Flight director Gene Kranz wrote that Cernan was his favorite because of his carefree and jovial attitude, unabashed patriotism, and his close personal relationship with the flight controllers. 

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Harrison Schmitt played a key role in training Apollo crews to be geologic observers when they were in lunar orbit and competent geologic field workers when they were on the lunar surface. After each of the landing missions, he participated … Continue reading →

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Apollo 17 would break several crewed spaceflight records: 1) longest moon mission duration: 12 days 13 hours 52 minutes (just a day and a third shorter than the 14 days set in 1965 by Gemini 7), 2) longest total lunar … Continue reading →

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On re-entry Casper hit the atmosphere at an altitude of about 400,000 feet above the earth and at a velocity of nearly 25,000 miles per hour. 

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The LM eventually crashed due to lunar gravity anomalies. Since Houston didn’t know exactly where it landed, it was not useful to calibrate seismic experiments on the surface. 

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It was the only time in their whole lunar stay that Charlie had a real moment of panic and thought he had killed himself.

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The crew nicknamed this operation “The Big Sneak.” They figured the only way to do this was to approach from behind a big rock, then reach over and collect the sample.

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John and Charlie also collected several rusty-looking rocks with brown stains on their surfaces. These were exciting finds because the rusty appearance suggested the presence of hydrated oxides of iron. “Hydrated” meant water and the scientists had a serious interest … Continue reading →

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Flag Crater was so steep that if either one of them fell in, it would have been fatal! There was no rescue from the bottom of a big crater.

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Charlie and John were startled by their landing spot. Much of the landing area was covered with rocks or had a steep slope.  Fortunately, they had managed to land on the only level and smooth spot around.

The post Space Rocket History #362 – Apollo 16 – Moonwalk 1 – Part 2 first appeared on Space Rocket History Podcast.