The New Age of Discovery
By an Awake! staff writer
HAVE you ever watched a space-shuttle launch on TV? Did you wonder just how big those rockets are? And how much room do the astronauts have in the space shuttle itself? I had an opportunity to see for myself when I visited Spaceport USA at Cape Canaveral, also known as the Kennedy Space Center, in Florida, U.S.A.
Having watched all kinds of space liftoffs on TV and thrilled at the first Apollo flight to the moon in 1969, it was quite an experience to find myself at the very heart of this activity, just an hour’s drive east of Orlando. As we drove into the parking lot, I saw in the distance a display of rockets that had been used in the past to send men and instruments into space. And there, parked on the tarmac next to the Rocket Garden, was a full-scale replica of the shuttle orbiters used in earth-orbit operations. It is called Ambassador, and although only a copy, it was impressive to see, to visit, and to photograph. It is 56 feet [17 m] high at the tail and 122 feet [37 m] long, with a wingspan of 78 feet [24 m].
It was Friday, November 22, last year, and I was anxious to get near a launching pad, especially the one where the shuttle Atlantis was waiting to be launched on Sunday, November 24. There are several such pads, but they are a few miles away from the exhibition area. So I took the official bus tour of the main rocket building and launching installations.
Our first stop was at the Flight Crew Training Building, where we saw identical copies of the service and lunar modules that had been used on that historic trip to the moon in 1969. The lunar module was a really ugly contraption—it had none of the smooth lines and shape of the typical space vehicle. At first sight it appeared more like a conglomeration of cubes and pyramids with a set of spidery legs attached. Yet, its twin had served to land two men on the moon.
In July 1971, Apollo 15 landed on the moon, and astronauts Scott and Irwin unloaded the lunar rover, or moon buggy. At $15 million, that was probably the most expensive jeep ever built. And if you want to drive it, all you have to do is go to the moon—it was left up there along with the landing stage of the lunar module! But don’t forget to take fresh batteries with you. The jeep’s are long ago exhausted.
My next stop on the tour was the VAB (Vehicle Assembly Building). You have to get used to acronyms at the space center—they are used for everything. Chris, a former engineer on the Apollo project whom I met later, told me: “I was transferred to another section, and for months I could not understand many things that were being said because their acronyms were different from mine!” What is so special about the VAB? At over 520 feet [160 m] high (equivalent to a 52-story skyscraper) and 518 feet wide [158 m] and 716 feet [218 m] long, it is possibly the largest building in volume, or cubic capacity, in the world. It covers an area of eight acres [3 ha]. It has to be so large because this is where the launch vehicles are assembled before being trundled out on their slow, laborious journey to the launching pad. But more about that later.
We were told that the VAB is so large that four Saturn V rockets could be assembled there simultaneously. And these were 365 feet [111 m] tall, designed to carry the Apollo spacecraft. The book The Illustrated History of NASA explains: “The total lift-off weight was a fantastic 3200 tons (2900 tonnes). Yet Saturn V’s engines, developing nearly 3800 tons (3500 tonnes) of thrust, could lift the prodigious load with ease.”
As I looked up at the top of this vast building, I spotted buzzards circling around, taking advantage of the updrafts over the roof. It also reminded me that the space center is located in the middle of an extensive national wildlife refuge that harbors dozens of bird, animal, and reptile species. On our bus journey, we passed a huge eagle’s nest, seven feet deep [2 m], perched high in a tree. It somehow seemed appropriate that eagles should be flying where man has made some of his greatest achievements in space flight.
Our next stop was going to be an observation area from which we would be able to see a couple of launching pads at a distance. However, a big question still remained. How do they transport those huge rockets to the launching pads three and a half miles [5.5 km] away? They use the biggest tractors I have ever seen! They are called crawler transporters and are capable of carrying 14.5 million pounds [6.6 million kg]. These transporters are each half the size of a soccer field and weigh in at six million pounds [2.7 million kg]. But don’t expect any speed records from these monsters. Loaded, they have a maximum speed of one mile per hour [1.6 km/hr]; unloaded, two miles per hour [3.2 km/hr]! The platform is carried on four huge two-track tractors, one at each corner. Each track has 57 cleats; each cleat weighs one ton.
Now imagine the special highway that had to be constructed to each launching pad, capable of taking the enormous weight of the mobile platform and the rocket and spacecraft.
What about the shuttle’s return journey to earth? The orbiter needs somewhere to land—and here at Cape Canaveral, that “somewhere” is no ordinary airport landing strip, being about twice the length and width of an average airport runway. It is 15,000 feet long [4,600 m], with 1,000 feet [300 m] of overlap at each end. If conditions are not right for landing, then the shuttle is diverted to Edwards Air Base out in the California desert, over 2,000 miles [3,200 km] to the west.
The immensity of the whole project was overwhelming. And it brought questions to mind. What has man accomplished in space exploration? What have been the benefits? And what are the prospects for interplanetary flight? Will man ever land on Mars?