The command ‘Abort RTLS’ was the last thing that astronauts on board the space shuttle wanted to hear from mission control.   It meant that one or two of the shuttle’s main engines had failed in the first couple of minutes after lift-off and that the crew’s only hope of a safe landing was a blood-curdling manoeuvre at super-sonic speeds.   The Return to Launch Site abort mode was an astronautic U-turn, aimed at getting the hobbled spacecraft back to the launch site at Kennedy Space Center.   RTLS was one of several abort scenarios for which shuttle crews had to train, and it was not even the scariest.

Ever wondered how the Space Shuttle came to be? Welcome to a new podcast series, 16 Sunsets. In this episode, Host Dr Kevin Fong delves into the range of options which shuttle crews had if they were forced to abort a mission during their ascent to space.  He talks to former NASA staff and astronauts about the gruelling training and simulation exercises for flying aborts and dealing with malfunctions, and he explores why shuttle needed such exotic and hair-raising abort modes.

Featuring: Gordon Fullerton, Stokes MacMillan, Tim Terry, Robert Crippen, Robert Kelso, John Young, Jeffrey Hoffman, Craig Sumner, Gerry Griffin, Roy Bridges, Gene Kranz, Mike Coats, Don Pettit, Barney Roberts, Robert Stewart, Christopher Kraft and Howard Hu.

Credits:

Written and presented by Dr Kevin Fong

Producers: Andrew Luck-Baker, Rami Tzabar and Dave Giles.

Assistant Producer: Kate Arkless Gray

Sound Design and Mixing: Richard Courtice

Music: Christian Lundberg, part of Hans Zimmer’s Bleeding Fingers Composer Collective

With special thanks to Sandra Johnson at Nasa’s Johnson Space Centre Oral History Project, to Stephen Slater for additional archive material, and to William Reeves and Herb Baker. 

Executive Producers: Stuart Coxe, Kevin Fong, Jago Lee and Rami Tzabar

16 Sunsets is an Antica and TellTale Production 2024

Check out our website at https://sixteensunsets.com 

Instagram: @sixteen_sunsets

Bluesky: @16sunsets.bsky.social

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Want more 16 Sunsets? Become a premium member of our community and unlock exclusive content, including early and ad-free episodes, by subscribing to 16 Sunsets on Supercast. Learn more at https://16sunsets.supercast.com

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Getting the 100 tonne space shuttle orbiter from the pad to orbit demanded a launch system like no other before it.  A huge external fuel tank containing hundreds of tonnes of liquid hydrogen and liquid oxygen fed the orbiter’s three powerful main engines.  But that wasn’t enough to lift the fully fuelled shuttle off the launch pad.  Two towering booster rockets, bolted to the fuel tank, were needed for most of the necessary thrust.  Compared to the Apollo Saturn vehicles, this was a novel and complex configuration of rocketry.  Designing and building the shuttle launch system required multiple engineering frontiers to be advanced, and some challenging and controversial decisions to be made.  

Ever wondered how the Space Shuttle came to be? Welcome to a new podcast series, 16 Sunsets. In this episode, Host Kevin Fong explores the awesome and explosive anatomy of the space shuttle launch system - and its vulnerabilities - with former NASA engineers who built its component parts.  The podcast takes you through the violent journey from final countdown to orbit in the company of shuttle engineers and some of the astronauts who rode on their handiwork.  

Featuring: Mark Mullane, Lowell Zoller, Craig Sumner, Mark Craig, Jeffrey Hoffman, Gerald Smith, Warren Wiley, Matthew Hersch, Jennifer Lavasseur, Robert Stewart, Robert Crippen, Ivy Hooks, Barney Roberts and David Mindell.

Credits:

Written and presented by Dr Kevin Fong

Producers: Andrew Luck-Baker and Rami Tzabar with additional production by Dave Giles.

Assistant Producer: Kate Arkless Gray

Sound Design and Mixing: Richard Courtice

Music: Christian Lundberg, part of Hans Zimmer’s Bleeding Fingers Composer Collective

With special thanks to Sandra Johnson and Nasa’s Johnson Space Centre Oral History Project 

Executive Producers: Stuart Coxe, Kevin Fong, Jago Lee and Rami Tzabar

16 Sunsets is an Antica and TellTale Production 2024.

Check out our website at https://sixteensunsets.com 

Instagram: @sixteen_sunsets

X: @16sunsets

Want more 16 Sunsets? Become a premium member of our community and unlock exclusive content, including early and ad-free episodes, by subscribing to 16 Sunsets on Supercast. Learn more at https://16sunsets.supercast.com

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Before we get back on the road to the historic launch of STS-1, we have another special episode to share with you. This time an interview recorded by Kevin Fong and Andrew Luck-Baker with former mission specialist astronaut Bonnie Dunbar while they were touring the U.S. gathering material for this podcast.  She’s now a professor of aerospace engineering at Texas A and M university  and they spoke to her there. Dunbar studied engineering at college and went on to work for Rockwell constructing the first Shuttle Orbiters, Enterprise and Columbia. Bonnie flew in something of a golden era of human spaceflight, logging five space shuttle missions aboard Challenger, Atlantis, Endeavour and twice aboard Columbia, the shuttle that she had worked on while an engineer. 

We hear about that tale of moving from the state of Washington to the high desert in California, watching the first space shuttle come to life. From there to her selection in the 1980 astronaut class and on to her first mission on, STS-61a in the autumn of 1985.

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For this holiday special episode, we’re bringing you something different - a conversation that captures a remarkable moment in space history, told by the incomparable Major General Charles F. Bolden Jr. Charlie, as he's known to his friends, carved a path from the Marine Corps to the stars, becoming not just a fighter pilot and astronaut, but one of the most influential figures in NASA's history. He commanded two Space Shuttle missions and later served as NASA Administrator under President Obama - the first African American to hold that position.

We begin with a pivotal moment - the launch of STS-60 - when Bolden, a Cold War warrior,  is thrust onto the frontline of international diplomacy, as part of a bid to bring the United States and the former Soviet Union closer together through space exploration - bugged hotel rooms notwithstanding.

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Now that the Space Shuttle Enterprise has successfully flown over the Mojave Desert, NASA needs to press ahead. Next stop is low Earth Orbit but first, this new star ship needs a crew. No longer the preserve of white male military pilots, the next generation of astronauts would need to have a variety of different skills and expertise. They would also need to better reflect the diversity of American society in the 1970s. So to help find these new recruits, NASA got help from an unexpected source - someone who had already crossed new frontiers on a fictional starship. 

Ever wondered how the Space Shuttle came to be? Welcome to a new podcast series, 16 Sunsets. In this episode, Host Kevin Fong explores the hiring of NASA's astronaut class from 1978, called the "Thirty Five New Guys." This group included the first six women astronauts, as well as the first African-American, Asian-American, and Jewish astronauts. The podcast reveals the challenges they faced as well as the hope and inspiration they brought to many people back on Earth.

Featuring: Alan Bean, Charles Bolden, Marianne Dyson, Jeff Hoffman, Rob Kelso, Cheryl McNair, Ron McNair, Bill Moon, Mike Mullane, Sally Ride, Rhea Seddon and Kathy Sullivan.

Credits:

Written and presented by Dr Kevin Fong

Producers: Dave Giles, Rami Tzabar and Andrew Luck-Baker.

Assistant Producer: Kate Arkless Gray

Sound Design and Mixing: Richard Courtice

Music: Christian Lundberg, part of Hans Zimmer’s Bleeding Fingers Composer Collective

With special thanks to Sandra Johnson and Nasa’s Johnson Space Centre Oral History Project 

Executive Producers: Stuart Coxe, Kevin Fong, Jago Lee and Rami Tzabar

16 Sunsets is an Antica and TellTale Production 2024

Check out our website at https://sixteensunsets.com 

Instagram: @sixteen_sunsets

X: @16sunsets

Want more 16 Sunsets? Become a premium member of our community and unlock exclusive content, including early and ad-free episodes, by subscribing to 16 Sunsets on Supercast. Learn more at https://16sunsets.supercast.com

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

12 August 1977. In the air, high above the Mojave desert, Apollo 13’s Fred Haise is at the controls of the Space Shuttle prototype. Alongside him is Gordon Fullerton. Cruising at 27 thousand feet, the vehicle is bolted to the back of a Boeing 747. It is the mother of all piggy-back rides. But this 68-tonne spacecraft is about to get its wings, as the moment approaches for the first free flight of the USS Enterprise. Haise pushes the button to blow the bolts - for a moment the shuttle lifts free, as the 747 dives away. But then - the master alarm is sounded: the computer controlling the orbiter’s flight systems has just died. Haise and Fullerton urgently work the problem. They only have one chance at a safe landing and that is coming up fast!  

Ever wondered how the Space Shuttle came to be? Welcome to a new podcast series, 16 Sunsets. Host Kevin Fong takes you back to a pivotal moment in history, revealing the high-stakes drama behind this iconic orbiter, as told by those who were there. In this episode we follow the dramatic inaugural flight of the Shuttle and meet the 91-year old ex-Naval veteran who led the charge to name it, The Enterprise!

Featuring: John Aaron, Bob Crippen, Bonnie Dunbar, Joe Engle, Gordon Fullerton, Gerry Griffin, Fred Haise, Jennifer Lavasseur, Tom Moser & BJo Trimble. 

Credits:

Written and presented by Dr Kevin Fong

Producers: Rami Tzabar and Andrew Luck-Baker with additional production by Dave Giles and Clare Wiley.

Assistant Producer: Kate Arkless Gray

Sound Design and Mixing: Richard Courtice

Music: Christian Lundberg, part of Hans Zimmer’s Bleeding Fingers Composer Collective

With special thanks to Sandra Johnson and Nasa’s Johnson Space Centre Oral History Project 

Executive Producers: Stuart Coxe, Kevin Fong, Jago Lee and  Rami Tzabar

16 Sunsets is an Antica and TellTale Production 2024

Check out our website at https://sixteensunsets.com 

Instagram: @sixteen_sunsets

X: @16sunsets

Want more 16 Sunsets? Become a premium member of our community and unlock exclusive content, including early and ad-free episodes, by subscribing to 16 Sunsets on Supercast. Learn more at https://16sunsets.supercast.com

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

A space shuttle stands on the pad, seething in the darkness, ready to go. Its mission is high speed espionage. Launching into the night sky, it heads north toward the pole, lining up over the Soviet Union. This is no science mission, but part of a highly classified military plan, which sees the Shuttle become an instrument of the Cold War. That requirement shaped both the design of the shuttle and the future of NASA’s human space exploration programme for the next thirty years. So why did that secret mission never fly?

Ever wondered how the Space Shuttle came to be? Welcome to a new podcast series, 16 Sunsets. Host Kevin Fong takes you back to a pivotal moment in history, revealing the high-stakes drama behind this iconic orbiter, as told by those who were there. 

Featuring: Bob Crippen, Guy Faget, Max Faget, Matthew Hersch, Jeff Hoffman, Chris Kraft, Jennifer Lavasseur, Ken Mattingly, Tom Moser, Bob Stewart, Ken Young.

Credits:

Written and presented by Dr Kevin Fong

Producers: Rami Tzabar and Andrew Luck-Baker with additional production by Dave Giles

Assistant Producer: Kate Arkless Gray

Sound Design and Mixing: Richard Courtice

Music: Christian Lundberg, part of Hans Zimmer’s Bleeding Fingers Composer Collective

With special thanks to Sandra Johnson and Nasa’s Johnson Space Centre Oral History Project 

Executive Producers: Stuart Coxe, Kevin Fong, Jago Lee and Rami Tzabar

16 Sunsets is an Antica and TellTale Production 2024

Check out our website at https://sixteensunsets.com 

Instagram: @sixteen_sunsets

X: @16sunsets

Want more 16 Sunsets? Become a premium member of our community and unlock exclusive content, including early and ad-free episodes, by subscribing to 16 Sunsets on Supercast. Learn more at https://16sunsets.supercast.com

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

 It’s 1968 and humanity reaches the Moon, but back on Earth, NASA is fighting for its life. As Apollo 8 makes history, the space agency faces a crisis. With the Vietnam War raging, political assassinations and social unrest gripping America, public interest in space exploration is dwindling, even before Neil Armstrong takes that one giant leap for mankind. To survive, NASA gambles on a radical new program: the Space Shuttle - a reusable spacecraft promising a new era of spaceflight, but it comes at a cost – a Faustian bargain with the US military, that will reshape its dreams and NASA's destiny.

Ever wondered how the Space Shuttle came to be? Welcome to a new podcast series, 16 Sunsets. Host Kevin Fong takes you back to a pivotal moment in history, revealing the high-stakes drama behind the iconic program, as told by those who were there. Discover how NASA, facing oblivion, forged an unlikely alliance and changed the course of space exploration forever.

Featuring: John Aaron, Guy Faget, Max Faget, Gerry Griffin, Matthew Hersch, Jeff Hoffman, Chris Kraft, Jennifer Lavasseur, David Mindell, Tom Moser, Teasel Muir-Harmony. 

Credits: 

Written and presented by Dr Kevin Fong

Producers: Rami Tzabar and Andrew Luck-Baker with additional production by Dave Giles

Sound Design and Mixing: Richard Courtice

Music: Christian Lundberg, part of Hans Zimmer’s Bleeding Fingers Composer Collective

Additional Research by Kate Arkless-Gray

With special thanks to Sandra Johnson and Nasa’s Johnson Space Centre Oral History Project 

Executive Producers: Stuart Coxe, Kevin Fong, Rami Tzabar and Jago Lee

16 Sunsets is an Antica and TellTale Production 2024

Links:

Check out our website at https://sixteensunsets.com 

Instagram: @sixteen_sunsets

X: @16sunsets

Want more 16 Sunsets? Become a premium member of our community and unlock exclusive content, including early and ad-free episodes, by subscribing to 16 Sunsets on Supercast. Learn more at https://16sunsets.supercast.com

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.