod

Watch for Rod's New Book:
Choosing and Using the New CATs--coming soon!

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To All

The problem with the show is that it's covering so much in so little time a lot of interesting facts are left out. I did like the part about "underfueling" the LEM descent stage so the Apollo 10 astronaughts wouldn't try to land on the Moon. I was also suprised to see Neil Armstrong on the program.

Rich (RLTYS)

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My recollection (and the information from Mike Collins in his book LIFTOFF!!) is that the Apollo 10 lunar module was still overweight, which is why it would have been unsuitable for a lunar landing attempt. I had not heard about it being "under fueled" until this program, and I have failed to verify (at least on-line and in two books about the program I have) that this actually occurred. I would have considered under-fueling a bit risky, as if something went wrong with the "nominal" mission, it would be nice to make up for it by having as much fuel as possible to get the spacecraft out of some potential jam. Clear skies to you.

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David W. Knisely
Hyde Memorial Observatory
http://www.hydeobservatory.info

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Unless they mention it on the next program, the Apollo-Soyuz flight was not even mentioned.

Clear Skies.
Rich (RLTYS)

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Nope, it was left out. The series continued to be a little uneven in the way it covered things. It started with the first test flight of the shuttle (STS-1) with some pretty good coverage and then "boom", quickly went to the Challenger disaster. It made the same mistake of over-simplifying the reason for the disaster, putting the entire cause on the weather (cold), rather than on the faulty field-joint design and the decision by flight directors to launch despite some dissension from some of the engineers at Morton-Thiokol. The program also missed things like the capture of the two wayward satellites and the rescue and servicing of the Solarmax solar observatory, both of which occurred before the Challenger accident. The music also was a little tiring, as it was kind of monotonous with the same theme played over and over. Tomorrow night (9 p.m. Eastern Daylight Time), The Discovery Channel again gives you a good chance to compare this long series with the very nice film "In The Shadow of the Moon", which I kind of liked a bit more. Clear skies to you.

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David W. Knisely
Hyde Memorial Observatory
http://www.hydeobservatory.info

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To All

Unless they mention it on the next program, the Apollo-Soyuz flight was not even mentioned.

Clear Skies.
Rich (RLTYS)

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Nope, it was left out. The series continued to be a little uneven in the way it covered things. It started with the first test flight of the shuttle (STS-1) with some pretty good coverage and then "boom", quickly went to the Challenger disaster. It made the same mistake of over-simplifying the reason for the disaster, putting the entire cause on the weather (cold), rather than on the faulty field-joint design and the decision by flight directors to launch despite some dissension from some of the engineers at Morton-Thiokol. The program also missed things like the capture of the two wayward satellites and the rescue and servicing of the Solarmax solar observatory, both of which occurred before the Challenger accident. The music also was a little tiring, as it was kind of monotonous with the same theme played over and over. Tomorrow night (9 p.m. Eastern Daylight Time), The Discovery Channel again gives you a good chance to compare this long series with the very nice film "In The Shadow of the Moon", which I kind of liked a bit more. Clear skies to you.

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In terms of appealing to a larger audience, I thought Discovery did a good job of covering the various phases of the Shuttle program in the 2 hours it had. Like it or not, the program has only had 5-6 dramatic instances that drew people in, and those are the areas where Discovery focused. The show certainly won't win any awards for completeness and attention to every detail, but I thought it was a good watch.

As to the Challenger disaster, I again think they spent the appropriate amount of time and covered the appropriate details. Sure they didn't go into covering the design flaws and poor communication as much as they could have, but the show stated the obvious facts; the cold weather led to the o-ring failure, nobody spoke up with their concerns, and everything culminated with the very preventable loss of the vehicle. I would hardly call such simplification a mistake on Discovery's part, it's the very essence of what happened. Just my $0.02 anyways.

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"Computers help us solve the many mysteries of the universe. They also help us make the same mistake many times, really fast."

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To All

Unless they mention it on the next program, the Apollo-Soyuz flight was not even mentioned.

Clear Skies.
Rich (RLTYS)

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Nope, it was left out. The series continued to be a little uneven in the way it covered things. It started with the first test flight of the shuttle (STS-1) with some pretty good coverage and then "boom", quickly went to the Challenger disaster. It made the same mistake of over-simplifying the reason for the disaster, putting the entire cause on the weather (cold), rather than on the faulty field-joint design and the decision by flight directors to launch despite some dissension from some of the engineers at Morton-Thiokol. The program also missed things like the capture of the two wayward satellites and the rescue and servicing of the Solarmax solar observatory, both of which occurred before the Challenger accident. The music also was a little tiring, as it was kind of monotonous with the same theme played over and over. Tomorrow night (9 p.m. Eastern Daylight Time), The Discovery Channel again gives you a good chance to compare this long series with the very nice film "In The Shadow of the Moon", which I kind of liked a bit more. Clear skies to you.

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In terms of appealing to a larger audience, I thought Discovery did a good job of covering the various phases of the Shuttle program in the 2 hours it had. Like it or not, the program has only had 5-6 dramatic instances that drew people in, and those are the areas where Discovery focused. The show certainly won't win any awards for completeness and attention to every detail, but I thought it was a good watch.

As to the Challenger disaster, I again think they spent the appropriate amount of time and covered the appropriate details. Sure they didn't go into covering the design flaws and poor communication as much as they could have, but the show stated the obvious facts; the cold weather led to the o-ring failure, nobody spoke up with their concerns, and everything culminated with the very preventable loss of the vehicle. I would hardly call such simplification a mistake on Discovery's part, it's the very essence of what happened. Just my $0.02 anyways.

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As a whole, don't misunderstand me, the program wasn't all that bad. It's just that it could have been a whole lot better. The unevenness in coverage was probably the most bothersome issue with me, but the overall tone of the narration also gave me a feeling of "disconnection". At times, the flow of the program seemed to get a little stuck on one thing and then just jerked forward past some non-covered but interesting events and on to other things. There were a lot of things I would have covered somewhat differently (and a few things I would have shortened or left out completely). For example, the program covered the Hubble deploy OK, but then kind of "played-up" a section on the balky solar panel deployment as it if was the major pivotal point of disaster. In fact, it was a relatively minor incident that was easily fixed by a little playing with the way the panel motors were commanded. The deploy was backed up by the astronauts being trained to crank out the arrays manually, but the incident was hardly a show-stopper. This part could have been shortened or eliminated to allow for something else (like the pre-Challenger achievements of the shuttle). Another slightly odd segment concerned the first flight of the Manned Maneuvering Unit. It was nice, but a little on the long side, and again, slighted the first major "application" use of the MMU on STS-41C with the rescue and servicing of the Solarmax satellite. That rescue was far more "hairy" than the solar panel issue with the Hubble release, and would have made a much better way of introducing a little drama to things.

In total, the program just left me with a kind of flat "been there, done that" sort of feeling. There have been other space series from Discovery that have been somewhat better, so this one was just a bit of a let-down. For coverage of the space program prior to Skylab, I would have to recommend the HBO series FROM THE EARTH TO THE MOON as a better alternative. It is kind of "docu-drama", in that some of the events are somewhat fictionalized, but most of the facts are correct and the *feel* of the overall story is much more gripping. Clear skies to you.

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David W. Knisely
Hyde Memorial Observatory
http://www.hydeobservatory.info

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I'd love to see someone get around to interviewing all of those engineers and getting the storys of their team efforts on film.

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It wasn't as gripping as the HBO series FROM THE EARTH TO THE MOON, but it was more documentary in nature, so that is to be expected. Clear skies to you.

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I'd love to see someone get around to interviewing all of those engineers and getting the storys of their team efforts on film.

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I'll second that idea.
They need to do it while most of these guys are still with us. They aren't getting any younger...

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There are several histories of the engineering of Apollo. Understand some of them are pretty dry.

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Preston



Celestron 11" Nexstar GPS XLT
Lunt LS60T/Ha 60mm f/8.33 (on order)

It’s not finishing something when your tank is empty that makes you a stronger person. It’s brushing yourself off and refacing the foe that defeated you with the same determination and willingness to fight that you had when you began your journey.

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There are several histories of the engineering of Apollo. Understand some of them are pretty dry.

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